2003/4
There is no real tabloid press in Spain. But there is a ‘pink press’. This concentrates on the lives of those who pass for celebrities in Spain, most of whom (it has to be said) are unknown outside the country. The TV version of this innocuous nonsense is the ‘discussion programmes’ which dominate daytime TV and which compete ferociously with each other. These are fronted either by very attractive young women or by older women who, I am assured, used to be very attractive before age, cigarettes and the sun wreaked their cumulative havoc. These programmes usually feature a line or semi-circle of guests who either talk excitedly in turn or – far more usually – all at the same time. The decibel level is always high and occasionally arguments or even fights will break out. Mind you, it is often hard to tell, as most Spanish discussions resemble arguments, even on the heavier programmes. In fact, the Spanish verb ‘discutar’ actually means to argue. Anyway, the depth of these programmes can be gauged from the introductory chat to one this morning. On a day when Sky News was full of pictures of bloody terrorist atrocities in Istanbul and Baghdad, we were told in solemn terms that the programme would be showing the pictures the entire world had been waiting for – Michael Jackson in handcuffs. The programmes do, though, reflect Spanish society in one very significant way – they make a fetish of conversation. Talking is something the Spanish do a great deal of and there can be no doubt that they are very good at it. The seriousness with which they regard it can be discerned from a tale told to me this week by my elder daughter. She was discussing different cultures with a group of female teachers in their 40s. During this, the Japanese were dismissed as a very boring race, the members of which preferred to visit tourist sites and take the same pictures in lieu of having a drink, going for lunch and, yes, just chatting. The inference was clear – talking to the Spanish has the status of a valid hobby or pastime. I did fleetingly ask myself whether it would appear on Spanish CVs but immediately realised that, unless other activities such as pot-holing, transcendental meditation or solitary praying were listed, it would naturally be taken for granted in respect of every candidate.
All Spanish TV channels are commercial and so carry advertisements, which take up a significant proportion of each hour of what might loosely be termed viewing. And then there are the product endorsements issued out of the blue by the programme hosts, gushing with specious conviction about some product’s merits. When I came to Spain just over 3 years ago, this mid-programme puffery was relatively infrequent but now it is almost common-place. If you really were desperate for a reason not to watch Spanish TV, this might just be the answer to your prayer. Worst of all, though, are the cash-strapped local TV stations. Their speciality is a banner ad running along the bottom of the screen during soccer matches. Three years ago, these only used to appear when play had actually stopped. They have since progressed – through discrete stages – to their current permanent status. I’m not sure that the situation is as bad on radio but last night I was listening to a soccer match when the main commentator suddenly burst into song, to be joined a few seconds later by his companions. This turned out to be a jingle for some product or other. Seamlessly, they then shifted back to the usual semi-histrionic chatter that characterises soccer commentaries here.
One thing I still find hard to take in Spain is the acceptance of pictures that are far gorier than in any other country in which I have lived. And I’m not talking here about pictures of bulls with glistening flanks. More the compulsory shots of pools of blood [or even bits of brain] resulting from ETA murders or road accidents. Today we had TV pictures of the murder of a US hostage by hooded Islamic terrorists. To be sure, we didn’t see the actual decapitation but we did see the knife drawn, the head thrown back and the blade applied to the throat. And then we were treated - over this frozen scene - to the screams of the victim mingled with cries from the perpetrators of Allah Akbar! Who knows what we’ll get tonight during the peak hour news bulletins.
I needn’t have wondered about missing the pictures [Letitia’s wedding] because the same 3 [or 4] channels spent the entire afternoon and evening doing what Spanish TV does best – having six or eight people sitting in a semi-circle analyse every conceivable aspect of the day. Much of this I cannot take but I did enjoy this comment before switching off - “The Infanta Elena does look absolutely beautiful but she needs to be more careful about how she walks.” Nothing too trivial for these ‘programmes of the heart’. Heartless, more likely.
There is an ad showing on Spanish TV which has ‘Land of Hope and Glory’ as the backing music. Next time I see it, I will be less slack-jawed and will seek to understand what on earth the connection might be with the product or service being offered.
I have a low opinion of Spanish TV. For those interested in seeing them, my views are set out in detail in ‘Initial Observations on Spain’ on my web page [colindavies.net]. They haven’t changed since I wrote them two years ago. So I was amused to see a dismissive description of Spanish TV in the 2004 edition of the Rough Guide to Spain. I was particularly taken with the suggestion that much of Spanish TV is merely ‘televised radio’. This is a reference to the many shows which involve a panel of up to 10 people who talk [more usually shout] all at the same time. These luminaries face the camera but have their backs to an audience which sits in serried ranks behind them. However, it has occurred to me that these are, in fact, essentially visual programmes in that the radio would not require the participants [of every age] to have plunging necklines and mini-skirts. Nor, on radio, would one get the full value of the facial gestures and gesticulations that are a necessary concomitant to the ‘discussions’. And the occasional fights make much better TV than radio. By the way, I have been told recently that there is a very large mirror behind the camera, allowing both the panel and the audience behind them to see the faces of the ‘celebrity’ participants.
