Sunday 24 January 2016

325 Granada Reports


First  viewed : Uncertain

I'm  not  sure  when  I  first  caught  this  but  I  think  I  would  have  chosen  this  over  Nationwide   as  part  of  that  Friday  night  schedule.

This  was / is  Granada's   version  of  Yorkshire's  Calendar  or  LWT's  Today  , a  half-hour  round-up  of  regional  news  and  events, sometimes  interesting  , sometimes  boring or  faintly  embarrassing. The  only  thing  that  made  it  stand  out  for  me  was  that  I  absolutely  hated  one  of  the  presenters  and  I  think  you  can  probably  guess  who  that  was.

At  this  point  in  time  I  didn't  have  a  clue  about  the  extracurricular  musical  activities  of  Tony  Wilson  ( as  he  then  was  )  ; he  was  just  this  super-aggravating  smarmy  git  with  an  awful  haircut  and  a  voice  and  delivery  that  insinuated  he  was  somehow  above  his  colleagues.

I  eventually  learned  to  tolerate  him  and  after  the  demise  of  Factory  made  him  more  vulnerable  I  grew  to  appreciate  what  he  tried  to  do  for  the  city  and  was  sad  when  he  passed  away.




6 comments:

  1. By the time I knew who Wilson was, it would have been due to my growing love for Joy Division and New Order. Before, he would have just been a face on boring (to me at the time) shows like "World in Action"...

    In contrast, "Lookaround" - the Border TV equivalent of Granada Reports - had none of the reflected glamour Wilson could bring, though a young Richard Madeley cut his teeth there (and, I was once told, got his car thrashed in Cleator Moor by some lads not happy of some 'Southern poof' being on their turf).

    My dad would constantly poke fun at the low-key nature of the news by predicting items like "man's hat blows off into Maryport harbour"... it sometimes seemed he wasn't far off.

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  2. I think Madeley moved around a bit because I remember him talking about working with Wilson which must have been Granada and it was on Yorkshire's "Calendar" that he got assaulted by Shaky.
    P.S. Thanks for getting the ball rolling re Comments on here !

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  3. Madeley met Judy Finnigan on Granada Reports and was such an obnoxious Tony clone it was unbearable. There's a great clip on Tony's obit programme that Granada specially made after his death that shows Tony deliver a news item and then conclude with "Over to Richard" and Madeley's sat there in exactly the same kind of pose as Tony in the same kind of gear. So naff. Always loved Tony, as a kid he was more known to me as the newsreader and, best of all, as the host of Granada Upfront with Lucy Meacock which was always great fun. The music side never really joined up in my infant/pubescent brain. BTW, Love that photo at the top there.

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  4. Yes, Upfront was a Friday night favourite for me too so it will feature in due course.

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    1. It just felt so vital and buzzing, genuinely live. Best debate show in my opinion, something about its night slot that lifted it away from the dour The Time The Place with the odious Stapleton or Kilroy. And he may have been a Marmite type but no one can deny that Wilson was a superb live broadcaster. It's a shame there aren't any uploads of it on YouTube - beyond the odd snippet.

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  5. I wouldn't deny that either. We will come back to him in at least five future posts.

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