It's spring and the birdies are singing their hearts out. It's warm and pleasant, but for reasons I won't go into in too much detail (but which would become apparent if you read my blog posts on a regular basis) we're stuck indoors. Under different circumstances, we'd be out and about visiting various properties managed by either the National Trust, English Heritage of the H.H.A. (Historic Houses Association). Instead, we're enduring some of the most unimaginative and positively tedious television to pass the time of day. I can't think why, with endless channels on Sky, there is such a total lack of imagination in programme-making at the present. All days on the main channels (BBC1, BBC2, ITV and Channel Four are identical (although, of the free-to-air channels, Channel Four is perhaps the least tied to it's regular daily line-up of programmes.) I mean, when I was a good deal younger, each day in telly land was different. You had different programmes for each day of the week, for example, a sitcom at 7.30 in the evening on a Monday, then a Tuesday probably a gameshow, Wednesday, probably a documentary and so on. Also, things like Play For Today or the Wednesday Play, which could often be hard-hitting, from a range of writers such as Dennis Potter or Alan Bleasdale. These would be one-offs. There were series and serials, such as The Onedin Line or The Brothers or going back further in time to the 1960's, Adam Adamant Lives and probably one of my favourites of all-time, The Avengers. Totally imaginative and very original. Now we just get the same shows on every day. Bargain Hunt is in the same slot on every day of the week, including Saturday and Sunday. Admittedly we do get quite a few good programmes, some excellent drama series and documentaries. But why do we have to have endless antiques, cookery and selling things shows? Why because something is popular do the schedulers think we're going to love more and more? Everything has to be ghettoised. Some of the best stuff the BBC does is on BBC Four. This stuff would have been put on BBC2, but even that has been overrun with endless gameshows and antiques shows. It was set up I seem to recall as being a sort of place for 'distinctive' programming. So where's it all gone wrong? Why don't we get such programmes as 'Not The Nine O'clock News' which could be quite biting satirically. We don't get satire any more, particularly when we have such an awful set of politicians who need to be satirised. Donald Trump is one such, but would you believe in him? Not really, as he's just one big comic character really ripe for satire.
I read all of Gerald Durrell's books when I was a teenager. I read the first one 'My Family and Other Animals' when i bought a second-hand copy of it as a paperback from a stall at Cardington church fetê. I loved it and read almost everything else Durrell wrote. I was more than excited when the BBC did an adaptation of the books back in the 1980's. A fairly reasonable and accurate adaptation. I think they might have done a sort of 'one-off' movie version sometime later, but I can't exactly say when or if that's true. Then ITV announced that they were doing a series based on the 'Corfu Trilogy,' (I think I'm right in saying, unless it's just based on 'My Family and Other Animals.' We watched the first two series of this, and I have to say it was reasonable. But I can't say I recognise any of the books from these adaptations. They've taken incredible liberties with the stories and characters. The books are centred very much on Gerry, the youngest of the Durrell children, but in the television version he has a much smaller role to play, intact he's quite a minor character in these shows. The wildlife doesn't play such a central role in this ITV version. But I've given up on watching the third series because it really has wandered away from what I remember of the books. They have just not held my attention so I'd ratter invest my time and effort of something else, such as reading. I wrote about the first series in an earlier post when this show first aired. But I'm afraid it has deteriorated considerably since the first season which is a great pity. I don't think I'll bother to watch any more.
I read all of Gerald Durrell's books when I was a teenager. I read the first one 'My Family and Other Animals' when i bought a second-hand copy of it as a paperback from a stall at Cardington church fetê. I loved it and read almost everything else Durrell wrote. I was more than excited when the BBC did an adaptation of the books back in the 1980's. A fairly reasonable and accurate adaptation. I think they might have done a sort of 'one-off' movie version sometime later, but I can't exactly say when or if that's true. Then ITV announced that they were doing a series based on the 'Corfu Trilogy,' (I think I'm right in saying, unless it's just based on 'My Family and Other Animals.' We watched the first two series of this, and I have to say it was reasonable. But I can't say I recognise any of the books from these adaptations. They've taken incredible liberties with the stories and characters. The books are centred very much on Gerry, the youngest of the Durrell children, but in the television version he has a much smaller role to play, intact he's quite a minor character in these shows. The wildlife doesn't play such a central role in this ITV version. But I've given up on watching the third series because it really has wandered away from what I remember of the books. They have just not held my attention so I'd ratter invest my time and effort of something else, such as reading. I wrote about the first series in an earlier post when this show first aired. But I'm afraid it has deteriorated considerably since the first season which is a great pity. I don't think I'll bother to watch any more.
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