Talking of words, I believe I have invented groinding. This is the grinding of [normally female] groins, a staple of Spanish TV. So, one of this year’s contenders for the brainless-summer-beach-hit features a young woman doing her stuff in front of 3 Masai warriors leaping up and down. Not surprisingly, their timing shows a complete disregard for the ‘music’. And who can blame them?
Another thing that happens in summer is that the miniscule amount of time devoted to serious TV evaporates with the sun. The kids being off school, all the early morning discussion programmes are replaced by cartoons, films, American teenage series and endless adverts. All dubbed by the same two women and three men, regardless of the ages and roles of the actors.
The first few hours of watching the Olympics have been predictable in two respects:- 1. Ads were frequently shown during the opening ceremony, and 2. the most featured ‘sport’ so far has been beach volleyball. This, of course, involves young women in bikinis but it has the added advantage that it involves hand signals behind the back. This affords plenty of legitimate opportunities for the groin shot so favoured by Spanish TV directors.
My friend Manoel tells me that the Greek accent is very similar to that of the Spanish. This is not the only thing they have in common, it seems. Although most events in Athens are being contested in empty stadiums, beach volleyball has proved a sell-out. Likewise, coverage of this event continues to dominate Spanish TV coverage of the Olympics.
My friend and fellow-blogger Manoel [theremon.blogspot.com] has taken me to task for suggesting that Spanish TV Olympics coverage is dominated by beach volleyball. He says that this is only on for the first half hour each day. Fair enough. But, as I said to him, if anyone Spanish is reading our stuff, I imagine he stands a far greater chance of being lynched than I do.
It’s been instructive watching the games on Spanish TV. As in every other country, the focus is on those sports in which nationals are taking part. And, at the end of each event, prominence is given to these in preference to the winners. So, for example, at the end of the women’s 1500m final the camera quickly moved from Kelly Holmes to the Spanish girl who had come in 10th. Kelly’s historic achievement of winning two gold medals played fifth fiddle to the Spanish runner’s account of why the race had not quite gone according to her plan. But then, as I say, this goes on everywhere.
Ah, the summer really must be over – one or two of the TV channels have re-instituted their early morning bow in the direction of serious programming. As ever, it is amusing to see that even intellectuals in Spain all talk simultaneously. Though at least they don’t shout and/or go for each other.
Another statistic which is troubling me – the Spanish are reported to use 40% more energy than equivalent homes in the rest of Western Europe. What on, for God’s sake? It certainly isn’t home entertaining. Perhaps it’s a reflection of the fact that TV viewing peaks at midnight and goes on well beyond. Or perhaps it’s all the illegal downloading of films and music, in which the Spanish are the acknowledged European leaders. Or both.
The News presenters on Spanish TV are falling over themselves to establish their ‘informal’ credentials. Off have come the jackets and now the ties. And today we had the weather forecaster in trainers. Where will it end? Presumably things will not go quite as far as the Canadian programme Naked News but we can live in hope. I speak, by the way, only of male presenters. Their female companions still dress as if they were going to a formal ball where décolletage is compulsory.
It’s the custom for Spanish TV presenters to hold a stack of crib cards and work their way through them. This reeks of old technology, if that is the word, and it is amusing to see what happens when they lose track of where they are. It’s hard to understand why – like the newsreaders - they don’t use an autocue. One theory I have is that, since the audience always sits behind the presenters, the director doesn’t want to run the risk of someone reading the autocue and shouting out the ‘witty’ commentary in advance.
Does anyone out there know why Spanish TV doesn’t show the score during football matches? The consensus here is that this forces you to keep watching until it’s briefly flashed onto the screen after each 15 minutes. But I regard this as so contemptuous of the viewer that it couldn’t possibly be true. Could it?
The government and the owners of the private TV companies have reached an accord around the content of children’s programmes, specifically ‘telly rubbish’ [tellybasura]. Under this, the hours between 6am and 10pm will be free of degrading content by Christmas. Coincidentally, this is the deadline I have set myself for learning Mandarin, Thai and the click language of East Africa. It will be interesting to see who makes more progress. If the government is successful, I guess we’ll have about 15 hours of white space per day on our TV screens next year.
Reading the culture pages of El Pais today, it belatedly struck me that Spanish papers don’t carry reviews of the previous night’s TV. But, then, how many times do you want to read ‘It was pure bilge’?
