tv – Page 18 – Rob Mansfield: Content-ment

Snooker loopy

It’s World Snooker Championship time again and the BBC goes into overdrive with saturation coverage on BBC2 for the next two weeks.

I know that the game of colourful balls has its detractors, but I can honestly say that it is a totally different proposition live to how it comes across on TV.

As a former student in Sheffield, I took the chance to watch some of the live snooker at The Crucible, back in 1991 and 1992, the era before Ronnie O’Sullivan and when the likes of John Parrott and Steve Davis were still in their prime.

Being in the theatre, watching them play in front of you was quite a novel experience. It was nowhere as quiet as you think it is – there were constant coughs, splutters and muttering and the referees spent a lot of time quietening down the audience.

I’ve also spent a few hours with a cue in hand trying to pot those pesky balls and, believe me, those guys make it look darned easy and it’s not!

Anyway, I’m going to be enjoying the coverage and the skill that it entails over the next couple of weeks.

Bill Oddie’s Bird Food

Bill Oddie is as well-known now for presenting Springwatch on BBC2 and being the acceptable face of birdwatching than as a comic in the 70s and one third of The Goodies.

And it seems as though Bill is now cashing in on his more recent flush of success with a range of Really Wild bird food on sale in all good garden centres and pet shops.

When I went to my local garden centre yesterday, you couldn’t miss it, sitting on a stand emblazoned with his face and all manner of bird food products, including bird seed, suet pellets, bird cake… the list seems endless.

Bill seems to be following in the footsteps of the likes of Barry Norman with his own branded product.

I interviewed Bill Oddie a few years ago and he was a very genial chap, kinda exactly what you see on the TV.

In fact, his one big beef seemed to be that the BBC never truly accepted The Goodies for being anything more than a kids’ programme and, in spite of its success, he had no qualms about the trio’s decision to defect to ITV for the final series.

ITV scores own goal with Pushing Daisies

In one of the most baffling decisions by a TV broadcaster for a long time, ITV has decided to only show 8 of the 9 episodes of new US comedy drama Pushing Daisies, so that the series will finish in time for Euro 2008.

More odd still, the episode they’re banishing is No.2, the one that should have been shown this Saturday.

Now it’s too early to say whether I’m a massive fan of the show, but this strikes me as one of the weirdest things I’ve heard in a long time.

If a show isn’t performing well in the ratings, it’s standard practice to shift its time slot, so it doesn’t hurt overall viewing figures or advertising revenues, but Pushing Daisies has only been on one week so far.

It’s also weird, given that this is the first US import that ITV have bought and scheduled in a primetime evening slot since the 90s and their head of commissioning was waxing lyrical about it at the press launch only the other week.

Dare I venture that it’s no wonder that ITV is faring so badly in the ratings war when they’re willing to make crass decisions like this?