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| Alesha to replace Judge Arlene http://www.bbfans.co.uk/viewtopic.php?f=54&t=37715 |
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| Author: | Madeline [ 19 Jun 09, 8:44 ] |
| Post subject: | Alesha to replace Judge Arlene |
Alesha Dixon's Strictly deal ‘in days’ Sun |
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| Author: | Madeline [ 19 Jun 09, 8:53 ] |
| Post subject: | Re: Alesha to replace Judge Arlene |
Strictly ageist? How Arlene Phillips, 66, is giving way to 30-year-old Alesha Dixon |
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| Author: | Madeline [ 24 Jun 09, 8:50 ] |
| Post subject: | Re: Alesha to replace Judge Arlene |
Amanda slams Arlene sacking Sun |
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| Author: | Madeline [ 09 Jul 09, 8:13 ] |
| Post subject: | Re: Alesha to replace Judge Arlene |
Strictly Alesha Sun |
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| Author: | Madeline [ 09 Jul 09, 17:23 ] |
| Post subject: | Re: Alesha to replace Judge Arlene |
Alesha Dixon WILL replace Arlene Phillips on Strictly Come Dancing, confirms BBC Mail |
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| Author: | Madeline [ 11 Jul 09, 14:11 ] |
| Post subject: | Re: Alesha to replace Judge Arlene |
Howard Jacobson: I never did see my function as supplier of the wherewithal to feed women's neuroses The dull truth is that women like men too much to forgo them It isn't often we call for direct political action in this column. But we call for it today. Boycott Strictly Come Dancing. Keep your televisions off when the new season of the programme starts. Do something else with your Saturday nights. Don't buy tickets for the show. Don't vote for your favourite celebrity dancer. Just say "No!". Drastic measures, I know. But if we can express our dissatisfaction with New Labour by staying away from the polls or voting in comic book Nazis, we can do something similar with the BBC's flagship Saturday night light entertainment show. And since more people watch Strictly Come Dancing than Prime Minister's Questions, since Bruce Forsyth is better loved than Gordon Brown, and since the judges enjoy greater fame than the Cabinet, you could say that this is an infinitely more significant political action we'll be taking. I mention the judges of Strictly Come Dancing because it is the new composition of the judging panel that has aroused my ire. It has been rumoured for weeks that Arlene Phillips, the one woman judge on the programme, is to be axed for someone younger. Two days ago that decision was confirmed. Alesha Dixon, who is half Arlene Phillips's age, whose only qualification as an estimator and interpreter of dance is that she won Strictly Come Dancing a couple of years ago, and who just happens to be exceedingly pretty, is her replacement. None of the remaining three male judges, aged 65, 53 and 44 respectively, is being replaced. Nor is Bruce Forsyth, aged 81. What does that tell you? Allow me to digress. There has been a great deal of idle speculation this last week about the unnecessity of men. I have not felt hurt by it. If it turns out that sperm can indeed be manufactured without a man in sight, and that women will be able to help themselves from a bottomless supply of the stuff, whenever the hankering for a baby, anybody's baby, grabs them – say after they've been thrown off Strictly Come Dancing – then that's all right by me. I never did see my function as supplier of the wherewithal to feed maternal neuroses. At a stroke – if the science is correct – I am released into carefree, free-as-a-bird functionlessness. I can throw my creativity around simply for the joy of it, without responsibility or consequence. Bring it on, I say. Who needs men? No one. That's the fantasy. The dull truth is that women like men too much to forgo them, and men themselves will not seize this opportunity for release. Together, in what we call society, we will go on as before, with men calling the shots and women encouraging them. It has long seemed to me that without the connivance of women in the patriarchal society, the patriarchal society would have bitten the dust. Woman's greatest enemy is woman. It is a woman, Jay Hunt, whom we must blame for the sacking of Arlene Phillips. Of course the culture of the BBC will have got at her, but she is called Controller of BBC1 so we must charge her with the responsibility of controlling it. She should have said we will keep Arlene Phillips because she is good at the job, because she is a distinguished choreographer, because viewers learn (and like to learn) from her expertise even as they enjoy the televisual equivalent of a bubble bath, because the exercise of seasoned judgement is part of the programme's success, and because a woman does not become uninteresting when she turns, or threatens to turn, 65. In fact she becomes more interesting – at least to everyone but sperm-filled teenage rugby players whom science is about to make otiose anyway. I will not, Jay Hunt should have added, kowtow to the crude and false assumption – ageist, sexist and brainist in this instance – that youthfulness is all, not least as Strictly Come Dancing has been doing very well, thank you, with audiences of all ages. Instead, Jay Hunt – may her name be a byword for perfidy among women – answered the charge of ageism by saying it wasn't ageism (you don't have to be subtle to be a BBC controller) and went on to say that "Strictly is not the Olympics for ballroom dancing, it's an entertainment show". Figure that. It's not the Olympics, Arlene, so you have to go. In fact, Arlene Phillips has no more failed the entertainment test than any of the judges. This being BBC1, a smattering of inanity is considered essential. Bruce Forsyth tells bad jokes and engages