Also:
- It's Saturday Night
- 2. An autograph before you go
- 3. A new kind of game show
- 4. A rising exasperation with the quantity of dirt
- 5. The whole thing suddenly fell apart
- 6. Synthetic propensity
- 7. It was destined to be an anti-climax
- 8. This is your show now
- 9. The awesome scale of our wastefulness
- 10. Hands up those who couldn't care less
- 11. Together We’ll Be Ok
- 12. Decide the shape of ITV in the 1980s
- 13. Alan is too commercial
- 14. It worked like a dream
- 15. Older men, doing school boy tricks
- 16. Killing the Golden Goose
- 17. People love us to be sexy
- 18. The manure is worth more than the cattle
- 19. They were big in the States and we noted that
- 20. I’m still aggressive and I’m still handing out the insults
- 21. A new style of lunatic humour
- 22. The Habitat-bean-bag-hessian-wallpaper brigade
- 23. Thoroughly sinful
- 24. All carrots should be scraped, sliced and cooked
- 25. Back then it was radical stuff
- 26. Whatever they do, we can do it better
- 27. You'll have to take us as you find us
- 28. Entertainment that keeps on the move
- 29. It's the public that has to pay
- 30. The last we saw of either of them was their sad faces
- 31. Just shoot the bastard
- 32. Britain could clearly be facing its darkest hour
- 33. Any enthusiasm we may have had for continuing discussions is waning
- 34. It was considered by LWT and then put in a bottom drawer
- 35. Watch the redoubtable Terry take off
- 36. I thought it might be terrible and I wouldn’t enjoy it at all
- 37. Kamikaze Mastermind
- 38. We haven’t moved into luxury
- 39. We are investing in people
- 40. Delivered impeccably
- 41. He has to allow you to do your bit
- 42. All the anticipation of the great emotive point
- 43. If you want Russ Abbot to do it, then you have to accept me and my ideas
- 44. Let’s get straight into this
- 45. Unedifying Greed
- 46. We’ve got the fucking lot!
- 47. Scope for humour and danger
- 48. Pure Megablast
- 49. There’s lots of killing, but not much else
- 50. I wanted to make sure it was going to be disastrous
- 51. Oh dear – Auntie’s playing bingo!
- 52. A Shrivelled Little Thing
- 53. I shouldn’t have accepted it
- 54. We would be the spoilsports
- 55. The Most Sexless Person In Television
- 56. They’d have strung me up if I hadn’t chosen him
- 57. Is there some way to play with the internal constituent parts?
- 58. The most important entertainment programme of my time
- 59. The plumply pretty female duo
- 60. The audience just sort of started to freeze on him
- 61. More pilots than British Airways
- 62. There's going to come a time when you'll have to go to the BBC
- 63. A slightly pretentious manifesto
- 64. Things Look Very Precarious
- 65. It’s no good doing all the same old people all the time
- 66. That’s just not funny Bobby, it's corny - just don’t do that
- 67. Well bottom’s not funny
- 68. We Are The Funnymen
- 69. The powers that be listened to Denis
- 70. Stretchers never go up stairs
- 71. I was in obscurity until this series
- 72. I don’t care if he doesn’t like me
- 73. There’s such a passion for nostalgia right now
- 74. I Heard A Seat In The Stalls Go ‘Gerdonk!'
- 75. This is your show, folks, and I do mean you
- 76. There’s good news for perplexed fans of 3-2-1!
- 77. Taking on Blind Date would be a real challenge
- 78. You wanna bet on it?
- 79. The yarns worked their tried and tested magic
- 80. The Charge-And-Shout Brigade
- 81. I sat for a moment in silence, then turned in my chair and left the stage
- 82. We just weren't allowed into UK terrestrial television
- 83. Beadle’s A Prick
- 84. The interviewer always has to know when it's best to keep his or her mouth shut
- 85. Can you come up with a good solution for the Murder Weekend mystery?
- 86. He's not a goody- goody hero
- 87. The Sexism, The Dolly Birds, The Catchphrases
- 88. The feel of Saturday night
- 89. 1990 Who would employ an ex-alky with lowered self-esteem
- 90. It were a right smack in the face
- 91. Look Straight Into My Eyes And Everything Will Be Alright, That's A Promise
- 92. That's the last thing I was expecting, Jim
- 93. The characters and situations are real
- 94. Oh Man, There Go All My Women Fans
- 95. A Double Order of Talent
- 96. If there is an air of spontaneity about it, it’ll be genuine
- 97. NTV brings you ... empty rooms!
