ITV in the Face Episode 3: TV-am
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- Опубліковано 15 січ 2019
- Made in 2015 to celebrate 60 years of ITV, a look back at a time when it wasn't a single channel but a conglomerate of regional channels, all with their own idents and identity: occasionally bizarre, often charming, this is the show that looks the history of ITV in the face.
Episode three: TV-am. The eighties' morning glory and despair, starring David Frost, Anne Diamond, Timmy Mallett and Roland Rat.
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ITN should have won the contract - they had 28 years of experience in news gathering by 1983. They could have provided a news driven show, but tailored in a way which wouldn't feel heavy for viewers waking up at 6am.
Never realised that TV AM opened exactly a day after wearing car seat belts became law, UK.
The comment about Frank Bough and leashes had me chuckling for a good few minutes.
I loved watching TV-am in the 80’s and 90’s when I was growing up! It was the highlight of my life. I miss TV-am and I wished it would come back!
"Hemophiliac piggy bank"
🤣🤣
I am still on episode 3 and I already love your ways with words.
I'll give you the Anna Ford comment. She was a really beautiful woman!
Every time you call thatcher Pinochet in a dress I laugh my ass off because your not wrong especially by the end
If she would have been allowed to get away with it. She would have committed the mass murders he did with the miners and anyone who didn't like her.
@@jean-lucpicard5510but with a difference, Pinochet imposed his dictatorship abolishing democracy and closing any media that wasn't aligned with him, and add his big numbers on exiled from his own people.
If I was in charge of TV-am in 1983, I would have 6.00am-6.30am - TV-am First Report, a news digest. 6.30am-9.15am Good Morning Britain magazine programme with David Frost, Nick Owen, Anne Diamond, Gordon Honeycombe and Wincey Willis. Blending the mix together of soft features and news. Kept Parkinson and his missus at weekends. I would never have hired Robert Kee, a journalist but not a broadcaster, and Commander Philpott would never have set foot in the studio if I was there.
I love this series! Your writing and attention to details, combined with an acid wit are outstanding! BTW...I am from the Westward, TSW region (Plymouth) I remember the Westward colour titles from when I was very little and grew up with TSW and Westcountry. Thanks for the great memories! :)
I'm convinced Chris Morris's character of Denholm Reynholm in the IT Crowd is based in Bruce Gyngell.
Anyone who feels stressed.... WILL BE FIRED!!!!
Frost stood over a botched launch of LWT and TVAM. Both times misunderstanding what the viewers wanted
Frost gave what the viewer needed in his opinion and not what they wanted. He kept doing this, which shows a bit of a snobbish, North London set attitude from him.
If only David Frost had taken cues from what NBC's Today was doing.
Dude spent time in America so surely he would have been aware of how Today and GMA were perfecting the formula. And TV-am under Dykes just made Good Morning Britain a British clone of the Today show anyway.
@@johnking5174That’s why when he was involved with CPV-TV’s bid, it was rejected by the ITC
To be fair, TV-AM & LWT might have brought the viewers in after Frost left both, but where both low-brow broadcasters by the standards of the time.
Really the best solution was to go down the road the likes of Thames & Granada (Pre-1990s) took, which was the right balance of Populist & High-Brow.
@@johnking5174 It wasn't so much that he misunderstood, he just thought they were wrong.
TV-am host John Stapleton said of the original launch of both breakfast shows in 1983, both channels were doing what the other channel would be expected to do. BBC = hard news driven agenda was the expectation, instead we got a fluffy, magazine Nationwide style show. ITV = down to earth, fluffy, magazine format, instead we got a ITV version of Newsnight at breakfast. Totally wrong footing on both channels in 1983.
Now, this is a subject I don't really know anything about, so when Roland Rat of all people was first mentioned, I was STUNNED. Who could imagine him technically sharing a show with David Frost?
