Last night, like about 8 million other people in the country, I watched the opening episode of ITV's The Palace, followed by the revamped News at Ten.
As someone who is easily hooked on soap-like dramas, The Palace scored highly on the addiction scale. It was so appalling it was brilliant. It identified every royal stereotype in existence and ran with them in such a shameless way it kind of worked. The casting of Jane Asher as the Queen gave the viewer the hint that this was supposed to be Crossroads on steroids, and they were not to be disappointed. There was a young Princess Margaret type character, Princess Eleanor, who is cast as the baddie of the programme, constantly seeking ways to undermine her brother, the new King. He is portrayed as a weak, hedonistic type - a kind of modern day Edward VII. Oh, and he just happens to be squiring the Prime Minister's Press Secretary. Monday nights will never be the same again!
As for News at Ten, I liked the new set, but that was about it. They scored a coup in getting an interview with Hasnat Khan. The only trouble was, he didn't actually say anything and it had to be padded out by the reporter. I only stayed with the programme until half time, before I switched over to the BBC News. As far as I could see, the News at Ten had failed its first test - was it going to report hard news, or continue to report the very worst type of dumbed down news - full of human interest features rather than what actually happened that day in the world of current affairs? What did you all think?
And on BBC news you missed a fantastic report from John Simpson illegally inside Zimbabwe. Proper news versus dreary royal gossip. Hmmmm...
ReplyDeleteI agree. I watched the first few minutes of News at Ten and switched over as soon as I realised it was simply another version of "Tonight with Trevor Macdonald" or whatever that other show was called. Poor effort. The BBC, Sky and ITV need to sit down and sort out the evening news schedules.
ReplyDeleteI thought the NaT opening sequence was great! Not sure about their very Americanised logo and graphics though. As for content well it's no more trivial than the BBC's watered down efforts and trivialisations.
ReplyDeleteI liked the opening sequence and revised theme tune, but thought that they should have been a bit more innovative on the relaunch. All they've done is bring back what shouldn't have gone away in the first place, but failed to do so with a bong.
ReplyDeleteI actually think they shouldn't have brought back Trevor McDonald, instead they should have used the opportunity to bring us a real fresh face. It would have been risky, but it would have been inkeeping with the News at Ten tradition of being pioneers.
I thought it was shite - absolutely no mention of Mrs T giving Scargill a kicking.
ReplyDeleteSo when did the House of Essex takeover from the House of Windsor?
ReplyDeleteI suspect the Zimbabwe story was a deliberate spoiler. It wasn't urgent in any real sense.
ReplyDeleteThis was kind of confirmed this morning when Today did a typically smug compare and contrast story on the 2 programmes.
Nice to know I am not alone in my guilty pleasures, that said King Richard reminded me more of Edward VIII/Duke of Windsor than Edward VII, although Richard was clearly a ladies man in a similar way to Edward VII
ReplyDelete...but you haven't mentioned the most amazing think that happened last night when Paxman smeared Cameron based on no facts at all. He (& his very junior looking sidekick) listed three already declared helicopter travel items from the HoC register & said that Cameron MIGHT have contravened the EC Rules because the cost to Cameron MIGHT have exceeded the £1k limit. Vaisey did a reasonable job at first of pointing out that this was pure speculation put he should really have attacked Pacxman & his puppy for an blatantly attempt at s smear where they had not done their homework. Gilligan got sacked for much less.
ReplyDeletePaxman looked like he was ready for bed ...
ReplyDeleteThink this news malarky is a young mans job or else his knees were sore again ? can't be easy earning a million a year
News at Ten ran a remarkable story from the South Pole and then ran a live link 600 Feet under the ice.
ReplyDeleteI thought that stunt was superb.
Apparently they are running a weblog on the subject.
10/10.
Julie Etchingham looked every bit the star of the news.
(remember it was her that dropped the hint of the Tories opening up death camps for immigrants)
11/10.
Gary
I think I managed 10 minutes of The Palace and 5 minutes of The News at Ten. Pure unadulterated sh*te the lot of it. It's back to re-runs of Top Gear and Catherine Tate I'm afraid!
ReplyDeleteThe BBC 10 o'clock news got just under one million more viewers last night. Overnight figures suggest ITV had about 3.9m.
