Tarquin Vandertwatt’s department devastated by cuts at BBC
Tarquin: 'incampotent'
Hi, Tarquin here again, and, y'know I've got to tell you, it's been a pretty crazy week. Not very cool stuff has happened, If I'm going to be honest, and as the head of Future Imaginary Diametric Digital Lifestyle Innovation Newness Group (F.I.D.D.L.I.N.G), I'm always honest with the licence-fee paying public. In fact, I'm incandescent with impotent rage (I call it 'incampotent'). You've all read the stories about the cuts being made at the B.B.C. The way I see it, if we need to rationalise our content platforms to remain competitive in a multi-mega-media age of future technology, then fine: we can strip out or down-size or outsource as much as we need when it comes to "public service" assets such as creative programming departments, new music radio stations and so-called "regional issues-based journalism". But man: when they threaten to take the axe to the B.B.C's most valuable future audience delivery unit, well that really bakes my Tilapia.
So my boss and so-called "pal" Mark Thompson crashed our latest F.I.D.D.L.I.N.G. Innovative Newness session held at the Burj Al Arab Hotel, Dubai (it's perfect for rewarding teams for doing their jobs - check it out!) on Tuesday with the horrific news. "Tarq", he says - as I'm about to announce my plan to restructure the whole department so that everyone has the same amount of syllables in their title - "Tarq, we've cut back virtually every last scintilla of original production at the Beeb. I hate to do this kid, I really do, but you've got to make some hard decisions in your own back yard. You gotta either cut your secretarial budget or the car hire: you decide. If you can't take the hit, we're going to have to look at your own remuneration package and expenses." And out he went for an executive re-charge session, swimming with some imported dolphins, stroking his achingly-fashionable three-day old beard and slapping his big, concerned forehead.
Well, like I say, it's been a week of tough choices. However, to maintain content quality across our remaining channel, that choice had to be made. Yeah, she's got impressive headlights, awesome curves, and purrs beautifully when you're changing lanes - but my Personal Delivery Assistant, Lucy, is clearly a luxury in our frugal times that I can't keep spending the bucks on. Let me make it very clear: I'm worth every penny of my £600, 000 pa salary (plus automatic future audience bonus), and I'm not exactly going to meet the movers and shakers in Digital Futurism by holding my audience-focused thinking sessions in Shepherd's Bush - can you get visibility on that?! Besides - the Bellagio, Las Vegas, has the loosest slots in town - which is, like, total value for your licence fee, so if you weigh up the transport options there, giving up the 24-hour personal luxury car and chauffeur hire doesn't make any sense.
Lucy: needs to be saved
Still, it's not like I wanna cut jobs from our essential new frontier services. I mean, if F.I.D.D.L.I.N.G. didn't exist, how on earth would we be able to imaginatively create cool new visioning platform options every month? But there is still time for the Great British Public to put a stop to this madness. There is already a "Save Lucy" facebook group that you can join, and literally six of the Senior FIDDLERS have, not to mention actual news broadcasters with real journalists on other channels out there who want to listen to what the people of Britain have to say on this issue, and speak truth to power. So come on guys! With your help, maybe I can keep my P.A., car, salary, bonus, and golden "how are you doing?" payments, and still have enough dough to bring back Walking With Mice in 3D. It may be a wild, crazy dream by someone dangerously unqualified to make assessments about the future of public service broadcasting in the 21st century, but that's my visionisation for the Beeb.
Tarquin Vandertwatt mourns the loss of a legend at the Beeb
Tarquin - devastated.
Hi, Tarquin here again, and I'm sure that, like me, you were shocked and saddened to hear that after 13 years of service Jonathan Ross will be leaving the BBC. Here at FIDDLING, the BBC's most valuable multi-platform future audience delivery unit, we are in 24/7 talent-mourning lockdown as we privately mourn the Loss of Ross. It was with great difficulty that I was able to share this loss with my Personal Delivery Assistant, Lucy, and 20 of my closest FIDDLERS at Belushi's, Shepherds Bush, during a three hour 'Innovative Newness' session.
The genius of Ross was his ability to reach such a wide audience. With his high-profile, prime-time chat show - the only one of its kind on the BBC, his three-hour prime time radio show on the most listened to station in the country, and his half-hour long weekly film review programme, again the only one of its kind on the BBC he captured the hearts of millions. To be able to reach such a great number of people with only 4.5 exclusive hours of prime-time broadcasting a week on the most popular networks in the country just goes to show what a talent the BBC loses in "Wossy".
Genius.
I find it difficult to really put into words what it was about Ross that made him such a truly infectious personality, but I think the BBC's own Media Correspondent, Torin Douglas, best articulated it when he said, "A lot of people hate him ... but that's because he's an arse-licking imbecile with a nauseating taste in suits." [Surely: "... but lots of others love him"? - Ed.] Who could fail to be amused when, on Russell Brand's radio show, he left a message on Andrew Sach's answerphone to say that Brand quite fancied a Wardolf Salad? Or what about the time when presenting the Royal Variety Performance, he turned to address the Royal Box and enquired whether the Queen had been flicking her bean during Michael Buble's performance? Priceless!
On his prime-time chat show he was able, through careful research of his interviewees, to give his massive audience fascinating insights into the stars of the day, such as Dizzee Rascal ("Your first album won the Mercuwy Prize. Did it help your caweer?"), Ben Stiller (Your new film is Night At The Museum 2. Has it already opened in Amewica?"), or a reclusive Ricky Gervais (The Office set a new standard for office-based sit-coms. Will Extwas be as bwilliant?") Is £3m a year too much for an interviewer of that calibre? I think not.