Just when you think you’ve seen everything on Spanish TV along comes Junior Pop Idol. The couple of minutes I could bear to watch of this featured a nine-year old girl groinding ferociously in imitation of Britney Spears and her ilk, supported by several other pre-pubescent poppets also dressed as jail bait. A veritable field day for paedophiles, I would have thought. It was a relief to get back to the news and the pictures of carbonated bodies and blood pools in the streets of Falujah. Excruciating junior talent shows we have had before but nothing to match this in its dreadfulness.
The precocious 9 year old I wrote about the other day appears to have been Spain’s contestant for, would you believe, Junior Eurovision. In fact, she won it last night. This explains why we were treated this morning to an extra dose of prepubescent groinding on the TV.
Isn’t it a bugger when you think you’ve invented a word and then find you haven’t? I combined ‘groin’ and ‘grinding’ to make ‘groinding’, the favourite shot of Spanish TV directors. And, although this doesn’t appear in the Shorter Oxford Dictionary, Google comes up with 22 citations. Ignoring obvious typing mistakes and porn sites which seem to embrace every word ever invented, it appears to mean some sort of material. See this fascinating document – The Influence of Wheel Surface Speed on the Grindability of Groinding Material.
One of the presenters on a TV gossip show tonight had a miniature Yorkshire Terrier as a fashion accessory. The dog, needless to say, made a more intelligent contribution than anyone else; it sat on the notes of its owner and refused to budge.
The already-insufferable 9 year-old who won Junior Eurovision last weekend has her own two-hour spectacular on TV later tonight, at the peak viewing hours of 11pm to 1am. Yes, this really is peak viewing time in Spain. So it’s not surprising that children’s programmes finish at 10pm.
I had the pleasure of watching half an hour of a South American soap opera this afternoon. Despite the background music of crashing cymbals, strident violin chords and a frenetic flamenco guitar, I could just about make out what was going on ….. Beautiful young woman marries older, rich owner of large hacienda; shortly after the ceremony in the mansion house, new bride slips away to have it off [or slips off to have it away] with her real love against the fence of the adjacent bullring; sister of new husband emerges from the shadows, denounces the lovers but then collapses into the sand before she can tell the rest of the wedding party; expiring from some unknown fatal illness, she begs the couple for help but is promptly suffocated by the new bride in front of horrified but static lover; the bride then ululates with manufactured grief, bringing everyone else into the bullring; as they mill about in sorrow, a nasty looking cove with a pigtail tells new bride that she would be well advised to pay him not to inform her aristocratic new husband that, apart from being a murderess, she is [worse] the daughter of a famous whore. At this point I had to leave but I would be happy to bet that our heroine’s day got even worse. Possibly one of her legs fell off.
A TV programme has come up with an effective way to stop panel members – even during hi-brow discussions – from talking simultaneously. Each participant has a long, proboscis-like microphone in front of them which retracts into the woodwork when the director thinks they have said enough. So, even if everyone talks at the same time, they can’t be heard. Quite ingenious. And amusing to watch. Of course, it won’t catch on. [It didn’t].
It’s hard to know how much further advertising can go in Spain. And just how much Spanish consumers will tolerate. Even the national channels have started to do what the cash-strapped regional channels have done for a while and run banner ads along the bottom of football matches whenever the ball is dead. Not to be outdone, the regional channels now don’t even bother to wait for this. Even worse, one of the national channels has started to show a ‘flier’ for its next programme during soccer matches, at a highly irritating frequency of every couple of minutes. And radio is no better. Driving back last night to watch a match on TV, I heard the kick-off on the radio. No sooner had the match started than the channel went into 5 minutes of advertising. A little later, the two commentators began to sing a duet about the sponsor’s products. I kid you not.
There was a terrible killing in Iraq yesterday, when several gunmen ambushed 3 members of the organisation responsible for the January elections. If you were in Spain, you’d be able to see newspaper pictures of the unfortunate men actually being shot in the head. And, lucky us, we’ll probably get a video of the action on TV tonight, provided the murderers had the foresight to take along a video recorder as well as a still camera.
2005
Sky TV today showed us David Beckham answering a press conference question in Spanish that was even more execrable than his English. This was bad enough but I could hardly contain myself when Sky praised it at ‘creditworthy’. Suffice to say it was so bad that Spanish TV had to put subtitles below him.
The Panel of The Wise [sic] which superintends the public TV channels has proposed that the government subsidy be increased from 5% to 50%, so that the volume of ads can be reduced. If I could bring myself to watch any of the programmes, I could get quite excited about this prospect.
