Television
All bark and no bite
Published 18 October 2007
Why do politicians no longer fear Paxman, the BBC's attack dog?
Newsnight BBC2
OK, so I'm a freak, but I used to enjoy Newsnight. In my twenties, I often used to arrive home tipsy after a midweek post-work drink at about the time it came on, and it was thoroughly satisfying to sit down with a slice of toast and watch Jeremy Paxman give some minister a good going-over. It was like Rocky, only with statistics and ties (or do I mean lies?). I can't say the same these days. The show has lost its swing, and I usually fail to make it to the end, despite all good intentions. You listen to the theme music (that, at least, still seems to promise so much), followed by Paxo's or Kirsty's announcement of what the show will be dishing up, and then - just as they utter the dread words ". . . we'll be asking the Transport Secretary why . . .", you find yourself wondering: "Is Skins on over on Channel 4?" Cue hasty deployment of remote control.
Paxman himself exudes such an air of boredom, it can't be long before he turns up to present the show in his pyjamas. This weariness used to be stagy - a way of signalling his contempt for his interviewees. Now, I sense that it is real. When he does get himself worked up, you feel he is merely going through the motions; his anger has an ersatz tinge to it that sometimes makes his victims laugh, rather than cringe. I recently watched him go for Andy Burnham, Chief Secretary to the Treasury. Burnham's performance was weedy and somewhat fact-lite, but his inquisitor's attack-dog act was so over the top that, far from sweat pouring down Burnham's brow, a smile played at the corners of his mouth. My hunch is that politicians no longer fear Paxman, because their instinct is that the viewers have noted all of the above, and thus aren't on his side any more than they are on the side of their elected representatives. What a depressing kind of stalemate.
The air of mild depression that hangs over Newsnight (weekdays, 10.30pm) is not entirely the fault of its presenters. Like all BBC programmes, it is fighting for its budget and has been told to get interactive, which is enough to make anyone tired (it speaks volumes that Peter Barron, its editor, posts his blog only every ten days or so). It also has to deal with a Labour machine that is loath to put its people on anything other than a nicely plumped breakfast TV cushion - which is why it is now mostly a stage for wannabes and hopefuls (Theresa May, Nick Clegg) or, if we're talking Labour, B-listers and second strings (it's Labour's very own end-of-the-pier show). This is obviously castrating, but does the frustration of it leech into other reports? Possibly. In the absence of political fish to fry, its reporters can get a bit overexcited about other subjects. Richard Watson recently asked whether Islamists were using Tower Hamlets libraries to push fundamentalist literature. Watson is a great reporter, but he was talking about a few books, and in one borough. And what was he suggesting? That certain books be banned?
It's not all gloom. The programme can't be a total disaster when Stephanie Flanders is involved with it. Newsnight's economics editor lights up the set whenever she appears (no mean feat, when you think how brightly lit it is to begin with), and I find myself taking a weird new interest in tax thresholds. I love it when she mildly unpicks the arguments of some (male) MP with a few well-deployed facts, as if she were pulling on a loose thread at the bottom of a horribly unfashionable sweater. And then there is Michael Crick, the show's political editor. Crick has his enemies, but I'm a fan. In a world of presentation and spin, he comes to us unplugged: he's no suck-up, which is rare in one chasing political scoops.
The other night, I peered over my magazine and found him reading out a limerick about Ed Balls and Ed Miliband. "Probably neither one of them will ever speak to me again," he guffawed. Yes, it was a bit Westminster bubble. But at least it wasn't another soggy round-table discussion starring Vincent Cable.
Pick of the week
Russell Brand’s Ponderland
22 October, 10.35pm, Channel 4
Britain’s favourite womanising ex-addict gets his own stand-up show.
Fanny Hill
Starts 22 October, 9pm, BBC4
Andrew Davies adapts a racy tale of 18th-century prostitution.
Imagine . . .
23 October, 10.35pm, BBC1
Henry Perkins, a real-life Billy Elliot, tries to make it with the Bolshoi.
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