Introduction:
C. J. - Charles Jefferson
- is the owner of Sunshine Desserts, and is as tough a boss as they come.
Tyrannical and unforgiving, he lords over his employees with a rod of iron.
He is married to Kate, but she is only ever referred to by him as 'Mrs.
C. J.', and they live in Virginia Water in sprawling grounds with a river
running through the rear garden. They have no children. He lives for being
in control and at the top of the business tree, and enjoys advising people
that he didn't get where he is today by doing or saying what his inferiors
have just mentioned. But C.J.'s life suffers many setbacks and revivals
as the series progress.
Series One
C.J. is briefing the three
key men - Reggie, Tony and David - on Sunshine Desserts' brand new project,
Exotic Ices. His office is large, with double doors and a huge oak desk.
His chair is ominous in itself and adequately frames the man who makes
his employees quake. He is present later in Reggie's much smaller office
for a 'tasting' to determine the three most popular flavours that will
launch the Exotic Ices project. The computer collating the results blows
up, however, and C.J. is left contemplating the fact that the three most
popular flavours are bookends, pumice stone and West Germany. The next
day, C.J. has his key man,
Reggie Perrin, in his office to tell him that he has chosen him to give
a speech at a fruit seminar on Friday. C.J. has decided the speech will
be called 'Are We Getting Our Just Desserts?' He begins to get concerned
about his decision for Reggie to give the speech when Reggie invites him
and Mrs. C.J. to a dinner party but refuses to give them any food. His
worries are diverted, however, by David Harris-Jones getting drunk, dropping
his trousers and asking him for the last waltz. Next day, Reggie is present
in C.J.'s office when he grills David over last night's events. He is more
concerned that David is a homosexual and that his underpants featured a
picture of Ludwig von Beethoven, and goes so far as to call for Tony Webster
to display his pants. David explains they were on sale while on holiday
in Bonn. As the day of the speech arrives, C.J. calls in on Reggie to see
if he is nervous, and more to the point, is still sane. He is, just about.
But Reggie gets drunk at Bilberry Hall and refers to C.J. as 'toothbrush',
and invites anyone from Tarporley to stand up and shake hands with the
person on their right. Reggie disappears,
leaving his clothes on a beach in Dorset, but not before sabotaging a fishing
contest held on C.J.'s private stretch of river, featuring Tony, David
and Doc Morrissey. Reggie borrows a van of loganberry essence and pollutes
the river upstream, having earlier promised C.J. in a furtive letter posted
under his door that 'blood will flow'. C.J. sees the 'blood' and is convinced
there is a crazed murderer killing all his guests. He wades into the river,
trips and is knocked unconscious. Doc Morrissey declares him dead. C.J.
declares the Doc fired.
A week or two later, C.J.
is in the pub with Tony and David. He is still not sure about David's future
with the company, but has promoted Tony Webster to fill Reggie's position.
Reggie, disguised as a Welshman, listens nearby to their conversation,
and is surprised to hear that his disappearance has made C.J. think about
life. He hears him tell his proteges that his dad once caught him thinking
and advised his son that 'philosophy doesn't get the washing up done'.
Reggie's death has changed C.J. He attends Reggie's memorial and cracks
jokes at the wake (Reggie attends both in disguise as Martin Wellbourne,
Reggie's friend from Brazil). Elizabeth falls in love with Martin and gets
him a job at Sunshine Desserts. C.J. has given Reggie the job of running
the Reginald Perrin Memorial Foundation.
Series Two
Reggie is again working
for C.J., except this time disguised as Martin Wellbourne. He hates his
job, as he's in charge of his own memorial fund. He has been asked by C.J.
to distribute a questionnaire among all staff about what people like about
Sunshine Desserts. There were very few things Reggie could report to C.J.
that people actually did like. One of the main things they didn't like
was C.J. himself. But C.J. is a changed, more happier man since Reggie's
'suicide', and takes
Martin's findings in his stride. However, things soon change after Martin
visits Doc Morrissey and the old medic recognises him as Reggie, and tells
C.J. The boss sacks both of them on the spot. With Reggie no longer 'in
memoriam', the Reginald Perrin Memorial Foundation is scrapped, and it's
back to business with the Exotic Ices project. After their split, Joan
has left the company and Tony is now overseeing the project in the position
left by Reggie. Reggie is out of work and there is no money coming in.
