I’m off for a few days, to do some interviewing for a forthcoming seasonal podcast for The Stage. Rest assured that the weekend’s Strictly Come Dancing scoresheets will be available form Friday as usual, and I’ll be back for the usual video review on Monday.
In the meantime, the comment space on this post is handed over to the Loppies, as their previous post has been getting unwieldy.
You Only Live Twice Radio 7, 12.00pm
The first of several programmes this week on the BBC networks tying in with the cinema release of the latest Bond film, Quantum of Solace and the centenary of Ian Fleming’s birth (see also last week’s reading of Casino Royale by Alex Jennings). Michael Jayston stars in this adaptation of Fleming’s 12th James Bond novel.
Saturday Play: The Late Mr Shakespeare Saturday Radio 4, 2.30pm
As a boy actor, Pickleherring played Viola, Juliet and Cleopatra for Shakespeare’s own theatre company. Now in his 80s, he finally discovers what it mean to fall in love… Jim Broadbent stars as Pickleherring in this adaptation of Robert Nye’s play.
The Fourth, The Fifth, The Minor Fall Saturday Radio 2, 7.00pm
Possibly singer-songwriter Leonard Cohen’s most well-known work, the song Hallelujah has been covered by over 120 artists including Jeff Buckley, Rufus Wainwright and John Cale. Elbow frontman Guy Garvey explores the history of the song, meeting artists and recording engineers involved in various versions of the song.
Elaine Paige on Sunday Sunday Radio 2, 1.00pm
The Ian Fleming/James Bond theme to the week continues, as Miss Paige presents a special edition featuring some of the most beloved Bond themes, musical scores and a few surprises.
Classic Serial: On The Beach Sunday Radio 4, 3.00pm
Mike Walker adapts Nevil Shute’s post-apocalyptic novel. As radioactive clouds roll across the globe, Commander Towers and his crew arrive in Australia, where they discover a radio signal coming from Seattle…
The Choir Sunday Radio 3, 6.30pm
BBC Radio 2 Young Choristers of the Year Sunday Radio 2, 8.00pm
As the final rounds of Radio 3’s Choir of the Year approach, Aled Jones catches up with current champions, Chantage. Later on, Radio 2 hosts its finals to find the young Choristers of the Year, in an event due to be recorded in St Paul’s Cathedral today.
Drama on 3: 24 Weeks Sunday Radio 3, 9.15pm
Scriptwriter Tony Marchant, perhaps best known for his TV works including Holding On and The Mark of Cain, presents a provocative new play about abortion. Part of Radio 3’s Free Thinking festival weekend, the play is due to be recorded tomorrow, Saturday.
15-Minute Musical Wednesday Radio 4, 11.00pm
The series of spoof musical satires returns with Washington High School Musical, in which school pupils Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton compete to be president of Washington High. Richie Webb, David Quantick and Dave Cohen are on writing duties with Webb, Dave Lamb and Vicki Pepperdine performing.
Friday Night is Bond Night Friday Radio 2, 7.30pm
Concluding the Bond-themed radio programmes for the week, Mike Dixon conducts the BBC Concert Orchestra and a host of singing stars in a concert celebrating the music of the Bond films. Performers include David McAlmont, Mica Paris, Tom Baxter and Jodie Prenger. Some of TV Today’s resident Loppies were in attendance, thanks to Lee Mead performing From Russia With Love — his performance hasn’t been mentioned in the programme notes, but hopefully will be included in the broadcast. (UPDATE: They were two different concerts. My error completely — many apologies!) During the interval, David Arnold talks about his composition of five Bond scores and his album of Bond covers, Shaken and Stirred.
Private Peaceful Friday Radio 2, 9.15pm
As Remembrance Sunday approaches, Radio 2 takes the opportunity to repeat this four-part adaptation, read by Robson Green, of Michael Morpurgo’s 2004 novel about brotherly love set during the First World War. The same author’s War Horse will be airing on Saturday 8th.
