Episode 7 Points of View

Good afternoon and welcome. It is finally Points Of View.

I'm not suggesting you've had a long wait for us.

It is just that so many BBC competition shows

reached their final this week

that we are in for a very "finally" kind of programme.

But first, it should have sailed in broadcasting splendour.

This time a fortnight ago, the captain of the ship,

Controller of BBC One Danny Cohen,

told us he was very optimistic about his plans for the Jubilee.

The BBC is the best in the world at covering those huge national events.

It's one of the things that draws the nation together,

watching BBC One at those huge moments.

But it appears that watching coverage of the Jubilee river pageant

was like witnessing a sinking ship for viewers.

Now, Jim... John, this ship is obviously a huge, huge ship.

-I've just spotted my 70-year-old dad out there.

-Have you?!

-Sophie's dad's out there!

I think he's got one of the flags flying, one of the Jubilee flags,

so maybe he's part of the pageant. Who knows?

This is the nicest boat - it's got a roof.

"Off with their heads," would appear to be the resounding response to the production team

who served us with that particular slice of Jubilee cake.

But apart from charges of being ill-researched and misjudging the tone of the occasion,

it would appear there was a further omission.

Well, one of the planned Horrible Histories sketches

did make it into the final coverage and here it is.

Well, here we are, and behind me, assuming I'm on the right bridge,

is the River Thames, which started life flowing off into another river that's now in Germany.

It's slightly confusing. You see, up until the last Ice Age, Europe was one giant land mass,

and the water from the Thames flowed into the River Rhine,

though they made me cut my "water turning into Rhine" joke.

Luckily there was a saving grace to the BBC's Jubilee performance -

the evening concert went down well.

# Let me entertain you... #

How are you feeling, London?

# Our house

# Was our castle and our keep

# Our house In the middle of our... #

# Isn't she special?

-# A young 86 years old... #

-LAUGHTER

-CROWD:

-# La-la-la, la-la

# La-la-la, la-la... #

The truly spectacular Diamond Jubilee concert, it was brilliant.

More programming like this, please. Thank you very much.

Yes, watching at home, and seeing the credits

run over the firework display, I did think

that they had lit the blue touchpaper there.

Will we ever hear the end of complaints about credits?

Now, we're all supposed to be eagerly anticipating the BBC's next big live production,

which is coverage of the Olympics.

It's been not just months but years in the planning,

but then, so was the Jubilee!

So how can the BBC avoid the mistakes made with the river pageant

when it comes to Olympic coverage?

Over to you, Alan Fox.

What is it about sports coverage on the BBC these days?

-CROWD:

-Yay!

-APPLAUSE

Sports programmes spend more time talking than showing the sport.

They talk everything to death.

There seems to be too much chatting around on sofas in the studio,

and then on the athletics programmes, there's three or four ex-athletes

who stand there just pontificating

'or analysing, and you've got commentators there in any case

'who are more knowledgeable than ex-athletes and can do the job on their own.'

-It's been interesting to watch.

-There's just too much talk and not enough action these days.

Good afternoon to Denise Lewis, Colin Jackson and Steve Cram,

and it's goodbye to the Kelvin Hall. We'll miss this quirky old venue, won't we?

'Less than 50% of the time actually shows the sports event.

'Then they will cut away to two or three of the pundits having a chat.'

It's frustrating when you want to watch it,

but all you can get is talk, talk, talk.

-He was like Basil Fawlty!

-Glasgow's Kelvin Hall...

This actually is going to be her marathon debut...

Lee and I don't have our top hats.

Hi, and welcome to the Monegasque sunshine.

The first of those races is the women's race...

VOICES CLAMOUR

-CROWD:

-Oh...! Yay!

-APPLAUSE

With the Olympics coming up this year,

I'm concerned that the number of pundits will be increased on all of the programmes,

and we'll end up seeing more of the pundits than we will of the sports.

The Olympics is unique. We should allow the sports to speak for themselves

and not the pundits to be the stars of the show.

Take note, Olympic planners.

Ease up on the punditry and you might be on to a winner, maybe even a gold medal!

There's certainly been no shortage of winners elsewhere on the BBC this week.

First we found out who had got The Voice.

The artist with the most viewer votes tonight

and the winner of The Voice is...

SHOUTING

..Leanne!

CHEERING

The powers that be are currently closeted away,

deciding on whether there will be a Voice 2, and if so,

what it will look like. So we will soon see

if they took your thoughts into account, Gem.

The next competition format to reach its climax this week

was the godfather of reality contests, The Apprentice,

which ended on the humiliation of the job interviews.

You say that you will "teach an old dog new tricks".

Now I don't really think

that's the way you should be speaking about Lord Sugar.

Choose energy supplier.co.uk, just to take that one, for example.

You don't own that website.

-I've checked.

-I do own... I do own four out of those.

Choose energy supplier.co.uk, I own.

You're going to be my business partner. Ricky, you're hired.

The big hitters on BBC One may get the lion's share of audience attention,

but a hardy band of BBC Two teatime viewers

have been feasting on the Great British Menu for the past nine weeks.

There have been contentious decisions in the past,

so what is the verdict on the finalist and their dish this series?

Well, we have our final banquet.

I would like to thank each and every one of you.

It's been absolutely amazing.

-Thank you, all.

-Thank you.

-Thank you.

'So, the final Olympic menu will kick off

'with Colin McGurran's spectacular Quail In The Woods.'

CHEERING

Now, we could forgive wildlife for being just a little confused this spring.

Drought followed by deluge,

a glimpse of summer and then those Jubilee downpours.

It has made the business of predicting nature's reactions

all the more difficult,

but has had unexpected bonuses for the Springwatch team.

Hello and welcome to Springwatch!

We're really chuffed everyone's enjoying it. That's great to hear.

This year, we've tried to put the emphasis right back on our wildlife,

the ups and downs, the highs and the lows,

and the sheer, unadulterated joy of watching our wildlife

in our time, in our country.

I can guarantee you you're going to be enthralled.

We're using some of the techniques

that the Natural History Unit have used for other big projects,

so we're using the macro cameras

and some beautiful, beautiful thermal imagery of our grass snakes

that are in the compost heap.

That red thing coming out like a bit of moving spaghetti

is the grass snake.

This year, because it's been such a really weird spring -

the coldest and the wettest on record -

it's actually been quite good for Springwatch,

because the stories have been exceptional.

With the water so high, he can't dip down under the ivy.

While it's been tough for the birds, it has been great telly.

-Do they all share the milk from both mothers?

-I think they would have.

We've got a really good presenter line-up now. We've got Chris Packham -

he's our central point for all the scientific information.

Martin Hughes-Games, who has spent many years working in wildlife television.

Michaela, who has an amazing background, going right back

to The Really Wild Show. It's just making sure that we've got the balance right,

and I hope viewers feel that on the whole we have.

So we end where we began - trying to get the balance right.

Springwatch made it and the Jubilee river pageant didn't.

Next week, we are expecting lots of football. Is that good or bad? You tell us.

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