Fascinating and very funny. I woke my husband -- am I still allowed to say husband? -- cackling about the Bazalgettes' sewage shoveling. But also, like all good nostalgia, this made me sad. Following events best I could from the States, I.remember the advent of Big Brother, and thinking "what the hell is this?" I could easily believe Brits would watch it -- I grew up in a New Town-- but not that the Beeb would show it, even after Changing Rooms, which I loved (yeah . . ) Of course, these days, I now regularly come to believe at least six impossible things before breakfast.
P.S. Oh, wait, Big Brother was on Channel Four. I've been living a lie all of these years. Thank goodness! So let's look at the good old BBC .... AIEEEE! 😱
Hello, Annette! How fun we both read the Metropolitan. Very worthwhile. 😀 Big Brother was bad enough but what about Who Wants to Marry a Millionaire? Cringe
Really enjoyed that. Did it run concurrently with the garden one? Wherein a nation’s gentlemen fulminated over a perfectly ordinary-looking woman Not Wearing A Bra.
Little known fact that Laurence Llewelyn-Bowen’s father was Jim ‘3-2-1’ Bowen…
Another reality TV show from this embryonic era, which I really enjoyed but which was short-lived (one series?), took people from a particular social milieu and trained them to ‘pass’ in a quite different one.
I remember an episode about a young woman from New Money, (probably Chester) who was trained to pass for Old Money (probably Surrey) and it involved all kinds of minutiae about how posh people ACTUALLY walk, talk, and ride horses. My favourite was the episode in which some delicate junior fellow from Oxford (I think!) was trained to pass as an East End nightclub bouncer. Lesson 1: how to swear properly.
It was an entire sociology study on British society, circa 1998 or whenever. Fun. I wish I could remember the name of it.
Linda Barker! Another candidate for nominative determinism, she seemed to shout all her comments at the top of her (quite grating) voice. Maybe she had a hearing problem? I think one of her episodes was subsequently featured on Harry Hill: a wall of open shelving created to divide a room and to display the neighbours’ pride and joy, their fine china collection - half of which was then destroyed when the shelves collapsed on it. I laughed, despite feeling sorry for everyone involved.
I had to look up Reith, and was delighted to learn it was a Scotsman who founded the Beeb. No matter how shite you might think BBC2 pablum is, it still beats US TV. I was among the first to purchase a VPN years ago in order to watch shows like “Rev” which were silly but still not insultingly inane.
I loved Changing Rooms and its American counterpart, Trading Spaces. These shows also, it seemed—maybe you know—to spawn the similar reality tv with Trini and her friend (can’t remember her name) who taught women and occasionally men, how to dress for their body type. The U.S. then gave us What not to Wear with Stacey and Clint. These were the anodyne shows I would watch over the weekend with my then 5 year old son. Who for whatever reason thought Clint’s bitchiness was funny. I miss those shows!
I still have the Wüstoff knife I won as a second place (loser) on the American version of the cook show we in the US called, Ready, Set, Cook. My friend in the audience told me she thought I’d lost because my chef hadn’t made a sauce for the sea bass. I think I’d lost because the audience was two-thirds comprised of a high school field trip, and what teenager in 1996 was clamoring for sea bass? But I love my knife, and the blender!
The alternative to florid and expensive was Conran’s Habitat: but you paid up the wazoo.
Fascinating and very funny. I woke my husband -- am I still allowed to say husband? -- cackling about the Bazalgettes' sewage shoveling. But also, like all good nostalgia, this made me sad. Following events best I could from the States, I.remember the advent of Big Brother, and thinking "what the hell is this?" I could easily believe Brits would watch it -- I grew up in a New Town-- but not that the Beeb would show it, even after Changing Rooms, which I loved (yeah . . ) Of course, these days, I now regularly come to believe at least six impossible things before breakfast.
P.S. Oh, wait, Big Brother was on Channel Four. I've been living a lie all of these years. Thank goodness! So let's look at the good old BBC .... AIEEEE! 😱
Hello, Annette! How fun we both read the Metropolitan. Very worthwhile. 😀 Big Brother was bad enough but what about Who Wants to Marry a Millionaire? Cringe
Hello, Whitney! I miss Reithian paternalism,, which didn't look down its nose at entertaining us, either. Best comedy. 😀
I love that he was Scottish and the father of the BBC, which everyone assumes is English.
Isn't it great?? I was thrilled when I learned that.
I really really enjoyed every sentence
Really enjoyed that. Did it run concurrently with the garden one? Wherein a nation’s gentlemen fulminated over a perfectly ordinary-looking woman Not Wearing A Bra.
Little known fact that Laurence Llewelyn-Bowen’s father was Jim ‘3-2-1’ Bowen…
Another reality TV show from this embryonic era, which I really enjoyed but which was short-lived (one series?), took people from a particular social milieu and trained them to ‘pass’ in a quite different one.
I remember an episode about a young woman from New Money, (probably Chester) who was trained to pass for Old Money (probably Surrey) and it involved all kinds of minutiae about how posh people ACTUALLY walk, talk, and ride horses. My favourite was the episode in which some delicate junior fellow from Oxford (I think!) was trained to pass as an East End nightclub bouncer. Lesson 1: how to swear properly.
It was an entire sociology study on British society, circa 1998 or whenever. Fun. I wish I could remember the name of it.
Was this “Faking It”?
That’s it - thank you… I think, lol! I was even able to find the Oxford boy to cockney hardman episode: https://youtu.be/hiU2bPgl72o?si=kxwYW7EdTJRHlfp8
Linda Barker! Another candidate for nominative determinism, she seemed to shout all her comments at the top of her (quite grating) voice. Maybe she had a hearing problem? I think one of her episodes was subsequently featured on Harry Hill: a wall of open shelving created to divide a room and to display the neighbours’ pride and joy, their fine china collection - half of which was then destroyed when the shelves collapsed on it. I laughed, despite feeling sorry for everyone involved.
We always suspected that Linda was no stranger to artificial stimulants. Can’t remember why though…
I had to look up Reith, and was delighted to learn it was a Scotsman who founded the Beeb. No matter how shite you might think BBC2 pablum is, it still beats US TV. I was among the first to purchase a VPN years ago in order to watch shows like “Rev” which were silly but still not insultingly inane.
I loved Changing Rooms and its American counterpart, Trading Spaces. These shows also, it seemed—maybe you know—to spawn the similar reality tv with Trini and her friend (can’t remember her name) who taught women and occasionally men, how to dress for their body type. The U.S. then gave us What not to Wear with Stacey and Clint. These were the anodyne shows I would watch over the weekend with my then 5 year old son. Who for whatever reason thought Clint’s bitchiness was funny. I miss those shows!
I still have the Wüstoff knife I won as a second place (loser) on the American version of the cook show we in the US called, Ready, Set, Cook. My friend in the audience told me she thought I’d lost because my chef hadn’t made a sauce for the sea bass. I think I’d lost because the audience was two-thirds comprised of a high school field trip, and what teenager in 1996 was clamoring for sea bass? But I love my knife, and the blender!