Before the royal marriage announcement drove it into a day-long frenzy, Sky News headlined its bulletins today with the story of a midnight fracas at a new IKEA store on the outskirts of London. This came complete with dreadful pictures taken on someone’s camera, followed by an interview with a chavette whose baseball cap appeared to be covered in zircons. The latter’s beef was that she and her 65 year old mother had been left stranded in the middle of the night as there was no transport back home. This, she seemed to think, was everyone else’s fault except her own. But, you will retort, surely the Sky interviewer pointed out that she and her mother had been imbecilic to go shopping in the middle of the night without knowing anything about transport arrangements. And you would be very wrong. Instead, she was accorded victim status and given a prime TV slot that would have graced Nelson Mandela. Oh, brave new world. I must find something else to do when enjoying my first coffee of the day. Neither Sky nor the coffee are good for my blood pressure.
Today was the last day of the EU Constitution campaign, the vote being on Sunday. I’m not saying it was entirely one-sided but living under the German Propaganda Ministry of the 1930s must have been a bit like this. Normally, serious discussions on Spanish TV are as rare as hens’ teeth after 9.30 in the morning but last night there was little else. Except they weren’t discussions, but monologues. I’m sticking my neck out and saying that, despite the barrage of promotion, the turn-out will not be much above 40%. If I’m wrong, I’ll eat a lamprey instead of humble pie.
Switching on the TV this morning, I was confronted by a pair of breasts covered in what looked like cling-foil. This turned out to be a bra-substitute called – and I’m not making this up – ‘Lift It Up’. I have written to point out that it should be ‘Lift Them Up’ but, as ever, am not expecting a reply.
The ‘Committee of the Wise’ which has been considering Spanish TV for the last 6 or 7 months yesterday came up with their recommendations. These are that the government [i. e. the taxpayer] should assume the existing debts of the TV companies and, in future, pay half the running costs. This, they say, would allow the volume of advertising to reduce to something like the level of other European countries. In addition a sort of quango should be formed to supervise the content of the programmes. The right-of-centre El Mundo splenetically pointed out today that the main beneficiary of all this would be a company owned by one of the main supporters of the socialist government.
El Mundo is still rather agitated about the proposed changes to the TV franchises which they claim will financially benefit the leading patron of the socialist government. Strangely enough, the left-of-centre El Pais has had nothing to say on this subject. But, then, it is owned by the individual in question.
The executives of a TV company have been arrested for large-scale fraud. Their simple scam was to solicit premium-rate phone calls in search of a prize for the answer to a simple riddle. Operators were instructed to keep the callers on the line for a minimum of 35 minutes. The unanswered riddle is how this obviously-phoney programme managed to run, to my certain knowledge, for at least 5 years before anything was done about it.
Saturday and Sunday night TV gave us the annual Mister and Miss Spain competitions. These programmes epitomise the telly-rubbish [telebasura] which is regularly excoriated by the heavier newspapers - five minutes of programme followed by ten minutes of advertisements; sponsors’ announcements during the parades; regular commercial presentations by the glamorous ‘presenters’; phoney prizes from cosmetics companies along the way; endless fore and aft ‘crutch shots’ of at least the female hopefuls; and regular plugs along the bottom of the screen for the channel’s upcoming programmes. Plus, this year, the fashionably essential humiliation of the contestants not going forward to the next round. And all this spread over more than three hours, starting at 10pm and going on until way past 1 in the morning. All in all, it’s hard to see how the producers could achieve anything more insulting to the viewers. So, naturally, the programmes achieve huge ratings.
I forgot yesterday to mention the worst aspect of the Miss Spain programme. Halfway through the announcement as to which young ladies would and wouldn’t go through to the second round, one of the judges leaped up to say that they’d got it all wrong. So, some of the girls who had been painstakingly and humiliatingly rejected were now re-instated and, worse, some of those who had gone through were now even more agonisingly rejected. Talk about Reality TV! The mistake was put down to a printer error. Of course. These pesky modern printers with a mind of their own!
Definitely the last word on the Miss Spain contest – Given that almost every one of the young women was an Identikit Hispanic beauty - of almost the same dark features, height and measurements - it was exceptionally hard to choose between them. However, before I went to bed, I decided that Miss Lleida did, in fact, stand out from the crowd. So it was a bit of a surprise to read the next day that she’d come second, behind a contestant whose only real distinction seemed to be that she was slightly below the average. The Spanish rumour mill, always working overtime, later theorised that this had been because the judges’ panel had had included several ex-beauties whose TV careers depended on not being too threatened by newcomers. As if!
Spanish TV was advertising a 5 CD history of the late Pope even before he’d had time to settle in his grave. The background music is from Verdi’s La Traviata so I guess it must have escaped the publishers that this is the story of a prostitute who didn’t quite come good. I imagine the Pope is having a good laugh, forgiving the sinner if not the sin.
