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“Quickly changed into a suit and left for LWT…”

Last week’s Creamguide concluded that, historically, and ignoring everything since c.1997, ITV’s regional efforts have outshone those of the BBC.

And one of the main reasons for that was surely The Six O’Clock Show, itself surely the best of its kind – an honour forever sealed by these 30 seconds of pre-weekend animated affability:

There’s Asp scurrying on at the end.

If only more of this show existed online…other than this tiny tiny bit of Mike a little out of breath and gallantly trying to rescue a feature that is plummeting rapidly downhill:

“I’ll get the team in – Cheryl Baker and Gary Wilmot!”

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0 Comments

  1. Five-Centres

    May 21, 2009 at 9:02 am

    That was a real ‘weekend starts here’ thing for me when I first moved to London in 1987. It was so very London – but by the time I was watching Chris Tarrant presented with Janet Street Porter and Danny Baker. They used to do things like stop taxi drivers late at night and ask them if they’d go to Brixton, thus keeping alive the myth that they’d not go south of the river after dark. Of course they all said they would, thus blowing that out of the water. It was like Esther’s vox pops in North End Road market – but a whole show’s worth. Such fun.

  2. theMonitor

    May 21, 2009 at 9:13 am

    What’s ‘Asp scurring’? Is it like bear baiting?

  3. gerard wiley

    May 21, 2009 at 10:18 pm

    Greg Dyke (the prog’s first editor) spends pages and pages talking about the show in his autobiog.

    He says the Aspel/Baker chemistry made the show- both representing a particular era of the capital. Aspel was the debonair London man of the 60s whereas The Bake’ was more rough-and-ready; more urban and 80s.

    Janet S-P hated doing the light items and wanted viewers to know she was into “fucking opera” as well….before quitting and being replaced by Paula Yates.

    And then Dyke weirdly axed it when he became LWT Chief Exec.

  4. Scary

    May 23, 2009 at 7:58 pm

    The 6 o clock show was a must watch for me as a kid too, it’s forever associated with Friday evening fish fingers and oven chips.

    As Danny Baker has pointed out a few times it’s the programme that The One Show is trying to be… it’s a shame that BBC London can’t replicate it’s style even with the Bake on board

  5. Simon Rueben

    May 29, 2009 at 8:53 pm

    My wife has a chunk of The Six o’Clock show on video, and if I knew how to get it on Youtube I would. She is a big Duran Duran fan and it is Danny Baker, outside Simon Le Bon’s house, interviewing fans outside and having a chat with Le Bon’s milkman.

    Its on her “DURAN DURAN” video which also has lots of clips from TOTP, Pebble Mill, Jim’ll, basically every show in the early 80’s DD were on.

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