So I was at the press launch of Strictly Come Dancing today, which was structured so much better than last year’s event. Held at the Cafe de Paris, events kicked off with Bruce Forsyth seemingly confirming the rumours that this series, the sixth, would be his last — but delivered in a way which meant that no-one really knew if he was joking or not. Some really badly written banter between Brucie and co-host Tess Daly didn’t really help matters — but once all the professional dancers came out and treated us to a group jive, all was forgiven.
It was my first opportunity to see all the professional dancers performing ‘live’, and in the intimate venue it was thrilling to watch.
And then it was time to meet the contestants…
TV Today’s second anniversary passed last month without much fanfare. A year ago, we compiled some geeky stats about which articles had been the most popular and the such.
There was a particular reason why we didn’t repeat that this year: one group of people has completely dominated the comments section of TV Today. Whereas most of our posts are lucky if they receive comments reaching into double figures, some have had comment threads with well over a thousand entries — so many that, on occasion, I’ve had to close the threads to avoid our web server going into complete meltdown.
The origins come from TV Today’s blog reviews of last year’s theatre casting show, Any Dream Will Do. A number of the contestants amassed fan followings, but perhaps unsurprisingly the ultimate winner, Lee Mead, acquired the largest fanbase. One particular grouping of Lee’s fans coalesced almost excatly a year ago — and tomorrow sees the anniversary of the name they acquired for themselves.
Yes, it’s a year since the birth of the Loppy…
Tomorrow sees the I’d Do Anything semi-final, which means that in just eight days’ time we’ll know which actress the public has cast in the role of Nancy in Cameron Mackintosh’s forthcoming production of Oliver!.
TV Today has, of course, been reviewing each week of the show online, while Zoe Tyler, vocal coach and judge on predecessor shows How Do You Solve a Problem Like Maria? and Any Dream Will Do has been doing the same for The Stage’s weekly print edition.
Next week, we’ll be recording a podcast discussion looking forward to the final and looking back over the previous eleven weeks of auditions, callbacks, sing-offs and saves by the Lord. If you’ve got any questions or comments about the series that you’d like Zoe and me to discuss, then please either leave them on our podcast blog or email them to podcasts@thestage.co.uk. Please don’t leave them as a comment to this entry.
All comments need to be received by 10am Tuesday morning, and the podcast will be online from Thursday.
The BBC has responded swiftly to Kevin Spacey’s criticism of musical theatre talent shows, TV Today can exclusively reveal this morning, by commissioning a search to find a character actor worthy of one of Shakespeare’s most difficult roles.
This time next year, audiences will be asked to find a male actor to play Shylock in a new production of The Merchant of Venice. I understand that the BBC is in talks with the Old Vic to put on the resulting show, and have asked Spacey to head up the judging panel.
My source tells me that the BBC are keen to downplay the stereotypical aspects of the Jewish money lender. “This will be a very twenty-first century production,” they tell me. “Although we could stipulate that Section (2)(A) of the 1976 Race Relations Act were to apply, auditions will be open to all, regardless of race or religion.”
Other judges have yet to sign up, although it is thought John Barrowman may not appear, for fear of over exposure.
The new show, with a working title of PRICK ME!, will be auditioning early next year, with the first programme airing the week of April 1 2009.
While we’re going to be dissecting every episode of I’d Do Anything here on the blog, I did also promise that we’d be extending our coverage into the print edition as well.
That coverage starts with this week’s issue, as we welcome our new columnist who will be charting the ups and downs of all the would-be Nancys and Olivers throughout the series. No stranger to the Saturday night judges’ panel herself, vocal coach Zoe Tyler will be writing exclusively for The Stage print edition each week.
So if, like me, you regret that this year’s judging panel will only consist of performers, have no fear — The Stage will be on hand to offer considered expert opinion, in print as well as online.
The first dribbles of I’ll Do Anything news have started to trickle through, with the announcement that the judging panel for 2008’s BBC1 musical theatre talent show will include Barry Humphries alongside old hands Andrew Lloyd Webber, John Barrowman and Denise Van Outen.
