Loosers weepers
He’s dead famous, my uncle
A PANG of conscience hits Gemma Sugar Free Farm’s the Collins: “These are window. buffalo outside my they are. Look how beautiful got to go and And now they’ve to eat meat. get killed for us How can I save this buffalo?” Offer to trade places? IF recent events have taught us anything, it’s that leaving big decisions to the public is a dangerous game. But forget Brexit and Trump. The latest, and most troubling, development came on Wednesday with this fake news bombshell: “And the National Television Award goes to… Casualty.”
That’s right. The best drama on British TV isn’t Game Of Thrones, Happy Valley, The Night Manager, Cold Feet or Line Of Duty, the greatest show of the decade which, unlike those others, wasn’t even shortlisted. It’s Casualty.
You can demand a recount until you’re orange in the face, that was the verdict of viewers across the land.
The unpalatable outcome is that it’s now incredibly unlikely BBC1 will even consider revamping a Saturday night schedule that became stale 20 years ago.
It is worth bearing in mind there there’ss no quality control at “television’sevision’s biggest night of the year”, r”, the NTAs – it’s purely a popularity contest. Which explains some of the more curious results from London’s O2 Arena.
Best TV Judge Mary Berry isn’t even the best judge on Great British Bake Off.
How Danny Miller didn’t win the soap performance gong, when Emmerdale triumphed over EastEnders and Corrie, is beyond me.
And one of the dullest series of I’m A Celebrity robbed what should have been the night’s most deserving winner – Love Island. (No, really.)
There were, however, rightful victories for The Chase, This Morning, Mrs Brown’s Boys ( a show hated by comedy snobs everywhere), Strictly Come Dancing, Ant and Dec as ever and Happy Valley’s Sarah Lancashire, although I’m not sure they had to ruin the end of the last series with the clip they chose.
I also can’t argue with Graham Norton’s Special Recognition, or “the NTA’s pity party” as he called it during a lovely acceptance speech. Risk-averse though the night was, host Dermot O’Leary had his best NTAs yet and has clearly benefited hugely from his X Factor reinstatement.
There were some genuinely enjoyable moments, such as Richard Blackwood eating fried chicken from a cardboard container in EastEnders’ VIP seats, and Ayda Field being greeted with 10,000 silent voices as she sang the first line of husband Robbie Williams’s Angels, expecting a Glasto singalong: “I sit and wait… no?!”
Award co-presenter Penny Lancaster: “Anyway…”
But the worst aspect of the NTAs isn’t on the night, it’s the weeks beforehand of shows begging for votes, culminating in Ruth Langsford getting Uri Geller to use his psychic powers to help Loose Women win: “I’m going to say, on one, two, three, WIN! WIN! WIN!” The following night... Alan Shearer: “And the award goes to… This Morning.” Wonderful. ACTING is in Sir Ian McKellen’s genes, with Who Do You Think You Are? finding a great-great uncle treading the boards. Reading the death certificate, McKellen said: “He would have been