Reality programmes are a money-spinning godsend for what passes for prime-time TV in Spain. For not only can you churn out endless variants on the basic voyeuristic theme but you can build on these by involving friends and family of the inmates in a studio discussion of every banal development, in the certain knowledge that they will end up hurling abuse at one another. Usually en masse. If you want to get some idea of what this is like, take a look at the interchanges on the BBC’s Strictly Dance Fever between the ‘nasty’ judge, Arlene, and the female dancing coach, magnify the volume and intensity by ten and then imagine it going on for hours on end.
I see that one can now buy a zapper which will [surreptitiously] switch off every TV in the world, though not all at once of course. It’s called TV-B-Gone and seems ideal for Spanish cafés and bars where no one is watching the intrusively loud box in the corner. Or even where they are.
Just picking up on yesterday’s dubbing theme . . . Possibly even more irritating than the use of the same few voices in every film is the dubbing [by the same bloody voices!] of the actresses used in TV ads, even though they’re clearly speaking Spanish. The actresses are chosen, of course, for their beauty but I suppose the dubbers’ voices are preferred because they’re comfortably familiar. They could hardly be anything else! Strangest of all is the dubbing into Galician of every Spanish language film or soap opera on the local channel, even though there can hardly be anyone in Galicia who doesn’t understand Spanish. Not surprisingly, a local paper last week featured the burgeoning Galician dubbing industry. I suppose we can expect a lot more when the nationalists get one hand on the reins of power. I wonder if English films are dubbed on Welsh TV.
In Madrid, the Socialist government trumpeted it was taking the politics out of TV and then promptly gave most of the new channels to a left-wing media magnate. The owners of the right-of-centre El Mundo say they’ll appeal to the Supreme Court about the shoddy treatment of its own digital candidate for more air space.
Sky TV today asked its viewers whether the war on terror had ‘made the world a less safer place’. Less surprising than the response was the fact that none of the well-educated, highly-paid Sky journalists seemed to realise this is bad English. What will it be next - more safest?
The BBC’s successful celebrity ballroom dancing TV program has naturally been copied around the world. I caught a bit of the Spanish version last night. There were two immediately obvious local touches. Firstly, the celebrity performing was one of Spain’s large army of more-than-middle-aged, still-long-haired, overweight female singers. These do not make for sexy disco dancers. At least not for me. And they don’t like to give up the microphone for anyone, which does little for continuity. The second local aspect possibly reflects the fact that, although the Spanish love a good argument, they’re not comfortable with direct criticism. So, instead of a single panel of ballroom experts who might be expected to get a little insulting, there were effectively two panels. One was composed of fellow celebrities who could be relied on to tell the Diva how stupendous she was and to give her ridiculously high marks. And the other comprised 3 experts who said very little but brought some reality into the marking. All in all, it was wildly OTT. Just as you’d expect.
There was an horrendous road accident in Bangkok recently, when a drunken driver ploughed into a group of policemen arresting another driver at the side of the road. I would be capable of answering almost any question about this incident, thanks to Spanish TV’s decision to show it 3 times in quick succession on the evening news. Just in case anyone missed any of the gore the first and second times around, I guess.
The word used by the serious press here to describe this sort of TV is ‘telebasura’, or ‘tellyrubbish’. Unfortunately, there’s very little else on offer. But, if this is the price the country pays to keep out a Murdoch-type tabloid press, then it is surely worth paying. No one is forced to watch it and the high quality press remains safe from the tabloidisation which has destroyed the great UK newspapers.
My daughter in Madrid has passed on the comment of an Australian friend on Spanish TV – They seem to think a pause is indicative of weakness.
Most primary schools in Spain reopened today, after the long summer holidays. Here in Pontevedra, the rolls are 2% down on last year, despite the influx of ‘immigrants’ [a euphemism for North Africans]. One positive consequence is that serious TV programmes have returned to the 9-10am slot, replacing the pan-channel cartoon shows and sweet adverts of the summer. No one is allowed to be serious during a Spanish summer. And it’s frowned on during much of the rest of the year as well.
It must be a shock for the Spanish when they first hear, say, a Chinese accent. For in films shown here both in cinemas and on TV every single voice is dubbed by one of the same 5 or 6 people [I refuse to say ‘actors’] who provide the voices for everybody of any age and provenance in every film. I feel the Spanish should stir themselves and riot against this. It must violate some race law somewhere. As well as annoying the hell out of me. If you haven’t noticed.
TV directors here are in perpetual quest for pictures of blood or gore. So it was too much to expect that they would not bring us the stained handkerchief used to prove the virginity of the bride at a recent big gypsy wedding in Andalucia. The other stroke of luck they’ve had this year is the high number of gorings during the summer’s bullfights. Not a lot of blood in fact – at least not of the human variety – but plenty of exciting action to reprise. And reprise.