Yes it is a great loss to the BBC, of that there is no doubt. One thing is certain: the Corporation must now channel all its energies into finding, nurturing and developing a similar talent so that they can then go on to take home the salary of over one hundred assistant producers whilst attracting audiences to programmes and schedule slots that have traditionally garnered high viewing figuers whatever their content. These are exciting and cool new times. The next overpaid, over-rated, tactless, giggling idiot is out there, just waiting to be discovered. And I hope I'm not accused of dancing on the grave of Jonathan "The Boss" Ross when I say: Welcome to the Beeb, Michael McIntyre.
Exclusive! Top Media Executive Tarquin Vandertwatt!
Tarquin - Very Excited.
Today at How Inappropriate we are delighted to be able to bring some of our not inconsiderable media weight to bear and bring you an exlusive insight into the world of the world's largest publicly funded broadcaster (for contractual reasons we are not able to reveal the exact name of the organisation here, suffice it to say that you pay for it whether you want to or not). Today, exclusively, only here at How Inappropriate we have an exclusive blog entry from none other than Tarquin Vandertwatt, head of Future Imaginary Diametric Digital Lifestyle Innovation Newness Group (FIDDLING) at aforementioned world's largest publicly funded broadcaster. Exclusive.
Hi! I'm Tarquin Vandertwatt
but my friends call me Tarquin! I'm really excited that the guys at How Inappropriate have given me an opportunity to blog here, these guys are really cool, I really like their stuff, it's really exciting. It's been a real shame that we haven't been able to find an appropriate commissioning vehicle that can carry their really cool, exciting material through our organisation but, as I hope you'll see from this update today, our schedules are pretty full with some really cool, exciting stuff!
Lucy - more media-focussed.
So I'll give you a rundown of my meetings today, there are a lot of them, and I'm really excited about that! First off I have my early morning catch up with my PA, Lucy, she's really cool. She's 19 and has recently shifted her focus from drama school to the media world, and it's really great to have someone young and vibrant helping me plan my day. Our early morning meetings are really valuable to me, we like to get in nice and early before anyone else gets into the office and spend some quality unstructured, time-allocation-focussed time together.
I'll probably spend the next two hours updating my Blog, Vlog, Tweets, RSS feeds, Facebook, Myspace, Linkedinn and a few other really exciting social networking tools. Then I'll spend another 2 hours checking out some of my favourite websites, and some of the really cool stuff coming out of our own FIDDLING department.
Next it's into my first editorial, commissioning, green-lighting brainstorm. This is where the REAL work takes place, and it's really cool and exciting. I remember not long ago spending four hours in this meeting discussing the re-branding of our immensely popular, cool and exciting 360 Multiplatform production of "Pet Funerals" - I hope I don't seem arrogant if I blow my own trumpet about coming up with the concept of the even more popular, exciting and cool spin-off of "Celebrity Pet Funerals". Boy, did we have some arguments about that show! I had to really battle with some of our commissioners about whether it should be celebrity pets - famous animals' funerals, or the pets of people who were famous. Man oh man! That was a late one! We went right through til 11 at night and had to order take-out sushi like 5 times before finally agreeing that it didn't really matter.
Tarquin - informing, educating, entertaining.
Today we'll be getting some pitches from some really young, dynamic, cool and exciting wannabe multimedia producers. I've read some of the treatments in advance while I was driven in to Shepherds Bush from my home in Ladbroke Grove this morning, and I have to say I am very excited about the concept of an innovative, interactive, 360 degree production of Celebrity Barbecue Disasters! That sounds hilarious! It really is a privilege to be part of an organisation like this whose only remit is to inform, educate and entertain.
I've checked with some of the top execs here and they've agreed to let me give you some exclusives of what we have coming up in the next season, so here goes guys, a brief list of some of the really cool stuff we've got in store for you, I hope you're as excited as I am:-
- A brand new series of Where Are They Now? A nostalgic look back at some of the stars of yesteryear. 2007 to be precise. We'll be looking back to 2 years ago and asking where the stars of all your favourite shows of that time have got to now.
- Walking With Mice - With a budget of £34million we've gone all out with the latest in Computer Generated Interactivity to give you a unique insight into what it's like to have mice in your house.
- When Celebrities Swear! - a hilarious look back at some of your favourite characters' faux pas on the set of your favourite shows! Yes we've brought together all those bloopers when the famous drop clangers! This is a strictly post-watershed production. Although there will be a pre-watershed version with any offensive terms edited out.
- Only Old Fools And Horses - The cast of Britain's favourite sitcom reminisce about the hilarious times spent on the set of the nation's favourite sitcom. See all your favourites and hear fascinating, never-before-seen anecdotes of what it was like filming this most memorable and favourite TV show. (I am contractually obliged to state that neither David Jason nor Nicholas Lyndhurst have yet confirmed their availabaility).
- The Politics of Politics - A startlingly in-depth look at the history of British Politics since the 1500s. Bringing together world-renowned historians, ex Prime Ministers and current cabinet members to give a unique insight into the forces and personalities that have shaped this nation's politics over the last 500 years. This 30 minute programme was broadcast at 3am this morning on one of our digital channels and was presented by Katie Price - catch it again on our online catch-up service.
So there you go, I'm sure you'll agree that makes for some exciting reading! We can't wait to hear what you think of all this, so please take the opportunity to have your say on our website, we welcome comments from all members of the public, but would especially like to hear from some who aren't members of the BNP.
Thanks for taking the time to read this, it's been really cool and exciting to have this opportunity, now I gotta shoot, I have a really important lunch meeting at Gordon Ramsay's in Chelsea, man, I hope it doesn't last 3 hours like that last one!