MY TV LIFE
Neil Fox
Neil, 59, also known as Dr Fox, is a DJ and former Pop Idol TV judge.
What was your first TV memory?
It was black and white... probably Watch With Mother. I used to love Camberwick Green, Trumpton and Tales Of The Riverbank with Hammy the Hamster. All the classics! That was when there were only two TV channels. But the thing I remember most vividly was watching the men walk on the moon when I was eight. It was mankind’s greatest achievement.
What was your first TV appearance?
When I was 12, my French teacher at Kingston Grammar wanted to be a pop star – his name was Simon May and he went on to write the Eastenders theme tune. At school he wrote a musical based on Nicholas Nickleby. The BBC bought it and filmed it, and we were the boys in the cast.
Who was your first TV crush?
Joanna Lumley as Purdey in The New Avengers. I had her poster on my wall. But she had strong competition from Farrah Fawcett, who played Jill Munroe in Charlie’s Angels around the same time.
What is your favourite current show?
I enjoyed Big Little Lies, and Little Fires Everywhere on Apple TV was superb. The only thing my family watch on normal TV is sport. We don’t need the BBC any more. They need to find a different way of funding, less quantity and more quality. Content will always be king.
Which TV show would you take to a desert island?
I’d take Friends, which is consistently funny and always watchable. It’s one of the most brilliantly made comedies of all time.
What TV show would you like to put out of its misery?
I’d cull some of the cooking shows... home decoration and make-over shows too. There are too many of them and they’re painful to watch. I’d also ban the word “celebrity”. Half the time you don’t know who they are – Twitter stars, vloggers, people from reality shows with no discernable talents. Give us entertainers who have learned their craft.
Guiltiest TV pleasure?
Doctor Pimple Popper on TLC. It’s about a doctor in California, a lovely lady, who specialises in removing boils, spots, cysts and lumps. It’s wrong on every count.
What are you up to at the moment?
I’m doing a chart show of heritage artists on United DJ radio, for older stars who still write great new songs. I’m also building a clever music app which launches next year.
Neil’s heritage chart show, Sundays, 1pm, on uniteddj.com
metopera.org
METROPOLITAN Opera New York has such a wealth of filmed operas that even with a daily-changing free slot there is still more to draw from the archives. Franco Zeffirelli’s lavish production of
La Bohème – available free until 11.30pm tonight – was filmed on April 5, 2014 when Latvian soprano Kristine Opolais saved the Met from disaster by stepping in at a few hours’ notice to sing the role of Mimi – no small ask by the management after her triumph the previous night in her Met debut as Madam Butterfly.
Reviews acclaimed Opolais’s “youthful, effortlessly nuanced voice” and her instant rapport with the cast. As seamstress Mimi locks eyes with tenor Vittorio Grigolo’s romantic poet
Rodolfo, it is almost literally love at first sight. The spectacular Café Momus scene illustrates Zeffirelli’s belief that “More is more!” with mezzo Susanna Phillips in eye-catching scarlet as a tempestuous Musetta, on-off girlfriend to Massimo Cavalletti’s artist Marcello.
The Met rolls back to yesterday’s stars tomorrow in the 1979 production of Verdi’s rarely performed Luisa Miller. A top cast of tenor Plácido o Domingo as Rodolfo, soprano Renata Scotto as his love Luisa and baritone Sherrill
Milnes as Luisa’s retired soldier father, guarantees superb singing.
The tale of Luisa’s downfall at the hands of Rodolfo’s bad father Count Walter (bass Bonaldo Giaiotti), who has other plans for his aristocratic boy, is predictable but nonetheless gripping.
Opera Holland Park last week gave an outdoor concert on the open space in front of the stage for what would have been the final night of the 2020 festival. The excellent assembly of singers from past productions included Natalya Romaniw, David Butt Philip, Jennifer France and Alison Langer. The City of
London Sinfonia was conducted by Matthew Kofi Waldren. Mascagni’s Inno del Sole (Hymn of the Sun) was the emotional finale, sung by the chorus in tribute to OHP’S retiring founder Michael Volpe. Possible plans for 2021, under opera director James Clutton, include Ma Marriage Of Figaro, Cunnin Cunning Little Vixen, and reviv revivals of L’amico Fritz, an and La Traviata.
More outdoor news from
English National Opera:
From September 19 to 27, ENO Drive & Live presents a new 9 90-minute La Bohème in the grounds of
Lon London’s Alexandra
Pal Palace. Cast, chorus and orc orchestra are double cas cast, and will rehearse and perform in two separate “bubbles”. Those without a car can enjoy the performance through distanced bicycle spaces or Uber boxes, and it will be broadcast free by Sky Arts. Artistic director Annilese Miskimmon said: “Covid has had a major impact on the arts, so we’re ripping up the rulebook with ENO Drive and Live.” Info: eno.org