W1A review – the Way Ahead is behind, and it’s brilliant, hurrah, joyous
It’s Monday morning and a new week at the BBC’s new Broadcasting House headquarters somewhere in central London, as head of values Ian Fletcher arrives in order to begin it.” So says narrator David Tennant, in a new series of the BBC’s self-parody W1A (BBC2), in order to begin it.
It is not just Fletcher (Hugh Bonneville) arriving, but also director of strategic governance Simon Harwood (Jason Watkins) and dim intern Will (Hugh Skinner), all on their foldy bicycles – a trident of mediocrity, a three-pronged, six-wheeled attack on the week ahead. By 9am, Ian, as someone whose job it is to steer the corporation confidently towards whatever it is that is going to happen next, is chairing a meeting of The Way Ahead Group. The focus is on the More of Less Initiative (“The fact is this is about identifying what we do best and finding more ways of doing less of it better,” explains Sarah Parish’s head of output Anna Rampton, helpfully). And with the royal charter up for renewal, the group is to be renamed The Renewal Group. The Way Ahead is behind. Brilliant, hurrah, joyous, yes, exactly, say the assembled members, watched over by a giant, smiling photograph of Mary Berry.
There is also change over at PR consultancy Perfect Curve, which is now called Fun, having been taken over by Dutch media giant Fun Media. Fun – which is, fun – comes complete with comedy bearded Dutch chairman and silent disco enthusiast Jens Smit. He is fun to his bone marrow. Happily, Siobhan Sharpe has been retained as joint CEO – happily, because she (Jessica Hynes) is still the best thing about W1A, stealing every scene she crashes into.
Back at the beeb, the newly renamed Renewal group is tackling discrimination head on. After discussing the case of a former footballer, who claims he is being overlooked as a Match of the Day pundit because he is a cross-dresser, they turn their attention to the gender pay gap within the corporation itself, and the attention it has been getting.
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Read moreProducer Lucy Freeman (Nina Sosanya) suggests that it might be fun (yay!) if they all write their own salaries on Post-it notes and stick them to their foreheads. Ian Fletcher starts to say that that might not necessarily be the best way to approach the issue, going forward, but before he has bumbled it out everyone else has said brilliant, yes exactly, hallelujah. And next thing you know, Ian’s sheepishly sporting a Post-it note with – in quite small writing but readable when the camera zooms in – £245,000 written on it. Meanwhile, senior communications officer Tracey Pritchard (Monica Dolan) has written “minimum wage, zero hours contract”. And she has also done all the O’s with a cross underneath, so they have become female signs.
At which point, BBC director general, Tony Hall, finally making a W1A cameo, bursts into the room to announce that he has launched at least three different enquiries into how this sorry state of affairs has come about. And that, in the meantime, everyone – male, female, the gender fluid, Ryan the cross-dressing former footballer, even Will the intern – will have their salaries bumped up to the figure he’s wearing on his own forehead: £450,000. And that, as a result, for budgetary reasons, the creation of all original content will be immediately cancelled. Going forward, the corporation will be solely an online platform for UGC (user-generated content), called BBCme, not wholly unlike YouTube …
You’ll know, if you actually saw it, that most of the previous three paragraphs are – to borrow a word from the “current controller of news and current affairs” – bollocks. I am making a point about W1A, though, in a really fun way, yay! [Puts on headphones, has little shuffle]
I’m saying it might be pitch perfect in its depiction of levels of nodding nonsense and corporate guff. And beautifully performed (Rufus Jones’s entertainment format producer David Wilkes needs a shoutout). It is very funny at times; and lovely that Auntie can do this, look in the mirror and have a little chuckle at herself. But it is just that – a chuckle, a playful slap on the arse (possible tribunal had it not been self-administered) rather than a proper kicking in the genitals, where anyone else making a mockumentary send-up of the BBC would go straight for.
Yes I know this was all done before the pay storm hit, so it couldn’t be in there. And of course they’re not going to give themselves a proper kicking. So it does all come over as a teeny bit smug and self-serving. The fact that BBC grandees and stars – Lineker and Shearer (both quite well paid I believe) – are queuing up to take part doesn’t help.