The Shedvision show on weekends
Had a PYE Tube Cube in white as a 8 year old in 1982 did watch Wide awake club and Wac a day and Roland Rat back then
My friends mum had one of those Pye Cubes. Young me thought it was so cool that he had a TV in his kitchen
I'm surprised that David Frost was given another TV channel to play with after the disaster he made with early London Weekend.
1968 to 1980 - 12 years and memories fade, or he had very good connections within ITV.
But they didn't give him London Weekdays in 1991. Unfortunately they gave it to Carlton.
I'll give you this: along with LWT and TV-AM, Frost went over to the United States to start up a newsmagazine called 'Inside Edition'. At first, it didn't do well because of Frost, obviously. So, Bill O'Reilly took over and then Deborah Norville and has since become a smash hit. For anything that Frost created, at least they found someway to find success.
I was surprised he was given the first one. Lol. I mean, what were his credentials at that point?
6 year old me was obsessed with the logo at 10:25. I would insist on painting it at school quite a lot. Also, Dick King Smith didn’t present Rub-a-thingy, he just did a bit about animals at the end. And yes, it was deathly dull.
I’m loving your ITV series. Wonderfully witty, and very informative.
Data run was apparently presented by Lulu's sister. I don't remember it but I was only 4 when TV-am started...
I really love this series
Perhaps someone can confirm, apparently the line to BT Tower from the TV-Am studios in Camden Lock was labelled "HOG" - standing for "Henly's Old Garage" from the car dealership days. Seems an odd reference to make, and oddly dismissive.
I love this - TV-am as a perfect analogy for the Thatcher years: glossy, big-shouldered, consumerist, seemingly modern yet empty at its heart,and consumed by its own greed and vacuity
This video is very impressive. Never liked Timmy Mallett when I was his target audience. I only watched Wacaday for the serialised Transformers cartoons. There's an urban myth that Mallett and the whole "Wacaday" thing was in fact a last minute replacement for a kids' show hosted by wrestler Big Daddy. Timmy Mallett is now a really likable and interesting artist/art communicater.
The Pye Tube Cube. It could only exist in the 80's. There's one as an exhibit in the Museum of Science and Industry in Manchester.
Time to go to Manchester!
(looks at price of round-trip flights from Kansas City to Manchester)
(looks at the price of hotels to stay in while I wait for two weeks in quarantine)
Okay, maybe later...
Another Manchester connection for you! The out of vision voiceover artiste in the Pye Tube Cube advert is Pete Baker. Back in February 1983 he presented the breakfast show on Piccadilly Radio. The same radio station that brought Timmy Mallett and Chris Evans on the road to fame.
I really want one to stick a Raspberry Pi in, maybe add teletext out etc.
Your writing is astounding at the end. Well done. I too enjoyed this station. I think I even posted one of my original videos of it.
TV-am could have been a success from the start, if David Frost hadn't been part of it. It was his high minded, high brow, upper middle class approach to breakfast television that ruined it from the start. "Mission to explain", was utter BS. At 6.00am when you are up, bleary eyed and just starting your day, the last thing you want is a heavy laden programme of news and interviews, which Frost seemed to want.
There were 7 applicants who applied for that back in 1980, including ATV, ITN and an applicant called AM-TV. You'd have thought that after the disaster LWT who included the name David Frost, they'd have never had him involved with another ITV franchise. Yet again the useless IBA went with him. And yet again the useless IBA did nothing (in exactly the same way as LWT) did nothing to interject and revoke its licence.
@@robertcomer2767 The IBA was different to the ITA who agreed the 1968 London Weekend Television deal, and so probably forgot the disaster of it. Second, Frost was not on his own with TV-am. He had Michael Parkinson, Anna Ford, Angela Rippon, Robert Kee and Peter Jay all alongside him. IBA felt if these people trusted Frost, then it should be okay. It wasn't. Problem was the format. All of them had the high brow nature of content. Really a North London bias of thinking. Michael Parkinson was really the only down to earth one among that group.
