Boggles the mind

[cosmolinguist]

Before it became The Train Fiasco day, last Monday was quite good. When we got on the train, Andrew told me about Richard Whiteley, who'd just died.

"He was a TV presenter. He did Countdown, you remember that, we saw it once."

"Oh, the people playing Boggle on TV!" We'd seen it at his parents' house not too long ago. Andrew took great delight in announcing that this had been around for twenty-some years and was wildly popular. It's as if he thinks we USians might not have TV shows with an odd-looking, awkward host and contestants playingg Boggle and doing arithmetic. For twenty years.

Then Andrew said something that surprised me: "It's a shame, because they'll probably cancel the show now." He said Richard Whiteley was part of the institution this game had become and it wouldn't be the same without him.

A couple days ago, Andrew sent me the link to what Richard Herring said about him in his blog:

I was walking alongside a man who was talking on a mobile phone. He was clearly receiving some bad news. "Oh no, that's terrible," he said, with no irony in his voice. He then turned to me, keen to unburden his news even on a stranger and said, "Richard Whiteley has died."

"Oh no!" I replied and even gave this stranger an encouraging pat on the shoulder. He hadn't recognised me off the telly and thus thought I should know, he just thought it was important enough news to tell a stranger. Which I think shows the regard the man was held in.

I don't think there are many deaths that people would feel the need to share in this way and I am sure there were many young people who had enjoyed Whiteley's work in an ironic post-modern fashion for so many years would now find themselves hit in an unironic fashion by his unexpected demise.

Richard Whiteley, I think, was like one of the family. In the sense that he was always there, sitting in the corner of the room, making rubbish jokes and who you openly chastise as a bit of a prat. Because he was always there you never considered how you would feel if suddenly he wasn't and I think this makes the shock all the worse. There was no pretension about him and in some ways only limited ability - I always thought my dad would do about as good a job...

I might be wrong, but I don't think there's that kind of connection between quiz shows, hosts, and the general audience in my country. I'm not a good one to ask, though; I don't like game shows much and I certainly don't watch them (and at one point avoiding Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? in my house took a bit of effort). So maybe I'm atypical, but when I find myself contemplating what would happen if Pat Sajak or Alex Trebek were replaced, I can barely muster a whole shrug.

But British people love quiz shows. No, really. That Whiteley's death received the response it did--the random-strangers-must-hear-this, for instance--is some indication of that. As is the fact that his obituary mentions some fan who was cremated to the 30-second Countdown signature tune.

And Andrew told me again about Mastermind, which is apparently a show where you sit in the dark and answer questions on your previously-chosen "specialised subject"--which will be something like The History of Lancashire County Cricket Club or The Eleventh-century Japanese Tale of Genji and Lady Murasaki--and then on general knowledge.

But that's just what it is. What it means I can't say; I've never even seen it.

It seems very British somehow, having something so interesting and catchy as "I've started so I'll finish" as a catch-phrase and being invented by a guy who was inspired by his experiences as a prisoner of war being interrogated by Nazis.

I do love this country sometimes.

Comments

yesterday's mastermind

[atommickbrane.livejournal.com]

Vertical take-off Harrier jets

Chequers

The Who

The Discworld Novels of Terry Pratchett

Similar, if not quite as on a large scale as Mastermind not as big c Cultish as Countdown, similar sentiments were felt when original host Magnus Magnusson passed away.

[ivana-duboise.livejournal.com]

Bob Barker. I doubt The Price Is Right would survive without him. I don't even watch it now that they have different models since my childhood memories.

[cosmolinguist]

Hm; you may have a point there. Like I say, I'm not one to judge, but I can see that. He keeps getting older but the girls stay the same age...

Man, I used to watch that show all the time during the summers when I was little. Children now are spoiled, having cartoons on all day. It wasn't like that when I was young! So, yes, lots of The Price is Right and lots of Love Connection type stuff.

Oh, and The People's Court.

No wonder I don't like TV now!

