Book cases?

Don't worry about the book cases, Sussexborn! Surely all you have to do is get yourself filmed in front of the Old Masters that you have on your walls. If you feel that some of them don't give the impression that you would like to give (I am assuming that you are expecting to be interviewed for a serious TV channel on a serious subject, and so a large classical nude might not be appropriate as a background) then all you need to have is an empty frame with a notice in it saying "Currently on loan to the National Gallery".

Sorted!

My books are currently in large boxes under the hall table, it now looks as if they will be there a very long time.
I am deciding which backdrop to choose for my interview.
Maybe the dining room with an awful mahogany cabinet that someone will offer to take off my hands when they see it on tv.

The only bookcase suitably placed for a backdrop here is full of books for the DGC, for them to read when they’re here and for us to take on our childminding stints. It wouldn’t really add to my gravitas to have people think my usual reading is Dear Zoo, The Wimpy Kid diaries and Harry Potter.

Time to replace your current reading matter ( ‘the little yellow cottage on honeysuckle lane’, or what have you?)with some good solid stuff for the camera: Dostoyevsky, Gogol,
Tolstoy etc then a few English classics: Austen, Hardy, Dickens.
To lighten the mood and show you are a quirky reader, maybe some Martin Amis ( but never his Father, Kingsley the better author.) Add in a few Booker Prize winners from the past ten years, a shelf of non fiction on everything from Wars In Europe to self help and Buddhism, and some contemporary poetry which is just about unreadable.
Pose yourself in front, with a book in your hand, looking thoughtful.

Sussexborn

Your bookcase should be a Statement Piece, not hidden away in a dark passage!

You should be displaying all your learned tomes, your first editions, just in case you are invited to appear on Morning Television alongside Lara!

Best get cracking.

Or do what Wheniwasyourage suggests.
I may do that rather than start moving The Worst Witch etc to a box.

Hmm! Slight hiccup! The only portrait we have is of OH’s Great Granny (we think)! It looks rather dark and I was wondering whether to scrub it with a nail brush? Not sure what would be best - fairy liquid or CIF?

The painting doesn’t sit above an antique chest. It’s above an inherited Ercol sideboard with doors that spring shut on inquisitive little fingers. This has become a rite of passage for younger family members.

I am only 5’ on a good day but I do have a Mothercare stander. Do you think it would detract from my gravitas if I used this? It would be the newer white one, not the old orange one that found it’s way out to the garden shed.

I'm going to start a new business, flogging a range of tasteful backdrops to be hung from the ceiling behind you.
Shelves of learned tomes, palm trees on a beach, a large modern kitchen with clear counters, gorgeous scottish hill sides, you know the kind of thing.

I'll opt for the new and tidy kitchen, bringing out my domestic goddess persona.

Copper pans, shining bright, hanging from a rack over the central island, bunches of herbs drying gently over the clean and sparkling Aga, the only books those written and beautifully illustrated and personally signed by top chefs.

All gleaming because I never cook, have all my meals delivered by these chefs who are eager for me to taste test their recipes.

Love the copper pans, so we'll also produce a traditional kitchen so that it will look as though you're seated at a large scrubbed table with a mixing bowl and cook book just in view.

We’ll also need some angelic grandchildren with slightly too large aprons and a tasteful (or tasty) dash of cake mix on the tip of their nose.

Making lockdown banana cake

(What is it with banana cake?)

Ps who's scrubbing the table? I hope it's a virtual table.

Actually, my DGD is more likely to want to make a smoothie and turn on the liquidiser when the lid is off.

Been there, done that.

I think you're supposed to use bread to clean old paintings, Sussexborn

Where are you getting all those bananas from Callistemon
You make banana bread every other day.?

If you clean your oil paintings with bread.....don’t allow your DH to eat it afterwards ( the bread) because, as you know DH’s will eat anything left lying around.

I ordered 4 bananas but got 7 very large ones, lemongrove!

Don't leave the crusts stuck to the painting either - eagle-eyed viewers will be discussing that online for ever.
Ad nauseum.

But I need flour and yeast to make bread and not sure if cleaning the painting would be considered a necessity?

Great Granny seems quite calm despite the grubbiness and she coped well with her daughter in law’s smoking and gin drinking in her presence for many years so I am sure she will bear with us for now.

My OH would make a sandwich out of the bread and not think twice about eating it.

That's ok, but just don't let anyone film him while he's doing it.