If this really is the BBC One Christmas Day line-up, then frankly we are fucked. “No one does Christmas quite like the BBC, ” says Charlotte Moore, BBC’s Chief Content Officer, “And this year we have raised the bar even higher with a cracking line-up that will bring people together across the UK.” Let’s be clear and understand that she is referring to this:
6.00am Breakfast
9.00am Trolls Holiday in Harmony (Repeat)
9.20am Superworm (Repeat)
9.50am The Gruffalo’s Child (Repeat)
10.15am Christmas Morning Service from Halifax Minster
11.20am Film : Toy Story 3 (2010)
12.55pm Film : Minions : The Rise of Gru (2022) Première
2.15pm BBC News, Weather
2.35pm Tiddler
3.00pm The King
3.10pm The Weakest Link Christmas Special
3.55pm Strictly Come Dancing Christmas Special
5.10pm Doctor Who : Joy to the World
6.10pm Wallace & Gromit :
Vengeance Most Fowl
7.30pm EastEnders
8.00pm Call the Midwife Christmas Special (Part One)
9.00pm Gavin & Stacey : The Finale
10.35pm EastEnders
11.05pm Mrs Brown’s Boys Christmas Special
11.35pm BBC News, Weather
11.55pm On Christmas Night
12.00am Film : Marry Me (2022)
1.45am Weather for the Week Ahead
1.50am BBC News
“No one does Christmas quite like the BBC” my arse.
It is probably just me, but there is not a single programme on BBC One that I would, under any circumstances at all, choose to watch; scheduling that has been compiled by someone with all the imagination of a house brick. I might just have to engage my brain and do something other than gaze brainlessly at the crystal bucket. Things are so much worse than they used to be, right? Actually, no. Christmas Day TV has always been a version of shit. Here’s one for the teenagers. The BBC One Schedule from Christmas Day 1979:
9.00am Star Over Bethlehem
a programme of Christmas music.
Eight nations, brought together
by that man-made star, the
communications satellite, joined in a
global celebration
10.00am Morning Service
A celebration of Christmas by the children
and young people from Christ Church,
Llanedeyrn, Cardiff
10.58am Weather Jack Scott
11.00am Bagpuss
11.15am The Spinners at Christmas
The Spinners are joined by their audience
in festive mood for a seasonal special
of music and comedy, which this year is
from Thoresby Hall, Nottinghamshire.
11.45am Film : Black Beauty (1971)
starring Mark Lester , Walter Slezak
1.30pm John Curry
with Katherine Foulkes and
Lorna Brown recorded at
Queens Ice Skating Club, London
2.00pm Top of the Pops 1979
introduced by Kid Jensen and Peter Powell
3.00pm The Queen
speaks to the Commonwealth
3.20pm Larry Grayson’s Christmas
Generation Game
special edition for Christmas Day –
with surprise guests and seasonal
games for the contestants and the
family to play at home. starring
Larry Grayson with Isla St Clair
4.20pm Film : The Gnome Mobile (1967)
The Walt Disney film starring
Walter Brennan, Matthew Garber ,
Karen Dotrice Première
5.45pm BBC News Peter Woods Weather
5.50pm Blankety Blank
Terry Wogan hosts a special Christmas
edition of the comedy quiz game, in which
contestants attempt to match their
“blanks” with Lennie Bennett,
Lorraine Chase, Wendy Craig,
Sandra Dickinson, Shirley Anne Field,
Kenny Everett, Liza Goddard,
David Hamilton, David Jason, Roy Kinnear,
Patrick Moore and Beryl Reid
6.30pm All Creatures Great and Small
A series in 14 parts
1: Plenty to Grouse About
7.20pm The Mike Yarwood Christmas Show
with special guest star from America
Johnny Mathis with Janet Brown
8.00pm To the Manor Born
Christmas comes but once a year
8.30pm Film : The Sting (1973)
starring Paul Newman, Robert Redford
Première
10.35pm BBC News Peter Woods Weatherman
10.45pm Parkinson at Christmas
Join Michael Parkinson and his
seasonal guests for a special show
which reflects some of the many aspects
of Christmas past and present
12.05am Closedown
Okay, you might find the odd show that would be preferable to Mrs Brown’s Boys, but then even rickets is preferable to Mrs Brown’s Boys. A mixture of God, ice skating, a faux folk group from Liverpool, Larry Grayson, some old films and the worst impressionist in the history of TV, the execrable Mike Yarwood. Granted, the magnificent The Sting is on, but I had already seen it at the cinema by then. Let’s be honest: 2024 and 1979 are effectively two cheeks of the same miserable arse. If you look across the whole piece, give or take the odd gem, it’s uniformly grim.
Ah well, I hear you say. What would YOU do if you were head of the BBC? What shows would you commission? What would you do better? To be honest, I’d probably piss people off in the same way as I am pissed off with this year’s grim offerings. But here goes.
Pack the morning schedules with stuff for the kids but after that let’s have some music, like a Top of the Pops type show, or even, perish the idea, some original music programming. It doesn’t have to be fronted by Jools Holland, which appears to be the law at the BBC, but it could include a wide variety of genres to keep granny happy, as well as the teenagers. Then, once King Brian has done his bit, how about an action Bond-type movie, perhaps an original show produced by or for the BBC. It can’t be that hard.
I suppose we must have a Strictly special, but why the misery of EastEnders, twice, Call The Midwife (why?), Gavin And Stacey (there is never a good time for James Corden to be on telly) and why or why Mrs Fucking Brown’s Boys? Because everyone hates Mrs Brown’s Boys, they really fucking loathe it. Who has Mrs Brown, or whatever his name is, been shagging?
The BBC makes so many good dramas – this year alone we have had Boat Story, Nightsleeper, Strike, Ludwig, The Jetty, Sherwood, Shetland to name but a few – and they best they can do on Christmas Day, when everything is closed, is programming so bad you must assume the only reason for showing it is to make it seem like the day will last forever, and not in a good way.
Would you believe I am a strong supporter of public service broadcasting in general and the BBC in particular, but the corporation seems to be doing its level best to get me to change my mind. In many areas, it remains world class, not least in its matchless radio provision, which is definitely a good thing, meaning that I can listen to stuff I like rather than watch stuff I don’t. Surely, though, they can do better than the drab offerings on offer this year?
Just because Christmas Day telly has always been shit – and we are kidding ourselves if we pretend it wasn’t – there must be someone, somewhere who can try something a bit different? The only positive thing to say is that things couldn’t get any worse. Could they?
