The Big Breakfast

I've seen a copy - it's really no shame.

That makes me feel old. I do wonder how a similar revamp might have worked with different presenters - if things had panned out differently it would have been Zoe Ball and Johnny Vaughan.

I don't think individually some of the changes made, like moving Family of the Week on the road and introducing the Telecopter, were bad ideas, and things like changing the news structure remained until the end.

The main things I remember being annoyed about was not having new titles, despite some great new break stings, and also axing the daily competitions - going from two a day to just one a week initially (and a poor one at that, ironically titled It's All Gone Pear Shaped IIRC) just took a bit of fun out of the show, especially as during Zoe Ball's brief stint on the show they'd actually been a bit more creative with them.

Rick Adams really looks like Daniel Radcliffe...

Not long before this Rick Adams had been tipped to be Zoe Ball's co-presenter on Live and Kicking, but then did badly in the screen tests. So he ended up doing this instead- and fared just as badly!

Everything just seemed wrong, Rick was wacky, Sharon wasn't, plus didn't have much TV presenting experience, the house was changed to be more like GMTV, it followed a successful period where even the best hosts would fail.

It's still notable how The Big Breakfast was only successful for about half the time it was on air, in the golden duos that everyone remembers were on air even less than that.

I agree completely - and will never understand how they went to the effort to produce new stings and a new theme, but kept the same old titles. Perhaps they were considered too iconic at the time to scrap completely?

They were already looking quite dated before that - I remember expecting an update the day Zoe started too, and the original stings had I think been refreshed already. Of course though we went from one extreme to the other with new titles practically every six months over the last couple of years.

We talk a lot about the on screen talent but I'm guessing a lot of the senior off screen talent changed between the 1996 and 1997 revamp.

P.S. Can anyone remember if there was a promo campaign for the 1996 relaunch?

What triggered the 1996 revamp? Was it increased competition from GMTV? How were the ratings shared out all of those years ago, did the BBC's Breakfast News take a lot less than nowadays Breakfast and was it really a ratings battle between GMTV & The BB?

Possibly a new producer wanting to re-invent the wheel as well, even though it was fine before, as these things too often are?

Gaby had left in January and the show hadn't really got over Chris leaving nearly two years earlier thanks to the job share arrangements with presenters. They certainly wanted to establish a new regular pairing so I guess that would have been the catalyst, plus by that point the show had been on air four years and followed pretty much the same format as it had in the early days, so a refresh was arguably overdue.

Also prior to this for reason I can still not fathom out they had hired Vanessa Feltz as the replacement for Lily Savage "On the Bed". That really should have been the early warning sign.

There was THIS which made the relaunch look much cooler than it actually was.



True. of the ,almost, 10 years it was on air it was only really good for about 3 or 4 of them. The rest of the time was spent recovering from presenter losses and ill-fated revamps. History seems to remember Johnny Vaughan as the saviour of the show but it was really Denise. She bought the show that extra 6 months it needed in early 97 when, then controller of Ch4, Michael Grade said he would have axed it had it not being for Denise. Also, the show never really recovered from her departure....even when she came back!. I wonder how tempted Channel 4 were to just end it with Johnny & Denise in January 2001? Considering how little they though of the show at that point (as revealed by Vaughan during that retrospective in the final show) it must have been a serious option on the table.

Agree that Denise probably never got the credit she deserved - even in the dark days of 1996/97 whether with Rick. Richard or two young Geordie upstarts the show was much more watchable when she was at the helm. Not sure if Sharron ever hosted with anyone other than Rick. Also Zoe pretty much carried the show a year earlier too.

Johnny absolutely needed somebody to bounce off - that's why he worked superbly with Denise and Liza but couldn't carry Kelly Brook.


It's no wonder the show flopped based on those. Very of their time and very much not what the direction the show was going in.