- 98. You’re BBC, you shouldn’t be here
- 99. If this doesn’t work out, we’re both snookered!
- 100. The humour of Beadle comes through humiliating people!
- 101. To allow such bilge on TV is an insult to the audience
- 102. Like a cup of cold sick
- 103. A litre of gin, ecstasy and crack cocaine
- 104. A reliable tent pole for Saturday evenings
- 105. It is in the cutlery drawer
- 106. Welcome to the new Saturday night
- 107. Congratulations, you have got the fucking Gen Game
- 108. The programme has done extremely badly and will be dropped after this series
- 109. Building the excitement and tension to a crescendo
- 110. He gives us our spirit of unity; we’d all like to strangle him
- 111. The worst programme currently on terrestrial television
- 112. I award the city state of Milton Keynes 100 credits!
- 113. There’s nothing that makes people scream, ‘Did you see that?’
- 114. It was of a standard frankly well below what the public would want
- 115. Waxing An Ape Is My Ambition
- 116. Don’t Get Mad, Get Even
- 117. The penalty shoot-out is the greatest ever endgame
- 118. 200 black boxes are strapped to the back of a cross-section of the nation
- 119. Better For You, Better For All Of Us
- 120. I mean who on earth thought that was a good idea?
- 121. I’m sure the tune was in there somewhere
- 122. This Time, You Decide
- 123. King of trash, that’s me
- 124. It’s about rejection now
- 125. They lost what Popstars was all about
- 126. Win the ads
- 127. A name in search of a series
- 128. Getting grief from the papers
- 129. I’m so pleased to be back on television
- 130. Saturday nights haven't been this interesting for 10 years
- 131. It’s the Usual Nonsense
- 132. The trip of a lifetime
- Epilogue: Why Haven't You Written a Series of Articles on Tuesday Night Telly?
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Tammy Cline’s career after Success continued to rise as gradually as before. She formed a new band, made a number of appearances at Wembley stadium and was voted “Best British Female Country Vocalist” for another two years. In 1982 she released a single ‘Love Is A Puzzle’ and followed it up with an album in 1983. In the late 1980s (still based in the UK) she formed another band (Two Hearts) and made a further album – this time in Nashville. Two Hearts split in 1992, and since then, Cline has devoted her time to her family.
Cline’s story is unexceptional in itself. She is one of hundreds those who have been paraded on our screens in the name of Saturday night television. That TV exposure is the making of an individual’s career is a myth is propagated by talent show producers. In 1982, two other new talent show offered virgin entertainers an opportunity for some rare Saturday night television exposure, and that elusive prize of a showbiz leg-up.
Central Television’s Funnybone and BBC1’s David Essex Showcase both started on 26 June 1982 and were intended to bring “wider exposure to lesser-known performers in a world where opportunity does not always knock”. Essex, in particular, was keen to emphasise that his Showcase was “not a talent show but a showcase for performers who are already professional … it’s so incredibly difficult nowadays to break into the mass media: unless you have a record in the Top 30 you don’t get on to Top of the Pops; radio is a very closed format; clubs and theatres have been hit by the recession. Unless you become a point of fashion and are picked up on, it’s very difficult to find those opportunities to show the public what you can do.” Coming at us from the Harrogate Centre in Central Harrogate, that first episode introduced us to “the exciting new names and faces of the 80s … The Belle Stars, Rikki Patrick, Pookiesnackenburger, Twelfth Night, Harry Dickman, Wavelength, and Barbara Rosenblat”. Essex failed to find any genuinely “exciting new names” among this line up. However, later editions would uncover Mari Wilson and Chris Barrie.
Refreshingly, Funnybone dwelled less on the possible discovery of new talent and more on developing a format that would suit a 1980s viewer, recognising the gradual shift in the appetite of a mass audience. “It’s a fact that television variety has been swinging from the format of a stand-up comic who links acts together with a few jokes and a lot of ‘big hellos and welcomes,’” observed journalist Alan Kennaugh in 1982, “to variety at a slicker pace and entertainment that keeps on the move without time-filling gaps … Central Television, which produces Funnybone, has in recent years been moving away from the host-type show. Ironically, Sunday Night at the London Palladium, which was produced under the banner of ATV (Central’s predecessor), not only relied on a compère, but the hosts – Bruce Forsyth and Jimmy Tarbuck among them – became bigger names than some of the stars they introduced. So in television variety, Central can face any accusation that it is not moving with the times”.
