Search results matching tag 'Sky One'

Danny Dyer - the best worst presenter on TV

1704826 — Tue, 07 Jul 2009 08:53:00 GMT

Bravo is three episodes into Danny Dyer's Deadliest Men: Living Dangerously and it's become obvious that the series is so bad it's actually brilliant.

Dyer, who achieved a modicum of fame in the 90s Brit film Human Traffic, is now forced to draw upon all his acting talent to show that the people he is meeting are actually dangerous. And this acting skill pretty much revolves around gesticulating, pulling worried faces at the camera and using the epithet 'facking' to describe every encounter.

The series started with him living on a gypsy camp in Salford - it was quite good stuff - but last night's episode saw him meet some 'notorious' old drug dealer who I'd never heard of and clearly wasn't dangerous. In fact, the scariest it got for Dyer was when he went just off the coast of Brighton (or the 'High Seas' as Dyer described it) on his own (well, with a film crew) overnight. They both then had dinner on the yacht wearing their life belts.

Anyway it really is rubbish and a lame pastiche of Sky One's Ross Kemp franchise. Mondays 10pm Bravo - watch it, it's hilarious.

Loose Talk: Empire, Absolute, ESPN, Kinetic, Sky One

2458936 — Wed, 03 Jun 2009 16:16:00 GMT

Page 30 - media biEmpire's 20th birthday celebrations continued last Thursday, when Bauer execs gathered at Centre Point for a charity auction of specially commissioned photographs, raising £20,000. Empire managing director Stuart Williams hosted the evening, where signed photos of actors such as Mel Gibson and Arnie Schwarzenegger - as organised by Steven Spielberg - were sold in aid of Great Ormond Street Hospital.

In attendance were chief executive Paul Keenan and managing director of the men's division Geoff Campbell, as well as incoming FHM editor Colin Kennedy, Emap alumnus Barry McIlheney and MediaCom's Steve Goodman. Meanwhile, at the launch party for Absolute Radio's "Summer of Live", chief executive Donnach O'Driscoll invited guests to the rooftop of the Sanctum Hotel in Soho to listen to up-and-coming band The White Lies (pictured with DJ Christian O'Connell).

Spotted tapping their feet were Absolute's new commercial director, Chris Goldson, Mediavest's Patrick Whitnall, Vizeum's Zoe Schmid, Starcom's Victoria Gemmell and Manning Gottlieb OMD's Tim Pritchard and James Parnum.

Ashes team falls foul of Law on Lord's pitch
Forget this summer's Ashes, Bitch knows the important cricket tournament took place at Lord's Indoor school on 21 May. ESPN digital media's Cricket Challenge allowed players from UM, MediaCom, Mindshare and more to rub shoulders with star players including Devon Malcolm, Mark Alleyne, Stuart Law (pictured, far right) and Martin Bicknell. ESPN's Abeed Janmohamed organised the event but, sadly, couldn't organise a winning team.

The Ashes to Ashes team were true media - they didn't win, played hard and proved they couldn't hold their drink by spilling beer on the Lord's turf and knocking over their Champagne glass tower. A MediaCom, Mindshare and ESPN team took the cup, thanks largely to Law of Derbyshire, Essex and Lancashire fame.

Kinetic sweats it out in the '80s to raise funds
Last week's annual fundraising challenge by Kinetic involved staff clad in '80s spandex, sweating profusely and pedalling furiously on a static bike next to their colleagues - and paying for the privilege. The '80s Charity Spin, organised as part of the outdoor specialist's ongoing fundraising for Leonard Cheshire Disability and The Royal British Legion, included staff from JCDecaux, CBS Outdoor, Titan, Primesight and Mindshare. The gang paid a fiver each for the 90-minute session, which was conducted to a soundtrack of classic '80s hits. Bitch is reliably informed that everyone is "eager to do it again" except, perhaps, for JCDecaux's national sales director Jamie Lindsay, who had to nip off early to "pick up the kids". A coincidence, surely?

TV star sets record for the fastest stick-up
And finally: Clear Channel billboards received some PR on Sky One last week, when TV presenters Steve Jones and Konnie Huq competed on Guinness World Records Smashed! to see who was faster at pasting a billboard poster. The duo were helped out by Clear Channel's bill posters Mick and Mark, and T4's Jones even achieved a new record for the "Fastest Time to Put up a Billboard".

