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Post by Teddy Bear on Dec 16, 2006 0:18:41 GMT
Expect deja view on TV this Christmas
by PAUL REVOIR
Last updated at 12:34pm on 15th December 2006
TV bosses have been accused of 'cheap and lazy' scheduling after it emerged that more than a third of programmes this Christmas will be repeats.
The number of reruns on the main terrestrial channels between Christmas Eve and Boxing Day will be up 42 per cent on last year.
Channel Five is the worst offender, with three-fifths of its output on at least its second outing - double the proportion in 2005.
The channel's prime-time highlights include a repeat of The Truth About Britain's Favourite Toys and a rerun of the Greatest Most Embarrassing TV Moments.
However, all the broadcasters are guilty of rifling through their archives to fill up their Christmas schedules.
The BBC will have its usual diet of Dad's Army, Porridge and Keeping Up Appearances, plus films including Chicken Run. On Christmas Day, BBC1 will be showing seven-year-old movie Entrapment, starring Catherine Zeta-Jones and Sean Connery.
Notably, its Boxing Day output will include a rerun of The Two Ronnies Christmas Sketchbook - effectively a repeat of a show made up of repeats.
Once again ITV will be digging up Creature Comforts for an airing as well as movie favourites The Grinch and Alice in Wonderland.
The channel's Christmas Eve schedule includes Eighties films Turner and Hooch and Uncle Buck, plus a premiere of the vampire movie Van Helsing.
Channel 4 will be showing classic comedy Some Like It Hot, as well as festive favourite The Snowman and a repeat of a Robbie Williams concert.
Research by the Liberal Democrats found that ITV is the only channel not to have increased the amount of Christmas Day repeats since 2003.
The party's culture spokesman Don Foster said: "This Christmas Day's TV schedule will leave many people with a real sense of deja-vu.
"We're not talking about a few traditional favourites that everyone wants to see. This is just a cheap and lazy way of filling up the schedule."
He added: "After original programming increased last year, it's a real shame that broadcasters have broken their New Year's resolution to clamp down on boring Christmas repeats."
A new BBC show is to sing the praises of eating animals killed in the road.
Road Kill Cafe will feature professional forager Fergus Drennan, whose signature dishes include pan-boiled fox, squirrel stew and badger meatballs.
He will use the BBC3 programme to argue that cooking animals killed in the road is healthier than eating many processed supermarket meats.
In the show, made by Jamie Oliver's Fresh One Productions, Drennan visits the Kent town of Sandwich and persuades locals to join him for a roadside forage.
BBC3' s upcoming schedule also includes such lurid offerings as Me and My Man Breasts, Teens Addicted to Porn, and Sex, Lice and Videotape. [/b] |
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