I’ve said before that the only serious TV programmes here go out around 9am in the morning, the equivalent of 7am by my rule of thumb. This is when most channels show a panel discussion on matters of the day, e.g. how long will it be before Catalunia sails off into the sunset. All of these are hosted by an attractive woman but you can tell the programmes are serious because these are in their thirties, not their twenties. And they all wear elegant blouses. I’ve noticed, though, these have at least one button more undone than would be the case on UK TV, with inevitable results. Perhaps this is necessary for the microphone to function properly. Then again, perhaps not.
Watching Frank Skinner tonight, it dawned on me that chat shows are not big on Spanish TV. But then a format in which just one person talks and everyone listens in silence is never going to catch on here. They much prefer panels of ‘celebrities’ who talk/shout/ fight all at the same time.
Spain has a monarchy, of course. And, just as in Britain, no world or domestic event can outrank certain developments in the life of the royals. Today the headline item on the morning TV news was a 3am pregnancy-check visit by the lovely Princess Letitia to a Madrid clinic. I had hoped it wouldn’t be the lead topic on the 9am serious discussion programmes but was, naturally, disappointed.
The BBC’s highly successful celebrity ballroom dancing program has been emulated all over the world. I guess it was too much to expect the Spanish version to do without the divas who dominate the TV here and whose rickety bodies are several decades older than their faces. The upshot last night was perhaps the world’s slowest ever quick-step. Excruciating. But a lovely – if rather rigid – smile.
I see the Sky News team has had the brilliant idea of converting itself from a group of staid news readers into a troupe of 5th rate chat show hosts and guests. My already-low tolerance threshold has now reduced to around a minute before I want to put a foot through the screen. Just like watching Spanish TV.
Visiting
2006
I see newspapers and TV channels now offer ‘Weblogs’. In other words, professional reports dressed up as blogs. I suspect the only similarity with the real efforts of us amateurs is that you can post a comment to them. And so pretend you’re part of a major news organisation. I suppose it’s cheaper than phoning in your inane comment and waiting for someone to read out ‘Baz in Croydon thinks the world would be a better place if all blacks was white’. I wonder when Sky will get round to asking viewers to vote on whether alleged sex-offenders should be strung up without a trial. Can’t be far off.
I’ve mentioned that - in contrast with Portugal - few Spanish TV and radio announcers seem to take the trouble to learn how to pronounce foreign names. Thus it was that yesterday I learned that the writer of The Phantom of the Opera was André Joyd Webber and that his ex-wife was Sara Breegman. My Spanish friends insist the Portuguese are better at this merely because their culture is very influenced by the British but I can see precious little evidence for this claim. When taxed, the usual argument is that Britain and Portugal have been allies for 600 or more years, ‘usually against Spain’.
To get back to sanity - The Spanish are not renowned for being animal lovers so it’s intriguing [and heart-warming, no doubt] that the TV News programs of the last few days have contained items about the confused Thames whale and the demise of the native British red squirrel at the hands [claws?] of the American grey interloper. Yes, I know whales aren’t animals but you know what I mean.
So Celebrity Big Brother in the UK was won by a woman who was a phoney pop star, planted by the TV producers. She’s won 25,000 pounds but is expected to make a million more in the next few weeks. This just about says it all about today’s mass entertainment in the UK. The only positive comment one can make is things are even worse elsewhere, naming no names. It makes one pine for Roman circuses. At least they were exotic, albeit fatally so for the stars. A feature which is surely overdue for a comeback.
On British TV last week, a prize was offered to whoever first answered correctly the question In which battle did the ship HMS Victory take part? Hastings, Waterloo or Trafalgar? Since two of these were on land, I think we can be forgiven for suspecting the real purpose of the exercise was not to test the intelligence of the viewers but to generate revenue from premium rate phone calls. Though I guess I may be overestimating the historical knowledge of the British public at large.
The BBC’s successful ballroom dancing program has been emulated around the world. Here in Spain it’s called ‘Look who’s dancing’ and features – charitably speaking – a range of celebrity performers. Despite [because of?] this, it’s very successful. And since Spanish TV directors feel you can’t get too much of a good [more often, very bad] thing, as soon as one series finishes, the next begins. Or putting this another way, it’s on every week. The big difference between our version and the original is in the ratio of talking to dancing. But I will leave you to decide in which country the lips of ageing divas move a great deal more than their legs.
A year ago, the government set up a ‘Committee of the Wise’ to review the state television set-up. Earlier this week, a journalist member commented that nothing in Spain could compete with it for corruption. But now he’s confessed to having put his foot in it, as all he meant to say was the TV companies were excessively extravagant. Which sounds plausible, doesn’t it?
On today’s early TV news we were treated to the sight of umbilical cords being cut, frozen corpses being lifted into a helicopter and what was left of a car and its driver after it had crashed into a statue at high speed in the middle of Madrid at 4am this morning. Is it any wonder Spaniards leave their breakfast until mid morning?