ReplyDeleteAs we say here: you're going home in a Shepherd's Bush Ambulance.
ITV's News At Ten was nicely packaged and presented. As a summary of the day's main stories I felt it worked. They went over the top with the Diana stuff, however.
ReplyDeleteIf you switched off half way through you would have missed Bill Neely's excellent report from Antarctica which was definitely a highlight.
There is a place for this kind of news programme - not everyone wants heavyweight coverage - ITV is a mainstream channel after all.
I thought leading with a story about a royal who has been dead for a decade was a crass judgment. I switched over to see Simpson of Kabul telling us that Zimbabwe is a basket case. That was the lead item, for God’s sake. Despairing of hearing about anything that had happened in the last twenty-four hours, I turned off the TV and switched on the radio.
ReplyDeleteI think Sir Trevor destroyed his reputation in that spiteful HIGNFY knock-off.
NaT was Easy Listening News and sometimes I'm in the mood for that. I'm rarely in the mood for being told what to think by the sanctimonious prats at the BBC. I'm not sorry to have missed another world-weary report about the Very Important John Simpson and how clever he was to get in to Zimbabwe. Now that there are so many News channels its perfectly possible to tailor the news to one's own requirements and to switch channels in order to avoid all human rights stories, all Gordon Brown photo ops and all paedaphile and rape stories and all John Simpson stories.
ReplyDelete- And as to Newsnight and the efforts they had put in to smear Cameron, is it possible that Newsnight we talking about the commercial rates for hiring a helicopter from a helicopter hire company? Cameron's helicopter trips were donated by private owners so only the cost of the fuel, the pilot and the airport charges should be considered.
Is it just me but are current 'news' programmes becoming more 'pastiche' than the rather good pi**-take Brass Eye? The presenters come across like auto-cue reading wax-work dummies; and Channel 4 news comes across as a pro-Liberal pi**-take! Mind you, i could watch the lovely Matt Wot-his-name on C5 news all day!
ReplyDeleteRe Today smugly saying how good their news always is, how they are the champs in the news business and how awful News at 10 was - I notice they carefully didn't mention the elephant in the living room - Sky News! (News Channel of the Year - as they proudly say umpteen times a day)
ReplyDeleteWhilst agreeing that lots of people get their news from the internet, they didn't ever want to mention that lots of people get it from Sky News too - and think it is far better and far more impartial than the BBC - not that that's difficult.
(PS - Didn't bother with The Palace, watched City of Vice on Channel 4 - excellent)
Bringing back News at Ten was an opportunity for ITV to drop the glitz and concentrate on quality hard news reporting. They blew it. I gave up and switched over after about ten minutes.
ReplyDeleteWhy does it take two presenters to read the news? Some sort of Health and Safety risk to their vocal chords, perhaps?
Iain, if you stayed to the end of News at Ten, you would have sir Sir Trev showing his age as he gazed uncomfortably into the wrong cameras & Julie Etchingham's make-up malfunction when the green screen started to reflect off the sides of her nose.
ReplyDeleteSo News at Ten led with a story about Diana ... it's as if they were reporting news that was important eight years ago when the show was last on air rather than anything relevant to the world as it is now.
ReplyDeleteI did like the Antarctica report which featured some breathtaking photography, but as it is to be serialised over several nights it feels more of a magazine feature than a special news report.
As for the BBC, they led with a good scoop with the Inside Zimbabwe item.
One curious note about NaT. While the revamped opening titles are smart, as is the set, why is the clock on the backdrop above the presenters heads fixed at midnight rather than ten o'clock?
I think you should read Pete Hitchens blog to read what I think, although I don't fancy Anna Ford and never have.
ReplyDeleteanon.11.01
ReplyDeleteI agree. "Dave, the home of witty banter," has become a sort of televisual refuge for me from all the, "contemporary" crap that appears on the other channels.
Freeview 19.
..sorry, I'm just laughing at my instruction to read Peter Hitchens so learn what I think, what I meant was I think he's right that the news has become another entertainment prog. And I remember standing for the national anthem too, even at home, but I didn't fancy Reginald Bosanquet.
ReplyDeleteJohn Humphries should be declared a national treasure.