This drives Elizabeth to desparate measures - she goes to see C.J. for
a job. He employs her as secretary to Tony and David. With Mrs. C.J. in
Luxembourg, C.J. uses the opportunity to wine and dine Elizabeth with the
hope of having an affair in his country cottage near Godalming. He uses
the ruse of a pile of papers that need sorting, and she reluctantly agrees
to meet him one Saturday morning. C.J. plies her with champagne but realises
the stupid mistake he is making, and reaches for the pile of unsorted papers.
All this time, Elizabeth has been lying to Reggie that she is working for
the British Basket Company, but he begins to suspect, and follows her to
work - all the way to Sunshine Desserts. He suspects, correctly, that C.J.
is the man at the centre of all this, but C.J. deflects the blame onto
Tony Webster. Reggie and Tony fight, and both end up with black eyes. Next
day, Elizabeth decides to get herself sacked in case C.J. tries anything
else, and does so by typing out a rude letter. Meanwhile, Reggie has returned
to the piggery, but the owner has found out who he really is too, and he
has been sacked from there.
Soon, Reggie gets his inspired
idea for Grot and goes to see C.J. for a loan. C.J. thinks it's blackmail
money and readily signs a cheque for him for £30,000. The Grot empire
soon grows, and at the same time Sunshine Desserts goes bankrupt. Reggie
thinks it would be fun to have all his old crowd working for him for a
change, particularly C.J. He invites C.J. for an interview and gives him
a job as Head Of Expansion (Europe). Eventually, Reggie tires of Grot and
the commuter rut he has found himself back in, and both himself and Elizabeth
leave their clothes on the beach and assume new identities. The following
day, they are sitting on a cliff-top bench when an old tramp asks them
for some small change for a cup of tea. It is C.J. He has followed Reggie's
lead in faking his death, and hundreds of others down on the beach are
doing the same. |
Series
Three
At the start of Series 3,
C.J. has not returned to society but has remained a tramp, or 'street entertainer'
as he prefers to call it, earning a living by busking, badly,
on the streets of London. Reggie has set out to recruit all the old mob
again for his Perrins Community and finds C.J. playing his banjo outside
a tube station. He treats C.J. to a pint and offers him a job, although
he'd have to live in a tent. With all staff recruited, the first meeting
is soon held to allocate everyone's jobs in the community. Reggie elects
C.J. the Work Therapist, as "no-one understands the problems of work..."
more than C.J., adding "having caused most of them yourself, C.J.". But
C.J.'s first task is less than satisfying for him. Reggie is in charge
of the household chores, and applies C.J. to babysitting duties three days
running. Linda's children Adam and Jocasta and baby Reggie Harris-Jones
are fond of thrusting a stuffed Kermit toy down the front of C.J.'s trousers,
much to his annoyance. Eventually, guests start to arrive, although half
the staff have to pretend to be guests to assure the first real guest that
he is not alone. C.J. pretends that he 'can't make friends' but the guest
sees through the scheme and flees in panic.