One wearisome similarity between the UK and Spain is that you can’t switch on daytime TV without being bombarded by ads for easy credit. My guess is these relentlessly represent about 90% of the total, featuring such companies as Credial, Cuentaexpres, Cuentahorra, Creditagile and Imagine. Mind you, it’s not as irritating as watching the Sky News presenters going through their pathetic comedy routines. At the moment, the two main readers are Irish. Can one imagine French newscasters dominating a Spanish channel? Or – even more surreal – English newscasters fronting an Irish station? Sometimes one can have too much equality. But I suppose it’s fair revenge for centuries of Irish jokes.
Optiline is another of the easy credit companies that monopolise daytime TV here. Needless to say, all of these use premium phone lines, making it a no-lose situation for them. Either you get a loan and pay astronomical rates of interest or you don’t but run up a massive bill during the rejection process. Or both. Perhaps it’s all nothing but a phone scam and no one’s got any money to lend at all. So, before the bubble bursts, I’ve registered a new company – SukaCash.
I’m regularly amused by the coyness of Liverpool Victoria’s TV ads for its life insurance policy. These assiduously skirt round the word ‘death’, preferring such phrases as ‘whatever may happen tomorrow’ and ‘when you are no longer around’. But who knows, perhaps even the Catholic Church these days prefers such pieties as ‘Pray for us now and at the hour of our no longer being around.’
I’m contemplating getting one of those TV-B-Gone zappers to switch off the TV no one’s watching when I’m trying to read the papers in my regular café. Though what I’d really like is an Idiot-B-Silent gadget for people who confuse shouting with talking and insist on letting us all in on the details of their lives. Even better would be a Smoker-B-Vaporised machine. But I’m possibly getting fanciful now.
I used my newly-arrived TV-B-Gone to switch off the two TVs in my regular café today. As expected, during the hour I was there reading the papers, no one even noticed. Not even the staff. One of the reasons was that it didn’t actually produce anything like a silence. There was a HiFi on as well as the TVs.
Streepers is what the Spanish call strippers. In the past couple of days my blog has been hit by people looking for streepers for women and reality shows for streepers. Perhaps it’s a TV executive doing some research fir a new prime-time program.
Ana Obregon is a 40-something reconstructed blonde who is a staple of Spanish TV sit-coms. She tells us today she’ll soon be starring in a new show which will be ‘different, daring, original and unique in Spain’. It will centre on the lives of 6 or 7 women and – apart from at least 12 prominent breasts – will surely have a large quotient of flying pigs.
As of now, I’m not at all clear which Spanish TV channels will be showing the imminent World Cup. And I’m not convinced anyone else is either. My impression is things won’t be clarified until we have a court verdict on a case being brought by some established channels against two new channels recently set up by the government and allegedly owned by some of their major financial supporters. Worrying times.
This week we’ve been told Channel 1 has the youngest viewers, Channel 5 the oldest and Channel 2 the richest. Frankly – having seen the programs – I’m surprised they have any viewers at all. At 11.30 tonight, for example, we have one of those documentaries which are the staple of serious TV in Spain – An examination of the important societal role played by female breasts. But at least it’s not another analysis of the problem of prostitution.
I’m not sure why but the Spanish public radio and TV company [RTVE] has proposed to the unions a deal under which 4,000 of its employees will be allowed to retire at 52 on 87% of their salary. Not only that, they’ll be allowed to take another job without this affecting their pension. Nice work if you can get it. It’s taxpayers’ money, of course, so painlessly spent but I personally think it would be better invested in fixing my teletext service, which hasn’t worked properly for several months now.
The Bank of Spain has expressed concern about the growth in personal credit. On daytime TV here – as in the UK – most of the advertising now relates to easy loans. In an article on this, I read there are actually 400 consumer protection companies in Spain – which came as something of a [pleasant] surprise. The oldest and biggest still goes under the name of The Housewives Association, which shows perhaps just how far feminism hasn’t gone in Spain.
Today’s Spanish media announced we’re shortly to see a new program on TV. This will centre on some sort of contest between recently married couples and will be called “Till TV does us part”. Doubtless the inevitable break-up of a few fragile relationships will be justified as a valid social experiment. What a world.
It’s Tour de France time again. This has a Spanish leg so there’s much TV coverage here. I can just about understand someone going into the street for a few seconds to see the two-wheeled circus fly past but I simply can’t get my head around people spending hours watching it on the TV. Perhaps they’re taking a break from watching paint dry.
Daytime TV in Spain is frankly dire. Possibly the worst items are the high-on-music, low-on-dialogue soaps imported from South America. One of the latest is set in an ‘elite’ school and features adolescent girls whose uniform consists of tight white shirts, black mini-skirts and high-heeled leather boots studded up the side. A paedophile’s dream.
