Many changes coming in this end of August at the French public broadcaster.
First, Franceinfo:tv, which is now three years old, is going to get a visual and musical refresh starting from the 26th of August, still on the grounds laid by the Movement design studio and Jean-Michel Jarre. The timeslot intros will feature an added "volume" effect.
A new motto will be introduced: « Franceinfo:, et tout est plus clair » (Franceinfo:, and everything gets clearer). It replaces the sort of typographic/dictation pun that was « Franceinfo: deux points, ouvrez l'info » (Franceinfo: colon, open the news).
Jean Chrétien, the channel's manager, explains he wants the refreshed branding to show that Franceinfo:tv is not "stuck in its jar" but a channel that is open on the world.
»» You can read more about it, as well as an exclusive interview with Jean Chrétien (in French) and watch the new intros on the Lenodal blog.
Beyond this, and as relayed here in July by London Lite, several anchors from France 2's breakfast programme
TéléMatin
will join the channel, in particular Sophie Le Saint (in the afternoons) and Nathanaël de Rincquesen (for
Franceinfo: Soir
, the 9pm-to-midnight timeslot). As for Karine Baste-Régis and Julien Benedetto, they will do the opposite motion and be transferred from Franceinfo:tv to
TéléMatin
.
Franceinfo: Soir
will also feature a full-length evening newscast at 11pm, anchored by Patricia Loison, former LCI and i>Télé journalist, who joined France 3 in 2009, and who is now back after a 3-year-long break.
This newscast was imagined to replace France 3's
Soir 3
(which Patricia Loison also used to anchor). The third channel's nightly news programme, which was created in 1978, suffered from very varying broadcasting hours lately, causing a viewer loss. The last edition of
Soir 3
is scheduled in the night of the 25th and 26th of August.
Worker unions are very unhappy about this for several reasons: first, even though
Soir 3
's viewer figures are not as strong as they used to be, it still attracted 585,000 viewers on average last year, sometimes more than 1,000,000; whereas Franceinfo:tv's viewer count hardly reaches 30,000 (0.5% of the total viewer share).
Indeed, few French people know Franceinfo:tv's existence (unlike Franceinfo:'s radio counterpart which is the 4th most listened-to station in the country). France·tv's executives announced the launch of a broad communication campaign to promote the channel and its number (27) on the TNT (equivalent of Freeview).
Journalists also worry about the quality and the diversity of the information: not unlike several other nightly news programmes on European PSBs,
Soir 3
had a stronger focus on international and European topics. France·tv's executives promised to keep the
Eurozapping
segment as part of the 11pm newscast, but this probably won't be enough to prevent a strike movement on the 26th of August.
On a different note, the 30th and 31st of August will be the last days of one of France 2's emblematic game shows, running for 29 years:
Motus
, based on the Dutch format
Lingo
. Thierry Beccaro, the 62-year-old presenter who animated it since its very start in 1990, announced a few months back that he retired as a presenter of both
Motus
and
TéléMatin
(in which he replaced the titular anchor, Laurent Bignolas, during his holidays; Beccaro's last appearance there was on the 3rd of August).
France·tv executives, who were planning on taking one game show off the air, and who originally planned to put an end to
Des Chiffres et des Lettres
(equivalent of Channel 4's
Countdown
), took this opportunity to remove
Motus
instead. No doubt that viewers will gather in front of their TV screens to watch the last episodes of this popular programme.
Motus
will likely be replaced by repeats of
Affaire Conclue
, the also successful adaptation of the German antique auction show
Bares für Rares
.
Jean-Luc Reichmann, currently animating
Les 12 Coups de Midi
on TF1, was
Motus
' first off-camera co-presenter. He announced he will be a candidate on the last episode of Motus.
Last edited by Quatorzine Neko on 23 August 2019 11:06am - 6 times in total