Without a talent spotter of the calibre of Hamp, Funnybone failed to find new stars. Director/producer Colin Clews had previous experience working with Larry Grayson, Frankie Howerd and Des O’Connor. However, all Funnybone bequeathed to the world was “new comedy duo” Cheese and Onion (hangovers from Clews’ previous production, the ATV Light Entertainment programme Starburst) and magician Sonny Hayes (who would, two years later, appear on the BBC’s The Copperfield Comedy Company). Funnybone’s only find of any note was probably Malcolm Stent, who (according to a 2005 online biog) enjoyed a long career as a “comedian, vocalist, musician, writer, actor and director”.
It might prove comforting for those featured in the respective first episodes of Funnybone and David Essex Showcase to note that a third show featuring new talent was broadcast on the evening of 26 June 1982. A Foggy Outlook featured Fogwell Flax, the winner of the most recent Search For A Star television series. Like Funnybone it failed to establish its star among the upper echelons of the light entertainment fraternity. After a brief and productive period working on Saturday morning children’s programmes such as Tiswas and Saturday Morning Starship, Flax has since enjoyed only occasional exposure on television and like many performers, has had to diversify to make a living.
Not that diversification doesn’t have its own benefits. As well as picking up a number of acting jobs (including the role of Miss Rosa in Orange is the New Black), Showcase debutant Barbara Rosenblat has worked in the field of audio book narration. Over the years she has been able to carve out a healthy career, receiving plaudits that would make the most successful entertainer jealous. Even at his peak, Noel Edmonds could never claim to be “spoken of with the same reverence and affection that the music industry reserves for Frank Sinatra and the Beatles,” yet this is the lot of ex-entertainer Barbara Rosenblat.
George White
March 5, 2018 at 10:59 am
Harry Dickman went onto a solid stage acting career, he was Albert in that Steptoe and Son stage show. He did Doctor Who a few years ago, and did voices for the UK dub of one of the Smurfs films from the 70s, has acting credits dating back to 60s eps of No Hiding Place and Z Cars, was a “Bagman” in an episode of Albion Market, has understudied Tommy Steele and voiced characters in PS1’s Medievil.
And it’s Orange Is The New Black. Though Oranges Are The New Black sounds more Cream-y, like something a gran says.
Funnybone I have been looking up, because Rae Earl mentioned Cheese and Onion on Looks Unfamiliar. One of the other “new stars” was Nina Finburgh, then 46, who seems to have been mainly a drama teacher.
The Belle Stars had a few top 20 hits, I remember seeing them in old Look-Ins. On Stiff, apparently.
Great stuff as usual.
I do wish you just published all this as an ebook, and have it done with, but the waiting and anticipation is tantalising.
TV Cream
March 8, 2018 at 7:52 am
Oranges now corrected – thanks George!
Richard1631978
March 5, 2018 at 7:00 pm
I used to think Sign of the Times by the Belle Stars was an early bananarama song.
I was put right by the totp repeats.
Glenn Aylett
March 5, 2018 at 7:17 pm
The Belle Stars did OK for two years or so and unlike many girl groups, played instruments and had a punkish looking drummer. Their cover of The Clapping Song was well liked at the time.
Droogie
March 6, 2018 at 12:34 pm
Jenny Belle Starr sings backing vocals on The Jam hit The Bitterest Pill. In the early 90’s, Paul Weller helped to fund a mod clothing shop in Hanway Street, London called Dredd Experience that Jenny Belle Starr managed. It got quite a bit of media attention, but when I visited a couple of times, both times it was shut with a back in 5 minutes sign in the window. ( I waited ages, but no one came.) The place must have lasted 6 months before closing for good. A mod friend told me the reason for the quick demise was that the money given to start the business was allegedly going up people’s noses rather than on the shop.
Glenn Aylett.
March 9, 2018 at 11:21 am
@ Droogie, Paul Weller’s attempts at creating some kind of music empire stalled and cost the Modfather a lot of money. Singers like Tracey and DC Lee that he hoped would be massive solo stars struggled beyond their first hits, his recording studio lost money and had to be closed in 1990, and the mod shop sounds like Weller had been taken for a ride. Luckily after a spell in the wilderness and financial problems in the early nineties, he bounced back as a very successful solo singer.