TELEVISION
I switch off
STUART HOOD
Paradoxically one of the most cheering pieces of intelligence I have picked up rec- ently is that there are indications of a fall in television viewing figures; not just a seasonal fall but an absolute fall in the number of persons using the telly as their primary source of entertainment. This is the kind of intelligence that spreads gloom among media men and, in particular, among the men from the advertising agencies; but to anyone who is concerned primarily with the quality of the programmes and their effect on the audience it can only cause pleasure. The question is whether the phen- omenon is due to increased selectivity on the part of the viewer or merely boredom at the repetitive nature of much of what he sees.
If the dip in figures persists after the sum- mer weather, audience research will no doubt begin to provide some evidence of what is happening. Meanwhile one can only clutch at such straws as the wind carries along; such as that, talking to a class in a Tomprehensive school about television, I found that the most popular programme (in the sense that it was the programme most of the class watched) was the news, that they watched less than two hours a night and that they were dissatisfied with the quality of American programmes and wished there were fewer of them. They did not give the impression of being a captive audience for any channel, now or in the
future. If their attitudes persist after they have passed through the pop and transistor -lige the television companies will not be able to take loyalty for granted.
What I have found depressing, on the other hand, is the news that there is- likely to be an extension of television into the daylight hours. We are probably about to see the advent of what the Americans call
'daytime television', some of which is so designed that one does not actually have to watch it but can listen to it as one shaves, baths, or has breakfast. We may not per- haps see anything as awful as the soap operas and quiz games which fill stretches of the daylight hours in the States; but what we certainly shall see are more programmes like Crossroads and more programmes aimed at the transatlantic market. The needs of the viewer will be sacrificed in the name of the export drive and Queen's awards. There is a case for daytime television. There are large numbers of shift workers who cannot ever see evening programmes. It seems sad that there is every prospect of their being fobbed off with the softest, mushiest form of television diet.
The pessimism of the television critic has its own etiology. It arises from an awful sense of being caught in a cycle of pro- grammes which constantly returns to its starting point, from a sense of having seen most of it before. The only cure for it is to break—Buddha-like—from the cycle and achieve some other avatar. But my pessi- mism at this moment is not altogether sub- jective. Television in this country does appear to be at a low point. The feeling is widespread in the industry. There are un- certainties about the future. There is an air of economic stringency. Producers and dir- ectors feel that their work is becoming depersonalised in the rush to meet the re- quirements of the channels. There is less time (which notoriously means money) to think. Producers and directors, too, have their own brand of pessimism. It springs from the disproportion between the effort to make a programme and the imprint it leaves on the mind of even the most faith- ful viewer. Name ten good television plays in the last year. There were ten. But what were they? Patterns on an electronic screen.
When it gets that bad it is time for a change.
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