That makes us the oldest ones
Jan. 18th, 2009 12:04 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
peterbirksAs Tony Soprano once famously observed, becoming the oldest of the surviving generations creeps up on you slowly, but it's an inevitable corollary to being in your 50s. Decades ago it happened when you were in your late 30s or early 40s. Perhaps now it's more likely to strike when you are in your 60s. But, it comes.
Theoretically there should be no such thing as "a generation". It should be a smooth progression. But life doesn't work like that. It moves in jerks, in fits and starts. Newspapers were young newspapers and become old newspapers and either regenerate like Doctor Who (step forward the Daily Mail) or age alongside their staff and readers (hello, Daily Express, Daily Mirror).
The introduction of TV as a mass medium meant that a generation "of an age" came into TV at the same time. They moved into it in the early to late 1950s, often in their late 20s or early 30s. We, meanwhile (by which I mean the generation "half a generation" behind this lot), grew up watching these people. Or, in the case of Oliver Postgate, listening to them. About a decade ago these TV faces of the late 1950s and early 1960s faded from the screens, heading off into retirement. Now they are dying.
Oliver Postgate went a few weeks ago. I don't know if I mentioned it here. I try to avoid repeating what other people have already said in a far better and more knowledgeable way than I could manage. But Postgate really was a part of my childhood -- the Noggin The Nog era rather than the Clangers era (although, unlike Alex The Gent Goldie, I did remember that the Clangers' planet was blue). To reverse a well-known saying, he had a great voice for television.
Now Tony Hart has gone. I'll admit that Vision On was never one of my great favourites and Tony Hart/Morph were not the duo that I most looked forward to seeing every week. I vaguely recall thinking at the time, "bloody silly". But you can't deny Hart's contribution to children's television, over more than 40 years. For sheer longevity in the business, I think that Brian Cant must be one of the few to compete. Cant is 75 now, but I'm sure that I saw him on TV the other week, reading to five-year-olds, as much loved by them as, in some cases, he was by their grandparents. I see from Wikipedia that he's also Fern Britton's brother-in-law. I also see that Cant beat Postgate for "best-loved voice" on children's TV in a poll a couple of years ago.
Tony Hart would never have been in the running for that award. What he did have was a kind of zaniness that was in tune with the 1960s. Anyone who watched The Monkees would have recognized the stylistic similarity.
It's hard to remember when your love of kids' programmes was replaced by a preference for "adult" kids fare (e.g. in my case, The Avengers, The Persuaders, Danger Man, The Saint). I would guess that it was around the age of eight or nine, although I'm sure that I stuck with Blue Peter through to the age of 10 or 11. Now, in a sense, we've lost that. There's the pre-school stuff in the morning, but that period from between school to when the news comes on is more likely to be watched for Neighbours than for Blue Peter. No longer is it fonr-page headlines who will be the new BP presenter. Instead we get a half-hour special to reveal that the new Doctor Who will be someone no-one has ever heard of, mainly because he is cheap.
________
Theoretically there should be no such thing as "a generation". It should be a smooth progression. But life doesn't work like that. It moves in jerks, in fits and starts. Newspapers were young newspapers and become old newspapers and either regenerate like Doctor Who (step forward the Daily Mail) or age alongside their staff and readers (hello, Daily Express, Daily Mirror).
The introduction of TV as a mass medium meant that a generation "of an age" came into TV at the same time. They moved into it in the early to late 1950s, often in their late 20s or early 30s. We, meanwhile (by which I mean the generation "half a generation" behind this lot), grew up watching these people. Or, in the case of Oliver Postgate, listening to them. About a decade ago these TV faces of the late 1950s and early 1960s faded from the screens, heading off into retirement. Now they are dying.
Oliver Postgate went a few weeks ago. I don't know if I mentioned it here. I try to avoid repeating what other people have already said in a far better and more knowledgeable way than I could manage. But Postgate really was a part of my childhood -- the Noggin The Nog era rather than the Clangers era (although, unlike Alex The Gent Goldie, I did remember that the Clangers' planet was blue). To reverse a well-known saying, he had a great voice for television.
Now Tony Hart has gone. I'll admit that Vision On was never one of my great favourites and Tony Hart/Morph were not the duo that I most looked forward to seeing every week. I vaguely recall thinking at the time, "bloody silly". But you can't deny Hart's contribution to children's television, over more than 40 years. For sheer longevity in the business, I think that Brian Cant must be one of the few to compete. Cant is 75 now, but I'm sure that I saw him on TV the other week, reading to five-year-olds, as much loved by them as, in some cases, he was by their grandparents. I see from Wikipedia that he's also Fern Britton's brother-in-law. I also see that Cant beat Postgate for "best-loved voice" on children's TV in a poll a couple of years ago.
Tony Hart would never have been in the running for that award. What he did have was a kind of zaniness that was in tune with the 1960s. Anyone who watched The Monkees would have recognized the stylistic similarity.
It's hard to remember when your love of kids' programmes was replaced by a preference for "adult" kids fare (e.g. in my case, The Avengers, The Persuaders, Danger Man, The Saint). I would guess that it was around the age of eight or nine, although I'm sure that I stuck with Blue Peter through to the age of 10 or 11. Now, in a sense, we've lost that. There's the pre-school stuff in the morning, but that period from between school to when the news comes on is more likely to be watched for Neighbours than for Blue Peter. No longer is it fonr-page headlines who will be the new BP presenter. Instead we get a half-hour special to reveal that the new Doctor Who will be someone no-one has ever heard of, mainly because he is cheap.
________
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A parent writes....
Date: 2009-01-18 07:14 pm (UTC)You're denied the regular exposure to kids programmes throughout the 90's and 00's. The genius of such things as Mr Benn, Spider and Fantastic Max gave way to the current crop about which I really know nothing. But kids TV is still there, just on a lower light and denied any interest from ITV. I hear very good things about Iggle Piggle and Lazy Town but I don't have that close a connection. I caught a few seconds of Postman Pat the other day and was horrified to find him in a helicopter.
What has happened is that kids TV has been ghettoised, into Childrens BBC, CBeebies and Nickleodeon. When kids TV was a part of the 3/4/5 terrestrial channels it floated into adult consciousness a little more. Now, it's on channel 41 (or whatever the hell) and as a parent it'd be possible to avoid. Not that this would be good parenting, but then if you can parcel them off to another TV somewhere in the house whilst you watch Sky Sports News, some people see that as a result.
Re: A parent writes....
Date: 2009-01-18 08:00 pm (UTC)However, I don't think that it is "seamless", solely because so many young people came intop TV at the same time -- after the second world war. Corporations age (see Microsoft and average age of employee compared with, say, Google) and then there is a "quantum shift" as all these people reach retirement age at once. We didn't hear of the death of children's TV legends a decade ago, did we?
PJ
Re: A parent writes....
Date: 2009-01-19 01:22 pm (UTC)There are, sporadically, still some interesting and imaginitive children's shows on the BBC; not many, but a few, and I'm guessing that the last year or two have been relatively good. I particulary enjoyed Election, which was effectively The Apprentice for kids with Jon Dimbleby playing the Sir Alan Sugar role, a vague (very vague) politics-and-leadership-skills theme replacing the business, and much less ego and bitchery. Crisis Control at the moment is fine, too; effectively it's a RPG where the kids are not swords-and-sorcery fantasy heroes but modern-day "realistic" (in very heavy quotes) crisis-resolution fantasy heroes and a TV version of those "which order do you prioritise things in?" management exercises. It's also really, really well-made.