The Newsroom

The BBC putting looks before talent?

Natasha Kaplinsky, Sophie Raworth, Emily Maitlis... (March 2007)

This site closed in March 2021 and is now a read-only archive
MA
Matrix
oliverburgess1 posted:
I want them to bring back recieved pronunciation, it adds that more proffessional feeling to the news.


If only the same could you said for yourself, my dear boy.
LE
lewsnews
oliverburgess1 posted:
I want them to bring back recieved pronunciation, it adds that more proffessional feeling to the news.


RP is fine (Huw Edwards?? Welsh accent isn't RP but it's proffessional)
Just give us a weather forecaster with our regional dialect like Ron Bendall used to have here in the Westcountry!
NG
noggin Founding member
Hymagumba posted:
Karl posted:
I honestly think that a lot of you are either jealous of Natasha Kaplinsky or intimidated by her.


No, the basis of most people disliking her is how she whores herself around light entertainment and appears to want excessive fame. Also she has an air of falseness around her.


That is a pretty insulting, and very subjective statement.

Having skills as a journalist AND skills as a presenter doesn't mean you have to consign yourself to a ghetto of news. There is an equally strong argument that having presenters presenting news programmes who also present lighter shows makes the news programmes more accessible, and potentially increases their audiences, which is not something that should be apologised for.

I accept not everyone agrees with this - but it is a valid argument.

After all CNN's Fionula Sweeney presented the largest LE show of them all - the Eurovision Song Contest - and I don't think it compromised her journalistic integrity...

(Jan Leeming and Angela Rippon also performed those duties - though I'm not sure they really had a journalistic reputation to sully...)
KA
Karl
I agree with you Noggin. I think thankfully the majority of regular viewers have warmed to presenters like Natasha who have also taken their hand to presenting non-news shows.

Hymagumba, do you see Fiona Bruce presenting Crimewatch as 'diluting her ability' to be seen as impartial and taken seriously?
NE
Newsroom
cian posted:
Has the BBC started choosing female roles by their looks instead of talent...? In the last few years we have seen the female roles taken by younger, more attractive women, often who are appauling newsreaders. A few examples are Sophie Raworth (always stuttering and mispronouncing) Natasha Kaplinsky (Only in it for the huge paycheck and to find a doorway to fame) and Emily Maitlis (I think she's good, dont get me wrong, just not good enough for the nationals). When was the last time we had UGLY newsreaders? Does anyone agree with me?


What tardis have you been stuck in? You ignorant fool. God, this kind of remark be it personal or not irritates the hell out of me. What age are you?

Why single out the BBC? MOST networks employ good looking presenters, be it for news or other. How can you slay the talents of Kaplinsky, Raworth and Maitlis. They are all taleted women, who have worked hard to get where they are.

Your argument has no depth whatsoever. People like Natasha are sick of comments like this, unfouded and unjust! Sophie Raworth has been with the BBC for well over 7 years, Maitlis at Sky, Natasha at LNN, Sky and now the BBC.... It ain't recent, and this is a topic that surfaces on this forum once a year.

Get over it sunshine..idiot!
BN
Breakfast News
We'd all moan, if they were ugly gits...and anyway, i'd argue most of them aren't stunning, merely well presented...which is what, I think most people expect of newsreaders.

Hate being pedantic...but Sophie's been on BBC network news for 10 years this summer...doesn't time fly Shocked
JW
JamesWorldNews
Well said, Newsroom.
EA
eanok
I agree with Newsroom.
Before posting, think for a while - do we have this formula?

http://eanok.myweb.hinet.net/tvmock/formula.jpg
BS
brotherton sands
lewsnews posted:
oliverburgess1 posted:
I want them to bring back recieved pronunciation, it adds that more proffessional feeling to the news.


RP is fine (Huw Edwards?? Welsh accent isn't RP but it's proffessional)
Just give us a weather forecaster with our regional dialect like Ron Bendall used to have here in the Westcountry!


Clearly regional accents are fine, but regional dialects wouldn't be such a good idea (on national (UK-wide) telly, at least).

Rcvd pronunciation surely gets on the nerves of anyone who lives "north of Watford" (as they say). Especially the way that the "a" in words like "path" and "glass" is pronounced as if it has an imaginary "r" after it.

Geographically, 80%+ (or something) of the UK don't pronounce things like that, right? So, RP is too "London & the South East"-centric, and therefore very alienating for the rest of us.
PE
Pete Founding member
noggin posted:
That is a pretty insulting, and very subjective statement.


may I draw both yours and Karl's attention to my second post please?
RM
Roger Mellie
[quote="brotherton sands"][quote="lewsnews"]
oliverburgess1 posted:


Geographically, 80%+ (or something) of the UK don't pronounce things like that, right? So, RP is too "London & the South East"-centric, and therefore very alienating for the rest of us.


I maybe wrong about this, but I think it is more to do with class than geography (although RP is based on the accent of Bucks IIRC).

It tends to be the upper classes who speak like that, wherever you are in the UK. RP has been adopted by actors and broadcasters, because it is (or was depending on your view) seen as the "correct" way of pronouncing the Queen's English-- and as a clear way of enunciating things.

The trend of recent years has been to move away from "supercilious" (in some people's view) RP, to regional accents (albeit with "middle-class" pronunciation)-- hence Huw Edwards et al.

As long as the newsreader is totally comprehensible and his/hers regional accent doesn't impinge on clarity, then I for one welcome it. I personally find an effected 'cat-glarse' accent off-putting Laughing

Having said that, C4 have gone too far with that announcer who is supposedly from Stockton-on-Tees (of "Big Brootha" fame). I've never met anybody from Co Durham who speaks like that!
JO
Jonathan
I think Maitlis is really quite creepy looking. If you want an ugly newsreader, flick over to Channel Four News with Krishnan... gee, now that's one train crash of a human being.

Newer posts