The determination of Spanish women to remain glamorous until they pop their clogs does at least give us the satisfaction of witnessing some sights to which words simply can’t do justice. The TV, of course, is full of them, forever reminding me of my brother’s dictum that it’s amazing what you see when you don’t have your rifle with you.
Ana Obregon is a paradigm of Spanish TV – a reconstructed ‘blonde’ in at least her 50s who always seems to play women of more tender years. In fact, it wouldn’t surprise me if she was the voice of all the female parts in the numerous dubbed teenage dramas imported from the USA. Anyway, she stars in a much-hyped, new series tonight. A Spanish version of Desperate Housewives in which she runs a sort of hotel for women who’ve been cheated on by their husbands. Promising. If you’ve got absolutely nothing else to do with your life. A preview in one of this morning's papers described the show as 'high comedy'. I'm sure it will be; but not quite how the writer meant.
I will confine myself to giving you one critic’s views of the Ana Obregon program I mentioned a couple of days ago. This was a failure, by the way, achieving much lower audience figures than expected. But I will return to this theme tomorrow. . .
This new series at times recalls, unhappily, the ill-fated ‘Ana y los siete’ and gives an excessive response both to the incomprehensible interest of ‘la fantastica’ in frequently appearing semi-naked and to her unforgivable need to have everyone constantly telling here how marvellous she is. What have we done to deserve this Calvary? What sins have we committed? Do we Spanish really deserve such punishment however stupid we are? Probably yes, for according to Gustavo Bueno “You get the TV you deserve”. Amen to that
I suppose there must be some Spaniards who resent the fact us Anglos regard them as a pretty law-avoiding lot. Though I wouldn’t bank on it as everyone here seems aware of the general norm that you don’t obey any rules which you find personally inconvenient. And then there are the very visible examples such as the flagrant ignoral by the TV companies of the law obliging them to give at least 11 days notice of a change of program. This offence is committed frequently and with complete impunity, most often as ‘counter-programming’ designed to torpedo the first episode of a competitor’s new series. Which is what was done to Ana to Obregon last week. But the government has said it’s had enough of this abuse and is going to put a stop to it. Demonstrating yet again that core Spanish quality of pragmatism, it’s announced the 11 day notice requirement will be reduced to 3. This will do wonders for the statistics and, of course, send out the message that crime doesn’t pay. As if. What it also means is the TV schedules will now be even less useful than they were before. But this, of course, is the very essence of Spanish planning; it’s not to be taken too seriously. There’s always teletext if you want to know what’s possibly coming on in the next 5 minutes. What more do you need?
A final word on the Ana Obregon program. Well, two. Firstly, it’s now been described as the Spanish version of Sex in the City, as well as the Spanish version of Desperate Housewives. Though both of these were rather more successful, of course. Secondly, one of the 6 women in the hostel for betrayed females is a nun. I wonder who cheated on her. As they are traditionally regarded as being married to God, there seems to be only one candidate.
Only in Spain? – A rather fat and ugly transvestite who is a regular participant in the abysmal TV gossip shows has been arrested for involvement in international prostitution. Couldn’t have happened to a nicer guy/gal.
Munching my daily fibre intake this morning, I had the opportunity to witness a classic bit of what the Spanish call ‘tellyrubbish’. One of the queens of daytime TV introduced a ‘debate’ about the growing tension between celebrities and journalists. Flanked by 14 of these facing the cameras in a semi-circle, she solemnly pronounced each participant would have just one minute to present his/her views. There immediately followed a short but fierce argument, at the end of which the hostess announced 5 minutes of adverts. Compelling viewing. At least for those with the IQ of a slug. I didn’t wait for the inevitable bun fight once the attempts at discipline went up in smoke.
When a singer mimes to a record on TV – possibly called ‘lip-synching’ these days - this is known as El playback in Spanish. And Le playback in French. So ‘playback’ must be of Latin origin. Who’d have guessed it?
Over Christmas, I had the pleasure of watching the final of the BBC’s ballroom dancing competition, in which celebrities were partnered by professionals. It was a real joy but I couldn’t stop thinking about the Spanish version, which is at least twice as long and which features vastly more talking and showing-boating by celebrities ranging from buxom young women to geriatric divas who’d be happier performing on a Zimmer frame. Not to mention lengthy advertising segments. Not quite the same thing.
Within a minute of getting into my car in Santiago this morning, I had to illegally cross a solid white line because someone had double-parked on a main road. And in the café I stopped at for a coffee I couldn’t hear myself think for the TV in the corner showing one of the daytime shows featuring big-breasted blonde bimbos bawling at each other. But it’s great to be home.
The regional TV channel tells us that ‘Tradition dictates New Year’s Eve be given over to musical galas and humour’. If I were a TV watcher, nothing could depress me more.
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