[ivana-duboise.livejournal.com]

I remember a few days I missed school just to watch The Price Is Right. It always seemed like day-time TV after 11 was just horrid though. Talk shows and TV courtrooms.

[cosmolinguist]

And soap operas. Gah.

[ivana-duboise.livejournal.com]

My step-mom would always watch 'her soaps.' My dad now has to make sure to tape them for her everyday since she now works when they're on.

[cosmolinguist]

My mom calls them "her stories" and one of the reasons she gets excited about summer vacation is that she can watch them.

[tiltcorazon.livejournal.com]

Richard Whiteley started his TV career as a newscaster on Yorkshire Television and he'd built up quite a bit of affection before he started Countdown, so here in my part of the country his loss is felt even more deeply. And on an even more local level deeper still, as he was born near and died in the town where I live.

Get Andrew to tell you about Nicholas Parsons sometime. I'll be distraught when he goes.

[cosmolinguist]

Yorkshire gets its own Television? Is that normal? Yeah, I read he was from Bradford, which I remember because I've heard about it from you, and Bill Bryson.

[stealthmunchkin.livejournal.com]

ITV used to be/ officially still is an American style network, where each small region has its own broadcaster, which buys in programs from other broadcasters and does its own scheduling. So if you were to travel to, say , Bradford from Manchester in the 80s, you'd see Yorkshire TV rather than Granada.
They'd all put the big main programmes on at the same time, so everyone would see Coronation St at 7:30, for example, but smaller programs, or those bought in from forn parts, might not be shown on all stations, so in Manchester you might get a repeat of The A-Team while in Newcastle they were watching Knight Rider or whatever.
That all changed with the deregulation of broadcasting in the late 80s/early 90s, which you've heard me complain about a lot. A lot of the smaller ITV companies (and even some major ones like Thames and London Weekend Television (Thames did London's TV during the weekdays, LWT on weekends)) lost their licences, and then the bigger ones started buying up the other ones that were left, so essentially now there are only two ITV companies - Carlton (which got the London franchise when Thames & LWT lost it) and Granada (based in Manchester) - and the two copmpanies work so closely together and are in each other's pockets so much they're essentially one.
You still get regional news bulletins though, broadcast by the local TV companies, some of which have kept their names (don't know if YTV did). The regional one for Manchester is Granada Reports, which I may have shown you once just so you could see what the real Tony Wilson looks like.

[tiltcorazon.livejournal.com]

Next time I'm over, would you like me to bring my collection of ITV company start-ups? You might be a shade too young to remember daily startups, but some of the company logos should cause major rosy glows.

If you want to be really creeped out, I could show the fake startup and closedown I made with a friend.

[stealthmunchkin.livejournal.com]

That would be great. Unfortunately, though, at the moment we're TVless...

[tiltcorazon.livejournal.com]

Eat flash, TV-less boy!

http://625.uk.com/tv_logos/flash.htm

[tiltcorazon.livejournal.com]

Bill Bryson has been back to Bradford a few times and has said nice things about it. He's still a has-been, though.

[stealthmunchkin.livejournal.com]

Holly's heard a few episodes of Just A Minute, but she'll never truly understand him because she's never seen Sale Of The Century.

[hephaestos.livejournal.com]

Trebek might be missed, although certainly not on the level you describe here. I think the show would go on without him though, after all it predates him (I think Gene Rayburn had it before).

Nobody I know of gives a damn for Pat Sajak (or Vanna White either, for that matter) but maybe I'm just projecting. :)

[cosmolinguist]

Well, yeah, if I saw Jeopardy! (which is the only game show I find really tolerable, though I still won't go out of my way for it) and it didn't have him on, I'd think oh, that's weird and it kinda sucks, but it wouldn't be something I would tell people on the street.

And as for Pat and Vanna, I bet my grandpa gives a damn, but more in the "I'm going to be angry if anything changes" way than the "oh, someone died, that's too bad" kind of way. :-) He'd still watch it, of course, because it'd still be on before his beloved Daily 3 and Powerball numbers, but he doesn't even like getting new t-shirts, much less new people on Wheel of Fortune.