Those who only know Humphries via his alter egos, housewife superstar Dame Edna Everage or Australia’s cultural attaché Sir Les Patterson, may be scratching their heads at his inclusion — but he is actually better qualified than any of the other judges when it comes to Lionel Bart’s Oliver!…
It’s coming round to that time of year again, as the selection process for the Eurovision Song Contest rolls around again. What us oldies still insist on calling Song for Europe and which in recent years has been called Making Your Mind Up has now been renamed again. This time, the song selection show will be called Eurovision - Your Decision.
Thankfully, the inexplicably well employed Fearne Cotton will not be involved this year. Instead, the job of co-hosting with the omnipresent Terry Wogan — and possibly overruling him when the winner is announced — goes to the irrepressible Claudia Winkleman. Terry, meanwhile, will be assuming the role of head judge in addition to being host for the TV show.
While the contest is (notionally at least) about the songs being entered rather than the acts selected to showcase them, all attention this year will once again be focussed on the singers of each shortlisted song. In a break from previous years, the six finalists have been split into three groups: soloists, girl groups and (of particular interest to longtime TV Today readers) Joseph versus Maria.
The latter category will see former Any Dream Will Do contestant Rob McVeigh pitted against a former finalist for How Do You Solve A Problem Like Maria? Simona Armstrong.
In the other categories, singer and former EastEnders actress Michelle Gayle will compete against former X Factor finalist Andy Abraham, while the girl groups consist of duo LoveShy (Aimee Kearsley and Emma Beard, who previously competed in Popstars: The Rivals) and three-piece The Revelations (Annika Magnberg, Sarah Vitorino and Louise Masters).
Those of us who have proper jobs will have to wait until this weekend’s omnibus to see Andrew Lloyd Webber’s 3-episode cameo in Hollyoaks, which sees wannabe actress Summer Shaw (played by Summer Strallen) stalk the peer until he gives her an audition for Connie’s replacement in The Sound of Music.
Of course, Strallen herself is already contracted to take on the role of Maria. And now Lord Lloyd-Webber has admitted that Strallen’s character in the soap was concocted after Strallen had already been cast for the Palladium job:
The proposal initially came from Coronation Street producer Tony Wood. But Lord Lloyd-Webber turned him down, until Wood moved to Hollyoaks and the idea was revived.
Strallen was cast as the replacement for How Do You Solve A Problem Like Maria? winner Connie Fisher six months ago.
The 23-year-old then entered Hollyoaks in October.
I’m in two minds about this. On the plus side, it shows that people are thinking of more and more ways of promoting the joys of live theatre to a TV audience. On the other, the character of ‘Summer Shaw’ was often presented as single-minded, selfish, obsessed with fame and frequently unlikeable. While every profession has people like that, it’s hardly the best impression of actors to expose to a teenage audience.
I’m also wary of any blurring of the lines between dramatic presentation and advertising — it comes dangerously close to product placement. Is creating whole storylines and characters for the purposes of promoting a product or service really the way we want our television drama to go?
TV Today readers may not have noticed, but we have a new podcast available for download now, featuing Nuala Calvi’s interview with Sound of Music star Connie Fisher.
During the 50-minute interview, which was conducted before Christmas, Connie talks in detail about her time on How Do You Solve a Problem Like Maria?, her transition to West End leading lady, her much-publicised illness and her friendship with both Andrew Lloyd Webber and fellow TV talent show alumnus Lee Mead.
Connie also talks about one of her post-theatre jobs, in the ITV drama Caught in a Trap. She will play the fan of a musical performer (in her case, Elvis Presley) whose obsession takes over her life.
Aren’t we relieved we don’t know any people like that? :-)
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There’s buckets of good telly on over Christmas - be it on BBC1, ITV1, BBC2 & Channel 4 or any of the myriad digital channels.
Mark and I will be watching lots, of course, but may not be commenting too much on it (although each of us will attempt to pop in later in the week).
In the meantime, we wish all our readers a very happy Christmas.
And if you need some extra reading material to get you in the mood for When Maria Met Joseph on BBC1 tonight, why not peruse the interviews with Connie Fisher and Lee Mead, as published in last week’s print edition of The Stage?
