New Tricks is cool

I know Britain is as youth-obsessed as America sometimes, and an article in The Daily Telegraph, about cop show New Tricks, reminded me of that fact.
   Amanda Redman, the star of the show, and doing better here than in Honest, the remake of the New Zealand series Outrageous Fortune, says in the newspaper, ‘I find it extraordinary, because we are repeated more than any BBC drama ever, and for our repeats alone we get more viewings than the first showings of, for instance, Life on Mars.’
   She may be 48 but the other three principal actors in the series, Dennis Waterman, Alun Armstrong and James Bolan, are between 60 and 73.
   And for some reason, promoting this age group isn’t “cool”.
   The BBC needs to get itself sor’ed.
   With an ageing population in the west, the over-60s is one of the most desirable demographics and it would make a lot of sense to promote shows like New Tricks alongside its other hits such as Doctor Who and Ashes to Ashes.
   It’s why I think the US networks’ opposition to a last Columbo story, on the basis that Peter Falk, in his 80s, is too old to attract advertisers, is bollocks.
   And who is to say that being over 60 isn’t cool? Ask Tom Jones, who still draws in the crowds, including young ’uns, regularly.
   In the US every weeknight, David Letterman, 61, isn’t letting up.
   Interestingly, few seem to think that excluding people based on maturity is politically incorrect—yet we go around advancing the causes of the young.
   Dennis Waterman says in the article, ‘Apparently children are very impressed when their parents point me out and say, “That’s Dennis Waterman”. … They go, “What? Is there a real Dennis Waterman?” So maybe I’ve got a new audience there.’
   The west’s youth obsession hasn’t exactly moved the world on in too many ways: young, inexperienced leaders in politics have not proved visionary in many cases.
   I am not saying we should be like Saudi Arabia where old folks run the show without any idea of advancing human rights.
   But we owe baby boomers and those even older a great debt, and we should be championing their wisdom and experience, just as many great civilized societies have done. Older is cool, but we need to begin having a more accommodating mindset.