How Cleopatra carried on

SHE knew how to make an entrance, did Cleopatra. Wanting an audience with Julius Caesar at a palace in Alexandria, she gained admission as the filling in a rolled-up carpet. The floor covering was unfurled in the Roman general's presence and out popped the alluring Queen of the Nile.

Later, she used her showmanship to stage manage her first meeting with Mark Antony, sailing to their assignment aboard a golden barge. Even her exit was produced as a show-stopper, the C4 documentary reported. She committed suicide with a snake, not clasped to her bosom as generally thought, but which bit her on her arm.

The departure of Inspector Ken Chappel from The Vice was no less dramatic, as he throttled the pornographer who'd raped the undercover policewoman of whom Chappel had long been fond. It's a pity that the series has to lose leading actor Ken Stott, whose grim visage has become a trademark of this downbeat and gritty series. But if he had to go this was as good - bad? - a way as any.

He'd been moved sideways from the vice squad to a mountain of paperwork, leaving his old rival Chief Inspector Frank Vickers (Tim Piggott-Smith, as slimy and skin-creeping as anything encountered by Tuffers and chums in the celebrity jungle) to operate a zero tolerance policy, cleaning up the sleazy streets of London.

Some would say this was no bad thing. Pat had always seemed remarkably chummy and sympathetic to ladies of the night, dating several of them. Seeing vice squad PC Cheryl reduced to a junkie and whore was all too much for him. "Beware the man with nothing to lose," warned Vickers as Chappel took the law, and the pornographer's throat, into his own hands.

Cleopatra had plenty to lose and even more to gain by captivating two of the greatest Romans of her time. The troubled film with Elizabeth Taylor is remembered more for her off-screen romance with co-star Richard Burton than its historical accuracy. But, from what I recall, many of the facts presented here and in the movie were along the same lines. For once, Hollywood didn't need to embellish a story because Cleopatra's lust for power and men had all the ingredients for an epic movie.

We all think of Cleopatra as a beautiful woman. In fact, we don't really know what she looked like. The most reliable image, on a coin, shows her as a stern head of state, not a glamorous queen. But she certainly turned heads. She was an intelligent and cultured woman who married her brother because tradition demanded it. One-sixth of Egyptian marriages were between brother and sister, taking the phrase "keeping it in the family" a bit too seriously.

After Julius Caesar's assassination, Cleopatra hooked up with Mark Antony. Who knows whether it was love or political calculation to ensure she kept her throne? But their partnership in and out of the bedroom threatened the Roman Empire. It was Octavian, a brilliant spin doctor of his day, who set the pair up as political degenerates and led the Romans to war against them.

The programme reminded us that Antony and Cleopatra only narrowly missed victory. If that had happened, the world today would have been a very different place - just as the current series of The Vice will be without Inspector Pat Chappel.

Published: 27/05/2003