While I agree with Lucy Mangan (The Reckoning review, 9 October) that Steve Coogan is chillingly brilliant as Jimmy Savile, I feel differently about the lack of justification for making the drama.
First, the involvement and support by those who survived Savile’s violent predation cannot be second guessed by others. The value for them in being involved may be all the justification needed.
Many young people, and indeed international audiences, won’t have known Savile. Any drama that depicts, so clearly, a predator able to groom a nation for decades, and one who was never challenged by those in authority who suspected him, is a hugely valuable warning from history, and a story that should always be told.
Helen Walker
London
• Lucy Mangan is spot on in her review of Steve Coogan’s acting as “Sir Jimmy”, but perhaps because I’m old enough to remember the entire story from the 1960s onwards I found the flashbacks and archive footage useful.
As a survivor of sexual abuse at the age of 12 by a family friend, a much older man, I found the programme helpful in understanding the grooming process when it includes people around the survivor, and fascinating to note how many people fell for Savile’s so-called charm while oblivious to the darkness within. It wasn’t exclusively women who spotted that something was very wrong, at least in the programme, but it was noticeable that older women felt this the most strongly.
I didn’t tell my mother until nearly 15 years after the assault, and never told my father. How many more older women and men have endured feelings of guilt and shame for decades, and how many more will continue to do so?
Name and address supplied
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