This evening, the National University of Singapore hosted an evening with John Cleese – the actor, comedian and (the role I believe him to be most especially proud) writer. He was absorbing, entertaining, wise and of course amusing.
His key message was one that mirrors an aspect of television news which I find producers often overlook: In Cleese’s films, the item that risked offense, generated shock and promoted discomfort was also the item that people found the funniest and most importantly the most memorable.
In television news, particularly in sport, we have no need nor wish to offend, but there are incidental moments of rarity, quirkiness and amusement that we often ignore, prima facie with good reason. I always advise students and junior staff that the secret of good journalism is brevity. Why then should we play up a side show when the main story is already, inevitably and sometimes heartbreakingly truncated due to the pressures of space, time and rights restrictions?
The answer is because that moment will be the first thing, perhaps the single thing, that people will talk and laugh about at the water cooler the very next day.
That item, the one that made you smile or exclaim and sparked you into paying proper attention, may have had no baring on the result, but it’s why we love sport. Sport should be quirky, it should be about much more than the result and as my first mentor in sports journalism (Des Corkhill) once told be, it should be fun.
It’s for this reason that we should strive to show the baseball fan who catches the ball while holding a baby; why we should always show the elderly club chairman having a snooze after his half-time prawn sandwich; and importantly, why we should never take the very serious business of our own show, too seriously.
Most producers see the sense in this some of the time, although occasionally we all struggle to see the moment for what it could potentially be. When a producer sees it with crystal clarity, more than any of us, he has a special talent. That’s Kieran Mctague.
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