The Emmy Award Winning…

Sunday night in the US saw the Emmy Awards – theoretically, the most important American TV awards. Now their credibility is obviously nil since the best TV series to emerge from the US (and arguably the English speaking world) has had precisely two nominations in five years and no awards. That’s The Wire. It’s got a black cast and is set in Baltimore. Emmy voters are white and live in LA.
But the big winner at the weekend was another HBO show that I’ve been looking forward to – John Adams. It’s a seven part drama that aired in 90 minute ad-free chunks on HBO earlier this year. It won a grand total of 13 awards including one for Paul Giamatti who plays Adams, one of the Founding Fathers of America.
So I’ve been looking forward to it, and next weekend it starts on UK TV. Now whereabouts in the schedule do you think this 7-part epic is going to play?
Well it’s not on BBC1 or ITV1 – certainly. Nor Five… BBC2 would work, but nope. Channel 4 would be a good fit, but nope.
You’re getting warm.
BBC Four? It’d work nicely there. But no.
Instead it’s on More 4.
Now that’s a good fit. More 4 shows some challenging and interesting programming. In particular they bring us the nightly delight that is The Daily Show (Incidentally, did they give last Friday’s episode with the Tony Blair interview much cross promotion on C4? I don’t really watch much C4 these days so don’t know).
If I tell you it’s on at the weekend, when do you think you can catch it? 9pm or 10pm on Saturday or Sunday nights? Well Saturday night has “The 30 Greatest Political Comedies” – a list show presented by no less than Michael Howard (who I saw in the street in Golden Square the other day oddly enough) and Charles Kennedy. Not quite BBC Parliament’s coverage of the Labour and Tory conventions is it? That’s followed by a recording of the previous evening’s US Presidential Debate.
Earlier in the evening there’s a double bill of Property Ladder – and we’re all thinking about moving just now aren’t we? So there’s no space on Saturday night in the schedule clearly.
What about Sunday? Well there’s a repeat of a Jamie Oliver programme, then a repeat of a Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall programme, followed by repeats of two Gordon Ramsay programmes. Clearly everyone’s cooking on Sunday nights.
So when can this 13-time Emmy Award winning mini-series air? It cost over $100m to make afterall.
5.30pm on Saturday. That’s when.
Now on the one-hand, you could argue that it’s good counter-programming to things like Merlin or X-Factor that are on BBC1 and ITV1 at the same time. But it just feels completely hidden, and it’s a real shame. Surely there must have been some kind of primetime slot for the programme?
It reminds me of another cracking HBO show that was thoroughly hidden away in the schedule by Channel 4 years ago – From The Earth To The Moon. Produced by Tom Hanks no less, this dramatised the Apollo space race and was made at great expense. It was shown on Saturday lunchtimes or thereabouts here, and consequently most people will have seen it in repeats on something like FX or on DVD.
While I’m highlighting shows that you really should see, More 4 has another Emmy Award winning one-off next week that is airing in primetime, and is absolutely unmissable. Next Friday they’re showing Recount, which tells the story of the Florida part of the 2000 Presidential Election. You know, the one that Al Gore should have won.
The scene early on shows us mostly clearly what “hanging-chads” really were and it’s a masterly dramatisation of an important, but fairly dry subject. It’d be easy to have made it uninteresting, but a cast that incldues Kevin Spacey, Denis Leary, John Hurt, Tom Wilkinson and a wonderful Laura Dern, makes this an exceptional film. It’s followed by the intriguing sounding Vice-Presidential debate between Joe Biden and Sarah Palin.
[UPDATE] I’ve just listened to the most recent Guardian Mediatalk podcast and More4 controller Hamish Mykura talks up his channel’s showing of John Adams (and Recount) with great proudness. What a shame he’s scheduling it at teatime on Saturdays.


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