Initially I was disappointed to lose the foreign channels on Ziln, the New Zealand service that was broadcasting DW-TV, TV5 Monde, al-Jazeera English, etc. When I wrote to them, one of its bosses replied—on Christmas Day! He explained to me that Ziln’s focus had changed to promoting New Zealand content, so if I knew […]
Category: TV
Television-related posts and trivia.
The changing accent of Gillian Anderson
Gillian Anderson, Chicago-born, star of The X Files, grew up in North London and speaks with an accent that’s closer to Britain than the States. I noticed that she gets quite a bit of flak for this on YouTube comments, which is rather sad, perhaps revealing more about those who criticize her than anything else. […]
Reality TV is not everything non-fiction
I found it very odd that Antiques Roadshow and Mythbusters were nominated for the reality TV category at the Emmy Awards. Based on the vocabulary I grew up with, these are not ‘reality TV’. I doubt many of us over a certain age would think of The Gong Show or New Zealand’s Top Town […]
Bingo! Merry Christmas!
Here’s a Christmas treat, an hour in to Christmas Day in New Zealand. Bing Crosby’s Merrie Olde Christmas, filmed in 1977 33 days before the crooner’s passing, featured a duet between Bingo and David Bowie. Taped on September 11, 1977, the special aired after Crosby’s death, on November 30. The set is supposedly the […]
Starting Upstairs, Downstairs this weekend
I know I did this on November 23 on my Tumblr, but I have to share this joke with the Ashes to Ashes fans out there. Will the opening of Upstairs, Downstairs on Boxing Day on BBC1 (at 9 p.m.) begin with the Alexander Faris theme tune (see also below), or will Keeley Hawes […]
A new Eric and Ernie clip
I wonder if I should get part of the Broadcasting Fee, the way I promote the BBC. I like real-life dramas, particularly about recent history. BBC2’s Eric and Ernie, to be shown on January 1 at 9 p.m., looks very good. A new clip came out on YouTube 12 hours ago. The earlier […]
BBC drama, this autumn and winter
Don’t know how I could have missed this. Oh, yes I do: I was running for office. Now that I’m not, I want to give the BBC a bit of a push, because these dramas look awesome. Aurelio Zen, with Rufus Sewell, looks like my sort of drama, and begins the first week of […]
Johnny Foreigner might be better at running a car company in Shanghai
As I made links for the last post, I noticed there were a lot of comments on AROnline about the replacement for the Roewe 750, the Chinese car that is based on the old Rover 75. The replacement will be on the Opel Insignia platform, owned by GM. It’s been followed by a lot […]
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Yay for Paul Henry!
During the Paul Henry débâcle, I was surprised to find that I had friends who joined the pro-Henry groups on Facebook. This included friends whom I thought were cosmopolitan and internationally minded. It dawned on me that they were probably supporting the first Paul Henry who many of us encountered, when we were watching the […]
Is your favourite 1980s’ celeb here?
From the ‘Whatever happened to …’ and the ‘My God, is (s)he still alive?’ files comes this promotional video for the (Norwegian) TV2 show Gylne Tider, with a bunch of celebrities lip-synching ‘Let It Be’ (including, appropriately, Fab Morvan of Milli Vanilli). Sir Roger Moore kicks it off, but right after, you’ll catch (inter […]