This is television without any of its dignity

Syndicated to newspapers on 20 July 1967

THE MOST INTRACTABLE problem confronting a TV critic is to convince anyone of importance or significance in this land that the little box should be taken seriously.

Yet there it is, seeping into the marrow of our society, insidiously and subtly changing habits, tastes and attitudes at a speed unprecedented in the history of mankind.

Yet how can one respect a medium, or get anyone else to respect it, when it can lavish time, money, energy and thought on programmes like The Golden Shot or To-night With Dave Allen?

Even more distressing is the fact that both of these fatuous exercises have been put on by ATV, one of the programme companies that has just had its licence renewed for another six years.

Many forms of imbecility are tolerated in the name of entertainment. A critic who lost his temper with all of them would eventually have to be put in a straight jacket [sic – Ed] before undertaking is evening’s viewing.

Appeal

But, I think, some protest must be registered when standards are being debased — even if the genre of programmes is already so low that it is rarely off its knees.

The Golden Shot is a TV game demanding less intellectual knowledge than Double Your Money and far less physical dexterity than Beat the Clock.

As such, it should make an immediate appeal to all those with neither minds nor muscles.

The sole trick demanded of a competitor is to sight a target, press a trigger and hit a bulls-eye. The only difference between this game and those shooting galleries one sees at every local fair is that the equipment is expensive, gimmicky and electronically controlled and that practically no skill is required.

The one tiny idea is repeated over and over again with only an occasional singing group to break the monotony. Sometimes the contestants direct a blindfolded cameraman to hit the target, other times they handle the instrument themselves and the big bonanza prize (100 guineas) goes to the person who can snap a thread with the steel bolt that acts as the projectile.

The repartee used by the compere, Jackie Rae, to jolly up the studio audience and the contestants has the authentic note of grim desperation.

Learning that one of the participants was named Mrs. Sadler, he brightly asked, “Not your ballet company, is it?” Most of the others he treated as if they were on a psychiatrist’s couch with reassuring phrases about how happy, content, calm, and relaxed they looked.

Not surprisingly this idea is imported from Europe, where a god deal of moronic TV comes from. I suspect most European governments are terrified of the implications of TV and are only prepared to tolerate it if it is reduced to the proportions of a national yo-yo.

Ultimate

Like most TV programmes of this sort, the ultimate appeal depends upon the cupidity of the viewer. For doing practically nothing — merely being lucky enough to be chosen — he can win a spin-dryer, a tape-recorder, or cash.

He is not embarrassed by being asked such demanding questions as who wrote Hamlet or to conclude the expression “Home sweet …” (‘Do you need some help … you know … a place people live in … h … h … ho … ho … that’s it. Home! … the jackpot prize is yours!’). As such, it should please everyone except those concerned with the dignity and the potential of the medium.

To-night With Dave Allen is a late-night conversation programme that makes the Eamonn Andrews Show sound like the Brains Trust.

Presided over by an amiable Irish comic who made his reputation imitating drunks, Dave Allen’s more intelligible contribution to the conversation are the repeated assurances that he is Irish and that he doesn’t know very much. (“All I know about tennis is the word love.” Hysterical applause!)

His guests are an embarrassing mixture of cranks, eccentrics, publicity seekers, and serious people. Even the most trivial issues are reduced to almost dwarfish proportions under Dave Allen’s prodding.

Amazed

Having Roberto de Vicenzo, the British Open golf champion, on the programme, he asked him to drive a golf ball. The studio audience, by their rapturous applause, seemed amazed that he could do it.

An expert on etiquette was asked the provocative question: “What about general etiquette — sitting down, standing, walking?” On this vital issue a girl in a mini-skirt showed she could keep her knees together.

A night club singer, trying to raise support for a musical, sang a song with lines like: “Whatever happened to the guy named Joe. Who asked me to marry him and I said no.” which should not make her task much easier.

And Nicholas Monsarrat, the novelist, was being asked questions about The Cruel Sea, which he wrote almost 20 years ago, and had to stand round shuffling while listening to an idiosyncratic justification of the flat earth theory which was cut off just as the speaker was going to tell us about some flying saucers that landed in Dover last week.