@@johnking5174 Truth is the IBA were utterly useless. Just Lord and Lady this putting in a few hours a week and had no idea of how to intervene when companies such as TV-am and BSB were a complete disaster. It was a disgrace to see all the ITV companies allowing that rubbish on screen at 6am, but then it wasn't their airtime but an embarrassment to the network in those early months of 1983. Well its nearly 40 years ago so is all history now.
Thanks for being kind to Timmy. I was about 6 watching Wacaday and loved him. I did wonder why my parents were never in the room when he was on. Would never be allowed now, too imitatable - I did enjoy smacking my brother with a foam hammer.
The initial TV am approach works.. but on Radio 4 - Today. Not on TV.
31:15 - At the start of the lock out in November 1987 a typical TV-am day would have hourly and half hourly news summaries - repeats of interviews and feature items TV-am had made earlier in the year - cartoons - Flipper - Batman - Happy Days. However when Christmas 1987 arrived they managed to produce a 30 minute Good Morning Britain edition (extended to an hour later in January 1988).
Anna Ford and Selina Scott in one video? Phwoarrrhh!!!!
Totally agree, TV-am was the face of the 1980s. Wide-Awake Club was fantastic though....
5:49 This is now Paramount's UK studio.
Warning high levels of totally necessary tory bashing
The entirely necessary and justifiable levels of f@shb@sh is absolutely one of the appeals here.
I'm thoroughly enjoying your videos. It's absolutely criminal that your sub count is as low as it is.
I would love to see you do a history of C4 breakfast some day. 🙂
great series thanks for making these for people who like niche things
Now I better understand the launch episode of KYTV and the Drop Dead Donkey where Gus hires Russian techs during a strike.
r.i.p. tv am breakfast television 1983 to 1993 we not forget you
It was of course a shame too for TV-am to be replaced by GMTV in January 1993 as they did. Of course had they continued until at least the February then, they would have been on air ten years or even more had the ITC allowed it so too.
I can just about remember Robert Kee on First Report (later to be renamed News At One)
25:15 Nick Beggs, bassist of Kajagoogoo there talking about his newly acquired Chapman Stick. By that point, he'd probably replaced Limahl as lead singer, and about to have their other hit, "Big Apple". (It's a better song than "Too Shy" in my honest opinion!) Beggs is now a respected bassist and guitarist in the progressive rock circuit, playing on record and live for the likes of Steve Hackett and Steven Wilson and his own group The Mute Kings.
Good ol' Chapman Stick. A powerful weapon, especially in the hands of Tony Levin
Started off reasonably well, then went on the slide, with huge scale presenter changes and through the imposition of a certain rodent (you know who), upped the ratings and brought good fortune to the station.
Was TV-AM ever shown on the VHF 405-line transmitters?
I know Open University was UHF-only (logical, since nobody had 405-line VCRs).
Yes, as VHF was not switched off until January 1985.
@@johnking5174 Thanks!
it was sad tv am ended i spose nothing last forever
when Frank Bough said he’d “ hit some ice “ on the way into the studio, i couldn’t help recalling the sunday newspaper revelations alleging that he wasn’t quite as dull as everyone had previously thought….
0:31 I feel like I’m being called out.
I don't make the rules
29:10 - This was on Monday November 10th 1986 when the BBC killed off their warm magazine version of Breakfast Time and introduced the Newsnight at Breakfast format which remained until around the start of the current BBC Breakfast format in October 2000 when more warmth and relaxed approach returned.
Breakfast become a popular programme with its presenters who loved enjoy working with each other
@@richardsharpe2966 Do you mean Breakfast Time on the BBC 1983-1989 programme or the current BBC Breakfast programme?
@@johnking5174 The current one John
I didn't see TV-am until 1988
There was another choice, the groovy tunes of the Channel 4 testcard from 8.30 every morning. Or if you were lucky enough, Mike Read on Radio 1
It was the IBA who moved it from May 83 to February 83
TV-am management asked the IBA for permission to move the date forward. Peter Jay felt the longer BBC Breakfast Time had to settle in with no competition, the worse it would be for TV-am to attract an audience. Waiting until May 1983 would mean weeks passing by, where the BBC bedded in their show, making it better.
