Chapter 2
Eighteen months later. The Morgan Soames Hour television studio, London
Thelights were set to run hot, the interview was running hotter.
Too hot.
Far hotter than had been anticipated.
‘It’s too controversial,’ the studio owner had said all those weeks ago.
‘I prefer “provocative”,’ the director, a woman called Justine Webb, had replied.
‘We’ll get hundreds, maybe thousands of complaints.’
‘It’ll be a ratings smash.’
‘I’m not sure.’
‘And I have the final say on editorial content. We’re doing this.’
There’d been meetings and committees long before the director and the owner had had their dance, of course. Where Kane Hunt was involved, this was to be expected. Controversy – all of it carefully curated – followed Hunt wherever he went. Live TV appearances were increasingly rare.
ButThe Morgan Soames Hourhad never shied from controversy.
In the end it came down to two things: their commitment to balanced news and whether or not their presenter, Morgan Soames, would be able to handle him.
The argument for balance went like this: Saffron Phipps was due on the week before the proposed Hunt interview, and her views, albeit from the opposite end of the spectrum, were equally as extreme. Phipps argued that Valerie Solanas, the author of the 1967SCUM Manifesto, had been on to something. Phipps wasn’t suggesting, as Solanas had, that men should be eliminated. But shewasarguing that Solanas had been correct when she wrote that, because men only had one X chromosome, they were genetically deficient, incomplete females. This deficiency explained why males were emotionally limited, egocentric, lacking in empathy and unable to relate to anything other than their own physical sensations. Kane Hunt was the anti-Phipps, the counterpoint to theSCUM Manifesto. He would provide the balanceThe Morgan Soames Hourprided itself on.
For thoseagainst, the argument was far less nuanced – Kane Hunt was a misogynist who spouted his vile philosophy, not because he genuinely believed that men had a fundamental right to sex, but because it sold books. Having him on the show would give his new book a major marketing boost.
On the second point, whether Morgan Soames would be able to handle him, there had been no disagreement. She had the biggest pair of balls in any room she was in.
It was settled with a vote – the first one the production team had ever had over a guest. Justine, the director, voted no. She was responsible for the way the show was shot and it would be her dealing with the inevitable fallout. The head writer said no, too. He didn’t want to put his staff in the lion’s mouth if Morgan ended up looking foolish.
The social media manager couldn’t say yes fast enough, of course. She knew an upcoming Twitter storm when she saw one. The television channel said yes, too. Ratings would rocket and they would cash in.
The rest of the production team was evenly split. Allan, the show’s producer, had had the casting vote. In his heart he’d wanted to say yes. Whatever that little twerp Kane Hunt’s views were on women, Morgan was an apex predator. She would eat Hunt alive and 99.9 per cent of the country would rejoice when she did. And itwouldbe relevant – for too long Hunt had been getting a free ride. His claim of media censorship was a calculated strategy. If he were outrageous enough, he could never appear on television, and if he were never on television his views couldn’t be challenged. Censorship was the shield he cowered behind. He coveted it because he relied on it.
But Morgan had been taunting him for months. Every opening monologue of her show began with a dig at him. Every closing piece ended with him being the butt of a joke.
She had been daring him to appear.
To the surprise of everyone, Hunt had said yes. Publicly. He would appear on her show as long as it was one-to-one and he was given the questions beforehand. Morgan didn’t play that way, though. She would give him time to answer, but he didn’t get to dictate the direction. Hunt had reluctantly agreed. If he backtracked now, he knew Morgan would laugh about it for years.
So Allan had wanted Kane Hunt on the show.
But he had voted no. Allan’s surname was Webb, the same as Justine’s, and that was because they were married. They had worked together for twenty years and had been husband and wife for ten. They were a team both on and off the pitch. Professionally and personally, his job was to have her back.
It fell to Justine to let Morgan know. She had decided to tell her shortly before that night’s show, hoping it might limit the amount of time for abuse. Morgan had interviewed impeached presidents and disgraced prime ministers. She’d trapped royals in lies and reduced war criminals to tears. She wasn’t a woman to mess with.
Justine had knocked on her dressing-room door and entered. Morgan had been in makeup, her stylist, and long-time sounding board, fussing around her hair with a tiny brush and a small bottle of spray. Tissue wedged between her neck and the collar protected her two-thousand-pound navy blue Oscar de la Renta bell-sleeve blazer from the harsh studio makeup she had to wear. Off camera she looked like a supervillain,oncamera she would look perfect.
Morgan had turned, fixed Justine with those steely grey eyes and gave her a reverse head nod. Her auburn hair, rich and glowing, didn’t move.
‘Quick word, Morgs?’ Justine had said.
‘Shoot,’ she’d said. ‘Just rehearsing tonight’s monologue. Want to get in one more joke about the PM standing in dog shit yesterday.’