When the community is fluorishing,
we see C.J. in a role-playing session with two guests, Thruxton Appleby
the textiles tycoon and Arthur Noblett. an arc welder. Reggie looks in
to hold a 'watching brief', and suggests that the worker should be the
boss and the tycoon should be the labourer to demonstrate the 'them and
us syndrome'. C.J. reluctantly agrees and decides to be the boss's secretary
Cynthia Jones. The two guests fail to become each other and so C.J. and
Reggie decide to show them how it's done, but get carried away and end
up in a slanging match. Guests are now pouring into Perrins as a result
of TV and newspaper promotions and Reggie tells staff members they will
have to share. He bets Elizabeth five pounds that he can get C.J. to share
with Doc Morrissey, and does so, but only by first telling him he must
share with sweaty, germ-ridden Scottish chef McBlane then 'compromising'
by saying the Doc instead. But when
the Doc hears of his order to share with C.J., he faints. In Anti-Self-Consciousness
Week, C.J. has an idea to go out in public and having conversations ending
with '-ergle'. They try it on a train and it is a great success. A femme
fatale called Deborah Swaffham leads C.J. astray, even to the point of
them both being undressed. But the Community is threatened by thugs and
despite their best efforts, they cannot save it and it closes down. All
staff go their separate ways, and Reggie faces the prospect of never seeing
C.J. again. A few weeks later, however, a letter arrives inviting Reggie
to an interview at Amalgamated Aerosols where C.J.'s brother F.J. is managing
director. Reggie soon discovers he is to be C.J.'s 'think tank' and orders
Reggie to attend a 'smelling' to determine the three most popular fragrances
which will launch the new range of aerosols. C.J. is horrified to read
that one person has listed rude answers to what each smell reminded people
of, and he knows it's Reggie. He orders Reggie to conduct an investigation,
but Reggie decides to come clean and dictates a memo to be distributed
to all departments.
The Legacy of Reginald
Perrin
With Reggie now dead, all
are assembled at his funeral service, including C.J. Weeks later he, along
with all Reggie's other close friends and family, have been ordered to
attend the reading of Reggie's last will and testament at the office of
solicitor Geraldine Hackstraw. C.J. nearly faints when told he is to inherit
£1million of Reggie's money, but is less than keen to learn they
all have to do something totally absurd to earn it. After working separately,
they eventually decide to work together to march on London in demonstration
against ageism. C.J. funds the project, and recruiting begins. Meanwhile,
C.J. tries to woo Miss Hackstraw, little realising that Doc Morrissey is
trying to do the same. C.J. decides to betray the team and sell the secret
to the papers - spied on by Tom and David - but one journalist gets run
over by a lorry and is hospitalised, and another decides to join the team.
The big day arrives, and the injured reporter remembers his scoop in time
to tip-off the London police about the demonstration. Newspapers carry
the story of C.J. the betrayer and one has 'PM thanks C.J.' for allowing
the police to be there to meet them. On the day of the beneficiaries receiving
their money, no-one is speaking to C.J. and Elizabeth suggests C.J. should
forfeit some of his money in recompense. But Geraldine refuses to release
any of the money anyway, as the project failed to be absurd enough, and
C.J. nearly has a heart attack.
Character Analysis
C.J. is second only to Reggie
himself for the number of scenes and number of storylines to be featured
in during The Fall and Rise of Reginald Perrin. He has probably the most
fondly-remembered catchphrase of all the characters and, including The
Legacy of Reginald Perrin, has more 'rises and falls' than Reggie. C.J.
is remembered because his character was larger than life, and one that
everybody loved to hate. He was ruthless with his employees but also funny
without him
realising it. He revelled in his power and was uncaring in embarrassing
his workers in front of others. More than anything, he was real. People
who watched the series worked for people like C.J.. their tyranny, their
giant cigars, giant desks in their 'inner sanctums' of a giant office,
and their sheer brutality was displayed with total accuracy by C.J. It
is, however, only the first Series in which C.J.'s character is remembered
by most people. His subsequent ups and downs - working for Reggie at Grot,
becoming a busker, working for Reggie at Perrins, Reggie working for him
again at Amalgamated Aerosols - are not often recalled by most viewers
when they think of C.J. This is because, although, still a dominant figure,
the character became only as peripheral as that of, say, Tony or Joan in
Reggie's later projects, but still managed to provide some of the greatest
scenes of all three series. C.J. is now in the halls of sitcom fame as
the archetypal office boss, unmatched by newcomer pretenders to the throne
such as that of Ricky Gervais' creation in The Office. C.J. was king, and
still is. |