2025 it might happen from the recent news from the director general of CBBC moving out of linear TV.
17:53 Jim Sweeney and Steve Steen from CBTV there. They went on to join the Comedy Store Players and continued performing improv together (as they had done before CBTV) until Jim was forced to retire from performing.
reid is pumped with red bull or G-FUEL to be that jolly very early .
Fascinating how the Beeb taught TV-am everything it needed to know about how to produce populist, undemanding breakfast television. TV-am evolved or degenerated (depending which way you look at it) to become a commercial version of BBC Breakfast Time and then the latter kindly stopped competing and became a serious news programme, everything that you rightly point out Peter Jay had originally wanted TV-am to be. How ironic is that?
I grew up with TV-am as a child of the 80s. I am sorry but I never enjoyed Timmy Mallet. I always thought he was annoying idiot and still do. But TV-am as a whole certainly grew in popularity and quite frankly it was bewildering to see what a pale imitation GMTV was when it took over. It was the equivalent of how bad Westcountry Live was compared to TSW Today. The South West of course suffered two simultaneous ITV franchise changeovers in 1993 and neither were for the better.
Uhhh...... SHE'S NOW A PART OF THE BBC!!! OHHHH NOOOO! 6:13
Nononononono, you gotta say it like Knuckles does! "OH NO"
In the near 40 years Breakfast Television has been going in the UK which was the best era well BBC Breakfast 2003-2016 when Bill Turnbull Sian Williams Dermot Murnahan Natasha Spangles Kapliski Charlie Stayt Susanna Reid Chris Hollins Kate Silverton Carol Kirkwood did it I know Charlie and Carol are still on but not the same hope that you agree with me
7:36 Michael Parkinson...... As a TV talk show host, he was put well and truly *IN THE SHADE* by Australia's *Mike Walsh.* Reason being that Parkinson was always starstruck, was in awe of his guests, while Mike Walsh *did not* suffer such affliction, and in the egalitarian Australian way, placed himself at the *same level* as his guests, even if they were of that parasitic institution, Royalty.
No one believes that. No one knows who Mike Walsh is and no one gives a shit about Australia, the land where culture goes to die. Off you pop.
Of course the irony here is that Parkinson buggered off to Australia in 1980 & with characteristic modesty claimed that Britain was finished & he had fixed a lucrative contract down under. Within a couple of years he was back-tail between his legs! Coincidentally Lenny Henry did the same thing nearly a decade later when Hollywood gave him the bum's rush after one film. Thank God for Red Nose Day eh Len?!
Finally was the presenter being serious or sarcastic about 'Mogadon' Mike Morris?
Michael Parkinson an very northern person from Barnsley a atleast breakfast tv came in full circle .
To all intents and purpose TV-AM was a separate channel from ITV
Michaela Strachan *sigh*
Come for the history of itv and it's idents, stay for the unabashed Tory bashing!
Love a bit of Tory bashing. Too bad it's not physical.
Anna ford back in the day 😍
I must admit I liked Wacaday
Ever thought about a series on ALL Breakfast television programmes aroun the world? Thanks.
DAYBREAK THEME LOL ...DADA DA DA DADADAAAAA
i remember that strike because of the classic 1960s Batman series gained twice as many viewers as the usual doom & gloom & repetition of news & one guy at work - Porker , was continually late by 10 minutes because of Batman finishing at 08:00 😆
aw s the bb in 1998
I remember when things were bad and the adverts were appalling lol
A large puppet rat lol
Why the hell did the media in the 90s always refer to Margaret Thatcher as Mrs. Thatcher?
This is all really confusing to us Yanks because of course here in the US, everything you see on a particular frequency is run by one company per channel.
Hi Steve - yes the idea of independent franchises for just one network channel is weird. It is a sort of mash up of your own affiliates system in the US. If you need any more help, just let me know, as I am a very keen US tv fan myself.
