Party Animals

Programmes that purport to “lift the lid” on certain professions consider there is always something worth lifting the lid for. Read more

Comic Relief does the press launch

Some headlines (but not many, I’m tired) from this morning’s Comic Relief launch, held on a boat nestling beneath the London Eye.  Read more

Law and even more disorder

Further to my recent New Street Law ramblings, the show fell into the BBC1 schedule for February 14. And then, today: “The BBC have now scheduled Arsenal vs Bolton on Wednesday 14 February, which means that New Street Law has now moved to Wednesday 21 February at 9pm.”

Hooray!

Grandstand

Sometimes you get what TS Eliot meant. Grandstand, one of the most venerable sports shows in world TV, ended not with a bang but with the most whimperingly whimpery whimper imaginable. Read more

Final score

The demise of Grandstand this afternoon has come as a bit of a shock, given that the BBC had initially said it would be phased out by 2009. Read more

Lead us not into temptation

I first heard ages ago that The Afternoon Play was coming to BBC1 when the controller was interviewed on 5Live by Simon Mayo. Despite my interest being aroused by the idea at the time, only yesterday did I get round to watching one. Read more

Three’s continuity

BBC3 has always had an appalling press, but I’ve always been a fan of it because I think a lot of its programmes are very good (great to see Man Stroke Woman back) and it does something different to its rivals. However, one area in which it’s always been appalling is… its dreadful continuity announcers. Read more

Hocus-pocus, diplodocus

So there’s this “renowned evolutionary scientist”, Nick Cutter, and some years ago his wife – Helen – disappeared while exploring reports of a strange, giant beast in the Forest of Dean. Now it transpires she stepped through what everyone’s seemingly calling an “anomaly” and found herself transported back in time to prehistoric Earth. Is she still alive? Well, when Nick makes the same journey, he recovers her camera (we know it’s her’s, it has her initials on it – and then Nick says it is). Returning to the present day, said snaps are developed to reveal… two shots of glamour-Helen pouting at the camera, showing off the prehistoric hills behind her. Read more

Trials, tribulations

Somes I’m just too slow when it comes to getting things done. A case in point: Some days ago Paul Stump sent me a review of The Trial of Tony Blair which I only got around to putting on the site this afternoon… at which point Ian Jones had sent me his take on the same show. I don’t want to put two reviews of the same thing online, so, Ian’s sadly gets consigned to the offal bin. This blog. Read more

The Magic of Swan Lake

Tonight’s television was a bonanza for lovers of the extravagantly beautiful. Now there’s something rarely said about terrestrial TV, but it was (mostly) true. Read more

Ski Sunday

This may be one of the saddest confessions you have ever heard (no, really) but Ski Sunday changed my life. Read more

Are you feeling Jade-d?

This week has been polarising for those on either side of the long running Big Brother debate. As someone who has written in recent months to support the series, it is intriguing to see how easy it is to deconstruct all of this latest controversy into further proof that Big Brother remains an important and vital element of Channel 4′s public service remit. Indeed, to me, the very fact that there is conflicting opinion on whether or not Jade and her coterie’s actions constitute actual racism or not, is indication that there is a complex issue being explored here, and that there is a healthy discussion to be had on what does and doesn’t constitute racial abuse.  Read more

Staying awake through Lewis

On Wednesday I was at the press screening for the first of three new Lewis episodes, which begin their run on ITV1 mid February. Now, my problem is I’ve always found Morse deeply soporific. I even invested in a box set of the whole lot a year or so back, but failing to get through a single episode while remaining conscious, I ended up flogging it at a loss on ebay. I was poorer in the pocket, but richer in waking hours. Read more

“Can you arrange some tea, Coop?”

I really like Judge John Deed, yet I have to acknowledge there are flaws. It’s deliberately political. It’s riddled with legal inaccuracies. It pre-supposes that only three lawyers ever operate in the High Court. Read more

“A certain sense of normality”

And so my slight Louis Theroux thread continues. This weekend I watched a preview copy of his new documentary,Louis Theroux – Gambling in Las Vegas. It’s going to be on BBC2 sometime w/c 3 February. Read more

Pano-drama

So, the new prime time Panorama, then. Sadly, and inevitably, I didn’t watch it, but it was good to know that it was there, and that it will always be there. I liked the editor saying that people were asking if they could “do” Northern Ireland in 30 minutes, as if they could “do” Northern Ireland in 40 minutes. Read more

The Trial of Tony Blair

Here is a true story. A friend of mine stood against Tony Blair as a prospective parliamentary Labour candidate in the early 1980s. He quit in the final round, because Tony was, in his judgement “better looking” and more “electable”. My friend, now a mental health professional, also judged him to be “mad as fuck”. Read more

Calendar countdown – slight return

Now that Broadcast magazine has compiled the highest rating TV of 2006, it’s time to update OTT’s chart of the most watched programmes of the decade so far. Read more

Law and disorder

New Street Law. It’s three words the TV listings industry are learning to dread as, on Wednesday, it was dropped from the schedules yet again. By my reckoning, that’s the fourth time this has happened. Originally it was due last August, then September, then week two this year… and then week four. Now we’re told it’ll be with us some time in February. Read more

“What’s a dimella?”

One of the most surprising aspects of what has, up until now, been a largely dull Celebrity Big Brother has been the reinvention of Jade Goody. Read more

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