Oh the fall from grace - Martine McCutcheon

Being a soap star is a very precarious career choice. You are always under the sword of itchy writers who are looking to spark up ratings by killing a main character off. This is offset, however, by the fact that as an actor, the stability of working on a soap is a considerable advantage, rather than fighting through auditions, being cut off at the last five, taking the latest crushing blow to your already fragile self-esteem, sometimes struggling to string a decent diet together, to say nothing of rental payments etc.

Therefore, to be an arrogant soap star is a recipe for disaster. There's a reason Shakespearian actors don't take a career move to the cast of Corrie - it's credibility poison. It also says a lot about soap actors who think they are too big for the outlandish storylines, and paper-thin characters, and leave to better themselves and their careers.

With a few exceptions (such as Russel Crowe and Guy Pearce who both graduated from minor parts in Neighbors), soap stars invariably fail in their attempts to better themselves, ending up on sub-par ITV dramas, or late night quiz shows.

The latest example surely must be Martine McCutcheon. Usually when these washed up soap stars show up on cheap commercials, for say, Tesco home delivery, great lengths are gone to to remind the viewer of who this person is. A cheesy line from the fawning pleb usually suffices. McCutcheon apparantly, has become so irrelevant, she is not even afforded this luxury in the ad, and is merely a understudy to the delivery men. I wonder is the thought of playing a dippy Eastender seems like a comfortable alternative for our Martine now?

Technorati Tags: MartineMcCutcheon, RusselCrowe, GuyPearce, Neighbors, Tesco, commercials, Eastenders, CoronationStreet, acting

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Virgin Media - infringing on my Freeview

I have recently sang the praises of the vast improvement of Freeview since its inception. And I was sort of looking forward to Virgin Media stepping into the ring with their new channel, although I thought I was going to be missing out on the Eddie Izzard vehicle, The Riches, because the shitty all-in-one remote I bought doesn't function properly with my Freeview box, and therefore I cannot scan in new channels.

However, I woke up this morning to find my Ftn channel, which I was beginning to enjoy with their 15-to-1 repeats and X Files double bills offering some alternatives when required, now being hijacked by "Virgin 1/ We'll See You At 9pm".

Why must they muddle about like this? Why couldn't ABC1 and Ftn share the same channel number if room is to be made, or the two BBC children's channels (CBeebies and CBBC) share the channel numbers with the two BBC digital-only channels (BBC3 and 4). That would pave the way for at least three future channels (although the dearth of home-shopping channels would be a most welcome sacrifice for more quality fare).

Would Freeview not benefit from having more companies paying for their (increasingly valued, especially considering the terrestrial switch-off begins in early 2008) airspace? And would the consumers not benefit from greater choice of service?

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Propaganda statistics from drivers

Mike Rutherford from Auto Express magazine is being interviewed on News 24 about the recent rise on fuel tax. He has said that motorists contribute £55 billion per year in taxes. There must be a miscalculation in there somewhere, because that equates to every person in the country contributing slightly less the £1 billion £1 million (thanks P)* each, every year, never mind the fact of the fewer number of drivers on the road.


*P has pointed out, that if measuring the 1 billion to 9 zeros (rather than 12), the sum would actually come up to approxiamately £1000 a year per person.

Led Zeppelin reunion... with bloated consequences.

Apparently the 'one that nobody thought would happen' - reunion that is - Led Zeppelin have decided to regroup for a one-off show in memory of their one-time manager, and producer.

It seems as though this is reformation season, what with the Spice Girls, Police, Pink Floyd, Take That among others deciding getting the mates round for a nostalgia trip would suspend that mid-life crisis by a few years. (Another band the media have been touting as one of the recent reformees is Genesis - who the fuck cared that they were even apart - or together for that matter).

And with '20 million' people supposedly queuing up religiously (I would like to know how many of them are not touts, or touts' aliases), one thing can be guaranteed at this reunion. This will be the greatest display of self indulgence the planet will ever witness (at least in pop culture terms - let's not start listing some obscure African king, who decrees he must marry every woman in the country).

Anyone who has seen any record of the Zep at their zenith will be aware of their penchant for mastubatory gestures of their own grandeur. And indeed, nobody seems to deny the fact that it was the clashing uber-egos that split the band up in the first place.

Of course, the salivating millions will rejoice that they have heroes to worship that are as much of a dickhead as they wish they could be, and scramble to remortgage the house in order to get a back row seat, and regale to the grandkids that they were there as Plant kicked into his eighth fifteen minute solo on the lead spoon.

But the one good point out of all this of course will be to inspire yet more reunions of equally ego-massaging and cash-grubbing stature. One such one I am particularly looking forward to is if Ringo dies before him, Paul McCartney will surely announce a Beatles reunion tour.

Technorati Tags: Beatles, LedZeppelin, PaulMcCartney, Ringo, RobertPlant, SpiceGirls, ThePolice, TakeThat, PinkFloyd, music,

BBC bias at work again.

While on a night out in Belfast at the weekend, I was slightly alarmed at the extremely heavy police presence awaiting the emerging closing time crowd outside the Botanic Inn. For a crowd of not more than about 800, there was about nine armoured land rovers of police (excuse any inebriated memory inaccuracies), including two or three vanloads in combatative gear, flak jackets and batons.

I wouldn't actually object if there was a vanload of police posted to the area by default, because if any fights broke out, their reaction time (and thus preventative measures) would be invariably increased. However, this presence was clearly exaggerated.

Then, I noticed why there was such an increased volume of police officers. Weaving their way through the crowd was a camera crew for the current affairs show, Insight.
Clearly this was an orchestrated event, and was intended to show how the (predominantly) student crowd is a haven of drunken violence and debauchery.

Having been there, however, I can testify first hand that it was the most well-behaved post-club crowd I have ever been a part of, to its credit. I doubt that is the image that will be displayed on the show, however, and no doubt the crew quickly moved off to find a club where there was more action shots available.

Notably, within minutes of the camera crew's departure, the police quickly dispersed as well.

Technorati Tags: Belfast, BotanicInn, BBC, media, police

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