This system lasted from 1955 to 1994, at which point ITV companies were allowed to buy others out. The ITV companies in London (Carlton) and Manchester (Granada) bought about half the other companies each, with the exception of STV (Glasgow) and UTV (Belfast). The two companies then merged as ITV a few years later and that was it. UTV are no longer independent- so much for ITV.
Bob little amendment here the daybreak theme was David Dundas not Jeff Wayne
It was, yes. I didn't learn that until after I'd made it.
Pop in just a couple of other things I didn’t realise until recently having read the sum of the 234 website footage which has now been archived that children’s programs Nick Wilson stopped becoming at the in-house producer as he was tied up in the strike action I didn’t realise that I just assumed he left to set up a clear idea
Also did you notice the distain Richard Keys had for Timmy Malet that little incident on the last show 1992 I often wonder what that was all about
Was it right or wrong to end the TVAM franchise well that is a hard and tough question
The franchise ended because they under bid. No one took it away from them apart from themselves, by under bidding dramatically.
Seems the British see Australians as New Yorkers see Texans, big spending, 33:06 handsome yet boorish men that aren’t bound by the usual rules of the land, play by their own rules and get things done. And as much as they are derided there is a secret desire to be more like them. Thus New Yorkers wearing cowboy boots and the British obsession with Australian soap operas.
I was one of the few 9/10 year olds at the time who HATED Mallett. Found him irritating and so I often switched to C4 and watched some intelligent broadcasting.
TV-AM was doomed from the start. Basically, a poison chalice.
TV-am could have been a success from the start, if David Frost hadn't been part of it. It was his high minded, high brow, upper middle class approach to breakfast television that ruined it from the start. "Mission to explain", was utter BS. At 6.00am when you are up, bleary eyed and just starting your day, the last thing you want is a heavy laden programme of news and interviews, which Frost seemed to want.
@CreeWilly 1968 - 1983 is a long time, but still he thought he was right. David had a grit and determination, sadly it did not work when it came to running a television station. He totally misjudged both times what the public wanted. In 1983 he thought the public wanted news driven items at breakfast time and they simply didn't. In fact Ron Neil at the BBC who became BBC Breakfast Time editor did research in the states and found exactly the format that the public wanted. Frost didn't do his research.
@CreeWilly It still amazes me that he felt what the ITV viewer wanted at 6.00am in the morning was Robert Kee sitting in a newsroom delivering hard news stories as if he was presenting Panorama at 6.00am. Far too heavy for that time of day. Also commercially, ITV should not have gone for a BBC style approach, heavy news driven - it was commercial suicide for them, any one with half a brain could have predicted the format stunk and would kill the company which it nearly did. March 17th 1983 is when TV-am came so close to collapsing.
@@johnking5174 But don't forget Sir David Frost was a great broadcaster who had successful tv shows both sides of the Atlantic
@@richardsharpe2966 Being a successful broadcaster is no way a means to being a good runner of a tv station. History shows twice his attitude in running tv stations nearly brought them to collapse. 1968 London Weekend Television had to be saved by an Australian Rupert Murdoch because of Frost's high brow programming schedules which led to millions of viewers flocking to BBC One or BBC Two and a near financial collapse of LWT by 1970. Then in 1983 he did the exact same thing, brought a far too heavy, high brown North London approach to breakfast television, and what happened? History repeated, and TV-am verged on financial collapse, to the point where they could not pay their newspaper bills from the local newsagents in Camden Lock and the London Electricity Board came to cut off their electricity due to weeks of unpaid bills. He had the midas touch with interviews, but he was the kiss of death in management and running a station.
I bet the studio got ripped out after
@Puddock did anything of the old Studio remain in 1993 ?
@@castle6742 In 1993, yes. Quite a bit of it. Most of the exterior's gone by now, but last I heard the eggcups were still on the roof.
Eggcups are still there.
Good programme but ruined by narrator's unnecessary vile comments about the assassination attempt on the lives of the then UK Cabinet
Thatcher's still dead mate