Can someone tell me the name of 'Yorkie valley' in Snowdonia? I remember it was the place where the Yorkie bar advert was filmed and we used to call it yorkie valley but I can't remember the name. Thanks.
I am glad to see the BBC news challenged . The BBC need to raise their game anyway. So good on 'News at Ten.' The more choice the better.
ReplyDeleteI didn't want to be rude and mention this on Ed Vaizey's blog - but - Uncle Ed looked a bit 'plump' on Newsnight last night?!
ReplyDeleteIain, maybe you should tell Ed about your Special K diet or something?! Ed did a good job standing up to that old bully Paxman though.
No one could put it better than Quentin Letts in his review, discussing "Sir Trevor who, like the decks of the Victory, is a testament to the lasting power of wood."
ReplyDeleteIts not the BBC so its got to be good. I do not like watching that sneering Welch Man. Give me T Mc D anytime.
ReplyDeleteI thought it was very disappointing, to be honest. Was expecting a much more hard, factual presentation rather than the touchy feely stuff.
ReplyDeleteI can get that on the awful Beeb efforts, complete with their usual biases and instructions on how to think.
To lead with a non-story such as the Diana piece really set the tone for the whole show. Magazine style crap.
Back to Sky News for me, then. A real missed opportunity by NaT.
It did seem a bit soft and superficial but it was a quiet news day. A better test will be when there's a big news story and we can see who does it best.
ReplyDeleteSo BBC has Paxman and Martha
ReplyDeleteITV has Trevor and me Julie ..
Two greys and two blondes
Big contest really...
Eagerly I awaited Trevor M's News at Ten on ITV. But as soon as I heard him announce that their Headline was to be an interview with a dead whore's Pimp . . I returned to the BBC and Newsnight. Is ITV in a time-warp? Their interview was years' too late, and News is what's happening NOW. It's like having an interview with Monica Lewinski. Talk about rummaging through the rubbish in Hello Magazines dust-bin left unattended in an alley off St Martin's Lane? NEWS is what this nation needs . . . not pulp fiction from Mills and Boone.
ReplyDeleteI turned on News at Ten to witness the historic revival of the "bongs" but they did something very odd with them - I thought they used to time the headlines between actual live bongs, didn't they? Last night there was a bong, then a great long rambling headline, then another bong and a shorter headline, so a shorter interval before the next bong etc. This made it clear that they were not the actual bongs from Big Ben, and was most unsettling. Bongs should be regular not messed about. I might take my stopwatch to it tonight before switching over to the BBC for some proper news.
ReplyDeleteIt wasn't much cop. Perhaps there was too much hype in the first place. I wish I had watched BBC News as I would have liked to have seen the John Simpson report.
ReplyDeleteI cannot stand Trevor McDonald. he comes across as a stuffed shirt, lacking warmth or any sense that what he is saying should have some meaning.
ReplyDelete“The Palace” was unbelievably bad. The set for Buckingham Palace courtyard reminded me of the famous cardboard sets for “Prisoner Cell Block H”. It didn’t quite sway in the wind but it looked as if it might do. The characters were fantastically risible. The best bit being the mysterious entrance of the Prime Minister’s Press Secretary, who obviously manifested herself in the Throne Room, as she had not been checked by security (or everyone would know who she was). In real life, the poor King would be so tied to his diary that everyone would know who he was seeing. King Edward VIII showed signs of independence but he didn’t last long. This was clearly made for people who believe all they read in the tabloids and a bit more besides.
ReplyDeleteI am sorry to disappoint Verity but all but a few planks of “H.M.S. Victory” have been replaced over the years. I presume that we cannot say the same for Sir Trevor McDonald.
Forgot the opening night of the new NaT but watched (some of) it last night.
ReplyDeleteFirst impressions were a warning - flying along the Thames to end on Big Ben, kinda like a jazzed up mixture of Hotel Babylon and Have I Got News For You. 'Oh dear' I thought. Worst impressions confirmed by trivial items. Then, mercifully, I fell asleep.
Must get my freeview working so I can get back to Sky. Really don't need Marxist Al-beeb or NaW's Look How Glossy We Are.
There goes Norfolk blogger showcasing just how Liberal he actually is.
ReplyDeleteYou and Nick Clegg (Mr. angry) are a team.
No wonder your party is dead.
Gary