|
Down with the flu is one thing, forced to watch the box is another. It is uncertain when state television ended up in this pitiful state but, to my mind, it had to be a recent tragedy.
One afternoon this week, my nose as red as Rudolph the red nose Reindeer, and my voice as hoarse as Pierino from an Edwige Fenech B film, I watch, bewildered not at the beauty of TV, but at Eileen Montesin as she killed my afternoon and public broadcasting at the same time.
No it was not as Becky, but in one of those unbearable tele-shopping serials. Next to her some shy character in a suit with a contraption that cannot but be the best buy and the seventh wonder of the world.
Now, I have to admit that I am no fan of Montesin.
I know that she has been rehabilitated by the same people who scorned her and described as the worst thing that appeared on the box in the eighties.
So rehabilitated was she that even the traditional Labour haters have given her an unusual respite.
But to me she remains the eternal female version of Lord Haw Haw in the darker days of Television Malta.
There, there, I should not be blamed for believing that those were not the darker days and it was all a figment of our imagination.
Let us face it all the nasty characters of the past are now pasted either on TVM or Net, so why the fuss.
Given the choice between the Montesin of yesteryear educating children on the Aryan virtues of the colour red (MLP) versus the colour blue (PN) and her run rabbit run charades. And a Montesin trying to convince us that some machine can slice a chef’s choice (excuse the pun) sausage into fine circular delicacies, I fancy the former Eileen.
What has to be made clear to everyone is that TVM is not a private station, it is not Smash, or Net or Super One. This is state TV funded by tax-payers money and with a Constitutional obligation to serve the people.
And this is not a private station that requires itself to make ends meet and see blue on its accounts sheet rather than red.
In the darker days of Montesin on cold and humid afternoons tele-shopping was an unknown quantity, instead we had Doris Day, Laurel & Hardy and the comical but much loved Get Smart.
Then, TVM despite all its pitfalls with the absurd politics of the late Toni Pellegrini had some of the most competent talking heads.
The icons were Charles Arrigo, Charles Abela Mizzi and so many others with voices from a gramophone. Take a pick from the new faces and you have a juke box of nasal meandering, lisping and faces you would not want to send to Madame Tussauds even if tortured.
And somehow in that quicksand of political patronage there was more professionalism and savoir faire than today with all the unpleasant reforms undertaken by Austin Gatt’s tsunami.
The Montesin of our age was created by the excesses of Mintoffian stupidity but kindly resurrected after hibernation at Super One for some years with the political spinning of some of Fenech Adami’s lieutenants.
The influence of State TV is more important than, you or me could think of.
It is a mirror of our society and the heartbeat of this administration.
It reflects the meritocracy that does not exist, the mediocrity that permeates every nook and cranny of our society and the overall networking that abounds in this nepotistic society.
The other day, in between handkerchiefs and Panadols I could not help gasping at the Radio news of TVM and its reportage on the hike in the price of bread.
A price hike that was cowardly released the day after Christmas to the Sunday Times.
The news on TVM has improved according to Reverend Joe Borg, Joe Azzopardi now known as Peppi and Pierre Portelli.
The breaking news on bread went this way.
The newscaster said the price of bread would increase by 2c. But no source was quoted. It was obvious that the story was simply based on the front page one that appeared on The Sunday Times, now fast becoming the unofficial bulletin for government’s unsavoury decisions. But the news report did not even refer to the Sunday Times.
After a minute of stammers and stutters, the news reporter said the Ministry for Competition had been contacted but would not confirm or deny the report.
So why in the seven heavens did TVM conclude that there was a price hike.
Now so much for improved news on our state TV.
News forms opinions, opinions decisions, and decisions make or break people. And those broken people are usually the politicians.
TVM is crucially important not because it is watched, but because there is nothing else to watch on Maltese TV as a reference at the time of writing.
And that is why my first contribution of the year is dedicated to the theatrics that unfold year in year out at TVM.
If my unkind observations did not suffice, the cherry on the cake has to be the advert produced by the Broadcasting Authority and advertised on TVM encouraging people who have complaints about programmes on the same station to make use of the Broadcasting Authority and its services!
Can someone bring me an Extra Panadol?
I have a splitting headache!
|
