What James Bond Can Teach Us About Radio
It was a Zed family outing to the cinema last night . We saw the new James Bond movie, . Zed-daughter hadn't wanted to come along and had to be bribed with a promise that we'd visit the late-night bookshop after we saw the flick. Then there was popcorn, nachos, fizzy drinks and pick 'n' mix sweets. Well it was either this or a trip to the sports centre and I had the casting vote.
Of course I did feel a twinge of guilt when the film got going and blue-eyed Daniel Craig emerged from the sea with the kind of perfectly toned body that would make a perfect pair with my own in one of those 'before & after' adverts. I tried not to think about that and instead turned my mind to Hollywood's current enthusiasm for 'back to the start' themes in long-running franchises.
There was Batman Begins and then Superman Returns - both, like the latest Bond movie, allowed new fans to climb aboard without fear that they may have missed something vital. In other words, you don't have to belong to the fan club to understand what's going on. Take Star Wars movies, for example. I haven't a clue what they're about. And don't get me started on The Lord of the Rings!
So what's this got to do with radio? Maybe nothing, except that a few weeks ago I was listening to The Jazz House when the presenter, Stephen Duffy, read out a letter from a listener asking him to explain the difference between melody, rhythm and harmony within the context of jazz music. There then folowed fitfeen glorious minutes of the most wonderful explanation, illustrated by a musician live at the piano and augmented by archive recordings of jazz standards.
Suddenly I felt like I had been invited to the club.
It got me wondering what other radio programmes make assumptions about the audience. Does everyone really understand the workings of the Scottish Parliament? Maybe the Beechgrove Potting Shed sounds like a foreign language to non-gardeners. Perhaps there are people listening to our football commentary on Saturdays who have no idea about the offside rule.
Or is that just me?