Some advance notice for TV Today readers. The Christmas issue of The Stage will feature interviews with the West End stars who got their break from winning TV musical talent shows:
Lee Mead, currently starring as Joseph in Joseph and The Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat
Connie Fisher, Maria in The Sound of Music
Danny Bayne and Susan McFadden, Danny and Sandy in Grease
The Christmas issue of The Stage will be in the shops on December 20. Get your orders in now!
As we head towards December, the traditional end-of-year lists start to be collated.
We tried doing an online survey last year, but I made the mistake of including “write-in” elements in some categories, which resulted in a fan-led effort to have Richard Armitage labelled the “unsung hero of the year”. Considering the praise and public profile he had received during 2006, it kind of rendered the whole enterprise useless.
If we do the same thing this year, we’ll build in more protections to ensure that such hijacking won’t recur.
The full survey will be launched next month, but for now, I’d like to open nominations which Mark and I will consider when drawing up our shortlists.
In particular, we’re looking for your ideas for the TV event of the year. This could be a TV series or one-off show — but it could equally be something behind the scenes. Anything which had an impact on British television will be considered.
Either use the comments below, or email them to tvtoday@thestage.co.uk. The best entries will form part of our 2007 poll.
(And don’t worry, Loppies — I already have ‘Lee winning Any Dream Will Do’ down on my list, so you can put your thinking caps on for something different…)
There were a couple of things that irked me about last night’s National Television Awards, and I’m not including the Kelly Osbourne/Doctor Who thing, as I couldn’t bear to watch the ITV2 aftershow.
For a start, Ant and Dec cried plaintively that “it’s been a tough couple of weeks”. Yes, because the show you hosted was earmarked as having diddled TV viewers out of millions — and no one lost their jobs. They had the temerity to congratulate the Saturday Night Takeaway team as well. Congratulations for what? Not getting the sack for ongoing, persistent and wilful noncompliance that defrauded the general public? That got me so angry, I nearly laughed at one of Sir Trevor Macdonald’s awful, scripted jokes just to cheer myself up.
The other thing was the additional phone vote for Most Popular Talent Show — and not just because the closing deadline was given as the highly nebulous “start of part five” (what’s wrong with picking a specific time and sticking to it?)
It being October, it’s National TV Awards time again — in recent years, one of the most predictable awards ceremonies going. One of the main reasons for the predictability is that because votes are collected online, it’s increasingly susceptible to fan-based campaigning. Not for nothing has Doctor Who won Most Popular Actor, Most Popular Actress and Most Popular Programme for two years on the trot. Mind you, in the acting categories David Tennant and Freema Agyeman are only troubled by soap actors, thereby happily ignoring any other form of drama in 365 days of British television.
Although it came after Musicality, which has good claim to be the original musical theatre reality show, it was the BBC’s How Do You Solve A Problem Like Maria? which turned the selection process over to the public and triggered a series of similar shows, most successfully Any Dream Will Do.
Now, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation has become the latest to buy the format from the BBC, and like the original series, will be looking for a new Maria von Trapp. To be shown in Summer 2008, the theatre production duties will be handled by Mirvish Productions.
Actor and former Boyzone pop moppet Stephen Gately, currently touring the UK with Godspell, has been interviewed by This Is Lancashire. As a former West End Joseph, he was asked for his opinion on the current show and its method of selecting the star:
I think Lee is going to be really good, but I’m not 100 per cent sure about him even though he has a great voice. I thought Ben was really cute and he could have played the role with a lot of innocence. And I liked Craig too, but he has the looks but not the voice. I think overall those kind of shows are a really good way for actors who have been on the scene for years to get their break.
That’s a comment that’s likely to get the Loppies talking, if nothing else…
Remember Seamus? Well, it seems that, after his embarrassingly reworded version of Close Every Door, he has finally been promised a show of his own: a Michael Jackson tribute show.
Thriller Live, which toured in the spring, goes back on the road this autumn with an updated cast including not only Seamus, but Zoe Birkett, the highest-placed girl in the original series of Pop Idol (she came fourth behind Darius Danesh, Gareth Gates and Will Young).
Our what’s on section will have more details anon.
Meanwhile, Loppies: feel free to use this post…
No new Lee Mead-related news to report — but the previous Loppy post was getting far too unwieldy, so feel free to carry on below!
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