Pizza sponsorship - make it a new hate crime

1704826 — Mon, 23 Feb 2009 14:58:00 GMT

God knows how long Ofcom came up with its decision that Domino's Pizza's sponsorship of The Simpsons on Sky One breached its codes that are meant to restrict the promotion of HFSS foods to children.

Given that the adjudication extends to six and a half pages and includes various definitions from ASA and BCAP Codes as well as correspondence with some poor sod at Sky Media who had to put their case back to Ofcom, it is an investigation that would have put the Hutton Enquiry to shame. And all because the National Heart Forum had said that the long-running sponsorship failed to ‘observe the spirit as well as the letter of the rules'.

In the same Broadcast Bulletin adjudication, in which ITV and Highland Spring are also castigated for giving undue prominence to the water brand during an exchange on the British Comedy Awards, which if anything was sarcastic and in any case only attracted one viewer complaint, EastEnders was exonerated despite 90 complaints that its storyline was about paedohilia.

The majority of the complainants said that the subject, centred around Bianca's partner Tony who had started abusing her daughter when she was 12, was not suitable for a pre-watershed audience. Images of them kissing and lying on the bed together were also shown. Incidentally, EastEnders is transmitted at the same time as The Simpsons.

In its judgment, which extended to just three pages, Ofcom noted its responsibility under the European Convention of Human Rights that ‘information and ideas' must be ‘imparted...without undue interference'. Also that the programme prompted viewers ‘to respond to the Action Line...and to write to the programme makers outlining their similar experiences' and it was therefore OK.

At the risk of sounding like Richard Littlejohn, are we sure that Ofcom has its priorities right here?

Noel Edmonds is a national treasure

1704826 — Wed, 11 Feb 2009 10:44:00 GMT

Intrigued by the publicity surrounding ' mce_href=''>Noel Edmond's rant at the idiots at Wealden Council who refused a marine who lost both his legs in Afghanistan planning permission for a bungalow in his grandparent's garden, I tuned in to watch some of his Sky show - Noel's HQ - last night.

It was a peculiar show - a cross between That's Life, Crinkly Bottom and Esther Rantzen's Hearts of Gold - with Edmonds and his 80s sidekick Keith Chegwin performing to a highly-charged audience. The content focussed on rewarding people who had done good deeds - like a binman from Mansfield who had tackled a burglar - while exposing examples of that favourite tabloid expression, 'political correctness gone mad'.

Although I didn't like the show particularly I'm still glad that it's on the telly. OK, so Edmonds with his theories on cosmic ordering could be accused of being somewhere between Alan Partridge and David Icke and appears to have gone a bit strange but then what do you expect from a man who has spent his entire adult life surrounded by imaginary characters and puppets and manages to get excited about people opening boxes. The key point is that his heart is in the right place and the show does a lot more good than harm (Wealden Council has subsequently relented).

I doubt any other TV network would be brave enough to run the series but then again it's unlikely that they would commission anything as powerful or pro-armed forces as Ross Kemp in Afghanistan, an updated ''Return To' is also on Sky One at the moment. Both are unfashionable among cynical liberal media circles but that doesn't mean that they don't have a place. Surely that is the whole point of media plurality and it's good that Sky appreciates this even if no-one else does.

When swearing on TV is appropriate

1704826 — Tue, 03 Feb 2009 14:25:00 GMT

There are two TV series on at the moment and both are notable for the fact that they feature Scotsmen swearing profusely.

One features a multi-millionaire cook whose fortune has largely been accrued from the notoriety he has achieved from screeching profanities at people who are unable to cook a flan, amongst other things, to his liking.

The other is a powerful series featuring men from 5 Scots risking their lives on a daily basis, and for about 17k a year, in order to fulfil the will of the UK government, whose role is to protect our interests abroad.

One is on a public service broadcaster, which is currently waving the begging bowl for public funding; the other is on a relatively low-rent pure entertainment channel.

I can only guess that the two people who commissioned these shows were job-swapping that day.