So it was. I must have switched over during a VT and thought it was a documentary. It didn't help that the EPG was wrong but as you have mentioned it will have been due to the quick change to the schedule.
Another thing which annoyed me last night was how it became more a showcase of content you can download rather than a showcase of content you're watching there and then. Fair enough to make some parts available to download for extra cash, but I've always felt with Red Nose Day especially the content provided was there to thank those who had contributed during the day or donated during the night - but this year it was like thanks, but we want more please.
I think though the show just needs a bit of a kick up the backside - as indeed does Red Nose Day itself - they seem to have been using this "Do Something Funny for Money" slogan a few years now.
I definitely recall similar comments two years ago about how the "edge" had gone from the live sketches and there was too much reliance on pre-recorded material. For my money, I'm still catching up with various bits on iPlayer, but I found the Outnumbered sketch very unfunny and a bit grating when Michael MacIntyre suddenly jumped from serious donation pleas to jokes about his grandmother's use of the red button.
As for the "Funny for Money" slogan, IIRC this was only the second time it was used. Wasn't 2007 "The Big One", with 2005 "Big hair and beyond" which was itself an extension of 2003's "Big hair do"? I also remember 2001 as being "Pants to poverty", but I'm too young to remember anything older than that. (Although I do have a memory of what must have been 1997, when the CBBC Friday Show became the Red Nose Show, and some people told some very bad jokes!) One of my other early memories of Comic Relief was when Ant 'n' Dec were hosting, and they claimed that they had tatooed the donation number on the inside of their eyelids and thus when they closed their eyes they could see it. Cue a (faked) camera shot from "inside their head" to prove it. I guess this must have been 2001 or 2003, but can't remember which. Can anyone shed light on this or is it something that I'm making up completely?!!
The content of telethon shows has never been that good, but with Children in Need along with Sport Relief or Comic Relief, we're seeing one at least every six months and it just reinforces that they aren't really doing much. It's essentially just a few sketches alongside music performances with emotive VTs inserted allover the place. But a lot of what they do tends to be before the actual night, e.g. the celebrity challenges (Kilimanjaro in 2009, bike ride last year and this years desert trek) as well as things such as Lets Dance and 24 Hour Panel People. It does somewhat take the emphasis off the main night.
Well I echo part of what the likes of Brekkie have said.. I only saw the after 10pm bits last night but it did seem a bit flatter than in previous years. Re the slogans, perhaps it hasn't helped that Red Nose Day doesn't have a particular theme anymore? I remember the 'Pants to Poverty', 'Big Hair Do' stuff etc and you'd have vast amounts of merchandise to promote this.
But on the other hand, this year it seems to have been a 'back to basics' sort of approach but for a new generation... so we are getting the likes of Twitter, iTunes, texting, online material etc all playing a major part in the plead for donations. Because of this, there is far more emphasis on various events taking place outside of the big telethon evening itself.. i.e. reality shows, Chris Moyles Show marathon.
Back in the 1980s/90s, the evening itself was the main/perhaps only point for fundraising but that is less the case nowadays. For example, there'd be no point doing a 'live link-up' to the top of BT Tower anymore as with the internet, webcams, texting in donations..who's going to care about seeing people sat answering phones saying "Mrs Smith of Bolton has donated £5 by sitting in a bath of beans"? Nowadays, you'd need to have a whole reality show featuring a celebrity sitting in a bath of beans for a whole month!
I meant as in advertising, I didn't see much advertising of the event itself, as in previous years.
I was an avid watcher of the Chris Moyles event!
That's a point, there weren't any/many? Red nose advert or co-operations with big supermarkets etc.
There are never any Comic Relief night adverts apart from the ones a bit earlier on offering fundraising packs etc Also, what planet have you been on? Sainsburys pretty much turned red this year with more comic relief items on sale than ever. Red noses were available at the entrance of each store, at the tills and had their own separate section as well. Sale of Sainsburys merchandise raised a record breaking £10Million this year!
Mrs Smith of Bolton has donated £5 by sitting in a bath of beans"? Nowadays, you'd need to have a whole reality show featuring a celebrity sitting in a bath of beans for a whole month!
this is something I have never understood about the whole comic relief effort
where is the logic of raising money for third world nations by waisting food and sitting in a bath of beans
it's like harming children to raise money for children in need
ok it's off topic but I just find it very odd that's all
Mrs Smith of Bolton has donated £5 by sitting in a bath of beans"? Nowadays, you'd need to have a whole reality show featuring a celebrity sitting in a bath of beans for a whole month!
this is something I have never understood about the whole comic relief effort
where is the logic of raising money for third world nations by waisting food and sitting in a bath of beans
it's like harming children to raise money for children in need
ok it's off topic but I just find it very odd that's all
To be fair - Children In Need is much more identified with the 'sitting in a bath of beans' rather than Comic Relief or Sport Relief.
Regardless of how people feel about the event itself, and how the pre-events dampen the evening, the final totals by the end of the night prove the current format works better than ever. And I don't see the team changing what clearly isn't broken.
Regardless of how people feel about the event itself, and how the pre-events dampen the evening, the final totals by the end of the night prove the current format works better than ever. And I don't see the team changing what clearly isn't broken.
It doesn't help that no public figures ever say anything negative about the Red Nose Day evening.
Every TV presenter, radio presenter on air or on twitter has said something like "Brilliant night last night, particularly the Smithy sketch", saying anything different would result in them being off-message and ending up in the Daily Mail or their boss's office.
There is so little emphasis on the telethon now with all the tv shows that take place before, but as the ratings are still high, nobody will change that.
This year has completed RND's telethon's change into being completely the same as Children in Need's telethon. Besides the absence of Wogan, both are now filled with 'light entertainment BBC presenters' (Winkleman, Cotton etc) linking to clips, rather than anything happening in the studio.
