Viewers’ Views

Press, Volume CXIII, Issue 33193, 5 April 1973, Page 4

Viewers’ Views

Letters-on television topics are subject to the rules applying to ordinary correspondence. U.K. v U.S.A. I think “Yankee Lover” missed the point of my last letter. I certainly don’t expect programmes solely for my own enjoyment. What I object to is the imbalance in programming — Friday night is usually all American, Sunday and Monday mainly British (often two plays and two or three documentaries in one night). It's all or nothing. Until recently, boring, predictable American series such as “Marcus Welby,” “Nichols,” “Storefront Lawyers,” “Gunsmoke” and “Ironside” took up most of the peak viewing hours. 1 don’t think that al! British programmes are good. There have been some very good American documentaries, plays, and even old films in the past. Give me that versatile comedienne, Carol Burnett, over Morecambe and Wise any day. So many excellent programmes are

lost to viewers because of their late screening hour. I am not a television addict; an hour and a half a night, before 10 p.m., would be I ample for me.— QUALITY BEFORE QUANTITY. That awful voice of Cilla Black — “Is that yew. i’Urry?” Was there any call l for the N.Z.B.C. to inflict this rot on the inoffensive (viewer? I am so fed up with I the preponderance of British programmes on television ! that I am utterly grateful for the relief afforded by any programme that does not originate in England; does not have heavily accented, ■ barely intelligible voices; has personable actors and (actresses instead of real-life freaks; and can use language i i without injecting “bluddies” I lin every sentence. — SICK | SOCIETY. I It is patently - absurd, ; however satisfying to the ego, for “Yankee Lover” or anyone else to air their particular prejudices in viewing. A great deal of tripe is 'served out to us. by any

standards, from both England and America, and we can only restrict our choice (of programmes to those which do not offend us personally. But in view of our official critic’s animadversions on certain oftrepeated series of dramas or comedies, I think that an annual questionnaire would help to pinpoint the most deservedly unpopular ones, and we might then be saved what the majority obviously regards as a dead loss in entertainment for weekly runs of three months or more. This would, no doubt, cost money, but surely licence-holders deserve that much concern for their feelings. — I. S. TREW.