The BBC. They’ve done a lot of silly things over the years. Eldorado, for example. Fame Academy. That sitcom with the bloke from Minder that treated the nightmare of Alzheimers as a ‘bit of a laugh.’ Oh, and let’s not forget their most recent conquest: handing over a whole five-million English pounds to secure the services of official least-funny-man-alive (and that’s including Robert Mugabe) – Graham Norton.
And now they’ve excelled themselves. In a move of spectacular idiocy – hecklerspray is talking five-star, gold-award-winning calibre – the makers of a BBC 3 documentary about Bob Marley wrote a letter to the self-titled Bob Marley Foundation asking for an interview with the man himself…
Hence the perfectly logical reply: well, sure, Bob would love
to. There’s a minor problem here, however … namely that Mr. Marley is
ever-so-slightly, oh-just-a-little-bit, completely and utterly dead and frigging buried.’
Which kind of put a spanner in the works.
The BBC is reported to be ‘very embarrassed‘ about the whole thing. Indeed, as soon as the blunder was uncovered, a swift apology was issued …
… something which strikes hecklerspray as slightly unfair. Countless millions of people sat through Saturday’s post-ironic, post-whatever mauling of cherished childhood memory Doctor Who, and to the best of our knowledge they didn’t get an apology.
Okay, so watching Billie Piper‘s appalling non-acting wasn’t quite as bad as a chronic misunderstanding involving a long-dead relative.
But it almost was.
So we say: come on, Beeby-boys. Get a sense of perspective.
Sorry. Say it with us: sorry. It’s one little word, right? There’s an entire nation out there simply waiting for you to justify Strictly Come Dancing or Two Pints Of Lager And A Packet Of Crisps or anything else that you’ve thrown money at like some vain attempt to re-create the closing scenes of Brewsters Millions.
Just think about it. If you don’t show a bit of humility to all your viewers – not just the Marleys and their long departed daddy – then who knows what might happen?
We’ll all write really nasty letters to Points Of View, that’s what.
[story by C J Davies]
