Ted May trailer on ITV1

There was a brilliant trailer on yesterday (Sunday) for a programme whose name escapes me now. It was about somebody in a film crew working on a commercial or something.

The reason I perked up was because it was voiced by none other than "Mr. Central" himself, interjecting the script with his quirky sense of humour, blending the authoritative with the fun, and the way he finally said ("on ITV1!!!") - just after a shot of a car frame falling to the ground - was reminiscent of the proud and bombastic way he used to say "...on CENTRAL!!" He also has the gift of perfect timing and stress when it comes to indicating the day and time the programme is going to be on.

Anyone remember when you'd get him coming out with lines like, "Saturday Night *Sporting Action* at *8.30*..." rather than just "On Saturday at 8.30..." or "8.30 this Saturday" which is the usual now.

If only more trailers were like that one, and if he was doing live announcements in between them aswell.

Get him and Colin Weston on the job, and introduce an in-vision continuity studio like ITV2 used to use in their early days. It wasn't that long ago I first saw the clips of ITV2's opening, and I thought the IVC used on their first few days would work well on ITV1 on a suitably-tweaked set.

I'm sure the blue/yellow panels would be easy to relocate to different studios as space issues dictate (in the same way Citv in Birmingham have to do from time to time).

*seconded*

quite why ted wasn't snapped up immediately for the national team i do not know - back in the central glory days there was a good product to sell, but even with the poor product nowadays, he still manages to make it sound like the best thing since sliced bread.

i also fondly remember the way there was never a "sunday" here in the midlands for years - it was always "this central sunday" - very clever i always thought, an otherwise scheduling backwater was promoted as an *event*.

good old ted, perhaps he's too good for the national team - and i guess if they're forced to work with tiny announcements then perhaps even ted couldn't make "animals do the funniest things 4" sound appealing.

btw was that promo you saw for central's pulling power?

I think it was, yes. Do I take it that trailer would have been made in Birmingham but using the national template?

Since continuity finished in Birmingham Ted May has continued to voice most of the regional promos for Central and I've also heard him doing the same for HTV West. He also freelances from time to time on five, and hearing him talking over the closing credits of Home and Away reminds me of him doing the same on Central 5 years ago!