Obviously the next episode will mainly be about the gender pay gap scandal. And I will look like an idiot. So that’s all good then.
Source: https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2017/sep/19/w1a-review-bbc-send-up
It is not just Fletcher (Hugh Bonneville) arriving, but also director of strategic governance Simon Harwood (Jason Watkins) and dim intern Will (Hugh Skinner), all on their foldy bicycles – a trident of mediocrity, a three-pronged, six-wheeled attack on the week ahead. By 9am, Ian, as someone whose job it is to steer the corporation confidently towards whatever it is that is going to happen next, is chairing a meeting of The Way Ahead Group. The focus is on the More of Less Initiative (“The fact is this is about identifying what we do best and finding more ways of doing less of it better,” explains Sarah Parish’s head of output Anna Rampton, helpfully). And with the royal charter up for renewal, the group is to be renamed The Renewal Group. The Way Ahead is behind. Brilliant, hurrah, joyous, yes, exactly, say the assembled members, watched over by a giant, smiling photograph of Mary Berry.
There is also change over at PR consultancy Perfect Curve, which is now called Fun, having been taken over by Dutch media giant Fun Media. Fun – which is, fun – comes complete with comedy bearded Dutch chairman and silent disco enthusiast Jens Smit. He is fun to his bone marrow. Happily, Siobhan Sharpe has been retained as joint CEO – happily, because she (Jessica Hynes) is still the best thing about W1A, stealing every scene she crashes into.
Back at the beeb, the newly renamed Renewal group is tackling discrimination head on. After discussing the case of a former footballer, who claims he is being overlooked as a Match of the Day pundit because he is a cross-dresser, they turn their attention to the gender pay gap within the corporation itself, and the attention it has been getting.
Busy week? Sign up for Weekend Reading
Read moreProducer Lucy Freeman (Nina Sosanya) suggests that it might be fun (yay!) if they all write their own salaries on Post-it notes and stick them to their foreheads. Ian Fletcher starts to say that that might not necessarily be the best way to approach the issue, going forward, but before he has bumbled it out everyone else has said brilliant, yes exactly, hallelujah. And next thing you know, Ian’s sheepishly sporting a Post-it note with – in quite small writing but readable when the camera zooms in – £245,000 written on it. Meanwhile, senior communications officer Tracey Pritchard (Monica Dolan) has written “minimum wage, zero hours contract”. And she has also done all the O’s with a cross underneath, so they have become female signs.
At which point, BBC director general, Tony Hall, finally making a W1A cameo, bursts into the room to announce that he has launched at least three different enquiries into how this sorry state of affairs has come about. And that, in the meantime, everyone – male, female, the gender fluid, Ryan the cross-dressing former footballer, even Will the intern – will have their salaries bumped up to the figure he’s wearing on his own forehead: £450,000. And that, as a result, for budgetary reasons, the creation of all original content will be immediately cancelled. Going forward, the corporation will be solely an online platform for UGC (user-generated content), called BBCme, not wholly unlike YouTube …
You’ll know, if you actually saw it, that most of the previous three paragraphs are – to borrow a word from the “current controller of news and current affairs” – bollocks. I am making a point about W1A, though, in a really fun way, yay! [Puts on headphones, has little shuffle]
I’m saying it might be pitch perfect in its depiction of levels of nodding nonsense and corporate guff. And beautifully performed (Rufus Jones’s entertainment format producer David Wilkes needs a shoutout). It is very funny at times; and lovely that Auntie can do this, look in the mirror and have a little chuckle at herself. But it is just that – a chuckle, a playful slap on the arse (possible tribunal had it not been self-administered) rather than a proper kicking in the genitals, where anyone else making a mockumentary send-up of the BBC would go straight for.
Yes I know this was all done before the pay storm hit, so it couldn’t be in there. And of course they’re not going to give themselves a proper kicking. So it does all come over as a teeny bit smug and self-serving. The fact that BBC grandees and stars – Lineker and Shearer (both quite well paid I believe) – are queuing up to take part doesn’t help.
Obviously the next episode will mainly be about the gender pay gap scandal. And I will look like an idiot. So that’s all good then.
Source: https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2017/sep/19/w1a-review-bbc-send-up