Monday, November 11, 2013

Today, in the rain alongside Big Ben...

...on the green, across the road from Parliament. I recorded some promotional material for EWTN. A light fizzy rain was falling. We had to do the takes again and again as it's so easy to get things wrong - emphasis on the wrong word, too much smiling,  not enough smiling...finally, each one came right.  By which time the rain was beginning in earnest. We plodded damply, carrying the heavy equipment, across the bridge to St Thomas' Hospital where the camera team had left their car in the car park...and from there I got home, carrying books I'd bought at the CTS bookshop near the Cathedral, ready for the Towards Advent Festival in a couple of weeks time...

The absurd thing about TV is its mix of reality and utter unreality. My hair looked a bit messy, but got smoothed down by the rain as if planned that way.  My coat, brown in colour, looked a bit drab against the brown of the trees and the brown/honey colour of Parliament and the grey sky, so we cheered it up with a bright yellow scarf...well, actually not a scarf but  a yellow World Youth Day teeshirt that I happened to have in my bag...

Home to a great pile of work: a book due to be with the publisher in mid-Jan (gulp) and another due for Feb...

1 comment:

Malcolm said...

I participated in a TV programme once.It was about education. The presenter woman came on to some music and said "Mr Bloggs, you're a teacher at such and such comprehensive". Mr Bloggs said "no I'm not a teacher" (He was a leftie claiming to be an "educational facilitator" or some such nonsense). Anyway, she thought she'd got the wrong person, and became flustered.

So they took the shot again. She walked on the set to music and it was "Mr Bloggs, you work at such and such comprehensive, but claim not to be be teacher". Well that was unfair to us. And it was unfair to Mr Bloggs too. There was no ideology behind it, just need to maintain the image of the presenter as calm and smooth and professional.
It left me feeling very disillusioned with television.