Another source that suggests the media glamorised the Krays is source 4. It shows the promotional front cover of the video of the film ‘The Krays’. The cover shows Gary Kemp, who played Ronnie Kray holding a gun. Where the contents of the film are rated it suggests that there is ‘violence’ and ‘strong sexual content’ in the film. Both these factors send out strong brutal messages about the film. This source both glamorises crime and sensationalises the Krays.
Although some of the sources suggest that it was the media who turned the Krays into heroes or celebrities, it has also been suggested that the Krays use the media to turn themselves into heroes. The very fact that the twins allowed a film to be made about them confirmed that twins enjoyed being in the public eye. Even when the Krays were in prison they ‘happily minded their notoriety’ and there were ‘Kray goodies’ for sale. This comes from source 5, it shows that it wasn’t only the newspapers that celebrated the Krays they, themselves, advertised their lives by openly selling memoirs including videos, t-shirts, autographed photos and Kray belt buckles. The title alone, of source 1, tells us that John Pearson was ‘commissioned to write their biography’. This suggests that the Krays ‘Firm’ wasn’t a very secret business and they wanted to publicise their criminality.
Source 4 backs up ideas from source 3 (from a book about the twins called ‘brothers in arms’’). It compares the ‘Mafia of Sicily’ and the American ‘Cosa Nostra’, notorious organised criminal gangs, to the Krays and dismisses their serious behaviour, claiming they were only ‘jack-the-lads’. Later on in the same source the author tries to justify the two murders the twins committed. Both the murder victims were described as being ‘miserable, low-life street thugs'. The same source gives a list of all the crimes the twins were ‘never charged or convicted’ of including drug dealing, manipulation, corruption and terrorism. And when they were finally caught and convicted they ‘received the heaviest prison sentence ever handed down by a British court’.
Source 1 might seem like the most obvious non-biased source, because it was a ‘biography’. Bearing in mind the pressure under, which Pearson, the author, would be under to produce a book to promote the Krays and their already established popularity, he is reasonably blunt. Describing the Krays as no ‘ordinary criminals’ in the way, in which, they behaved as ‘strange’.
Source 6, which is an article from The Herald talks about the end for ‘the murderous duo’. He claims that the Krays’ reputation should have been buried 30 years ago in ‘healthy gales of derision’. Meaning that their reputation should have died and been forgotten about years ago. This shows that not all newspapers and writers were intimidated by the brothers and realised their serious crimes that happened behind the scenes. And recognised that they were selling themselves with merchandise in a desperate bit to achieve celebrity status for their heroism. But Reg had been buried that week as ‘almost a national hero’, something he, arguably, didn’t deserve. McLeod, the author, comments on the reactions, of celebrities Reg would mix with, after his death. People describing it as a ‘sad loss’. The source also has a sarcastic element, describing the Krays as ‘delightful’, ‘lovely fellows’ and as ‘killers-killers who built an empire. ‘Ron was a psychopath’ where as Reg had ‘some brains and abundant charm’. McLeod clearly biased towards one of the twins. McLeod also describes associates and friends of the twins as ‘fools’. He clearly justifies the sentences they got saying a ‘few years earlier…would have been hanged’, a completely different opinion from source 3 ‘the heaviest prison sentence ever handed down by a British court of law’.
Referring back to the question, most of the sources do suggest that that the media were responsible sensationalising crime, in general. There are certain sources, which certainly do glamorise the environment of the Krays. It shows what a ‘sheddy’ place they were surrounded by and the kind of people who lived around them source 3 really shows this. The Krays themselves were involved a lot in making themselves celebrities and publicising their criminal activity, they also had a way of manipulating the media into printing stories that happened. The statement is an exaggeration of the truth, but the media definitely played a part in advertising crime and making it ‘trendy’.