in lumpen banter with the contestants and the judges. With Arlene Phillips, this banter was always lowered a notch to take account of her being a woman and therefore having the hots for male dancers with firm bodies. I found this unseemly myself, and would have liked it had Arlene Phillips punched Brucie or his scriptwriter in the mouth. That I would have called "entertainment". But she handled it with grace, giving as good as she got, and mingling – as the brief required – finesse with fun. Jay Hunt's Olympic jibe answers none of the objections. Arlene Phillips has been given the boot because she is a woman of a certain age, period. Nothing to do with the Olympics. Nothing to do with entertainment. To do with years. It's as brutal as that. In the eyes of the BBC a woman ages at twice the speed of men, and once she is past the time of ogling (and they are wrong about that too), she's had it. On other grounds than ageism, too, I find Jay Hunt's "entertainment" point offensive. "Entertainment" comprises more than foolishness. People who love opera are entertained by it. Little Dorrit is an entertaining novel. The Singing Detective was entertainment of a high order. There is no unbridgeable cultural divide between entertainment and seriousness, or between having a good time and making critical distinctions. Strictly Come Dancing was the proof of that. I say "was" because I trust we won't be watching it any more. But what it did was show how people knowing what they're talking about can be as entertaining as people falling over their feet. To sack a woman for not being young is criminal. Too sack a judge for judging is philistine. Both are deeply insulting to the audience. Jay Hunt should hide her head in shame. Or better still relinquish her position to someone younger. I nominate Alesha Dixon. She has the legs to be BBC1 Controller. Independent |
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| Author: | Madeline [ 11 Jul 09, 18:41 ] |
| Post subject: | Re: Alesha to replace Judge Arlene |
Arlene axe will turn off Strictly fans Sun |
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| Author: | Madeline [ 11 Jul 09, 19:19 ] |
| Post subject: | Re: Alesha to replace Judge Arlene |
Arlene Phillips should be Strictly Come Dancing's head judge If anyone on judging panel needs replacing it's Len Goodman guardian |
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| Author: | Madeline [ 11 Jul 09, 19:23 ] |
| Post subject: | Re: Alesha to replace Judge Arlene |
BBC denies ageism as Arlene Phillips shifted off Strictly Come Dancing Arlene Phillips, 66, will make way for Alesha Dixon, 30, on Strictly Come Dancing, but take role on The One Show guardian |
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| Author: | Madeline [ 11 Jul 09, 19:26 ] |
| Post subject: | Re: Alesha to replace Judge Arlene |
Strictly Come Sexism Whatever the BBC says, its treatment of Arlene Phillips will give rise to disquieting perceptions There have always been people who suggest that media studies is not a proper academic discipline. But the newer school will now be able to set classes a puzzler on a par with Fermat's last theorem in the maths faculty. Question: explain why Graham Norton is not blamed for the failure of the peak-time weekend show Totally Saturday and will be offered many other lucrative presenting roles, but – conversely – Arlene Phillips is not credited with any of the success of the peak-time weekend hit Strictly Come Dancing, and has been dumped and replaced by Darcey Bussell and Alesha Dixon. Many examinees will have a two-word answer – ageism, sexism – especially if they had as a guest lecturer Mariella Frostrup, who has recently written a series of pieces arguing that television operates a system of female euthanasia at what used to be called a certain age. Some broadcasters would argue that the success of a series results from a complex combination of elements – time slot, talent, format and what's on the other side – and that long-running shows are regularly "refreshed", a modern euphemism fit to rank with "ethnic cleansing" and "efficiency savings" (although, clearly influenced by the botched dropping of Edward Stourton from the Today programme, the BBC has been careful to line up a new package for Phillips on The One Show, where she will analyse this year's Strictly moves, like a cricketer retiring to the commentary box). My own answer would be that Norton has a longer track record, but that the contrasting examples also remind us of the extent to which television is an art rather than a science. The BBC1 leaders who are so certain that the 66-year-old expert choreographer is the part of Strictly Come Dancing that needs refreshing were presumably equally certain a few weeks ago that Totally Saturday – a flop so total that it is being dropped before the end of its run – was the perfect vehicle for one of their most talented and highly paid performers. Management – in broadcasting – is a series of hunches and gambles. And so the failure of one decision inevitably casts doubt on the wisdom of others. As a result, many viewers will continue to believe that Arlene Phillips has been punished for her birth date and her gender. This view will be encouraged for some by the fact that the same BBC press conference announcing Ms Phillips's departure previewed another series from David Attenborough, who, like continuing Strictly host Bruce Forsyth, is old enough to be her father. Sir David, though, is the wrong target. In almost all cases, television and radio presenting roles are leasehold rather than freehold. Everyone gets the knock on the door eventually: even Forsyth has been thrown away at least twice. Only a very small number of performers – Attenborough, Wogan, Paxman – will be able to do what they want until they want to stop. Female conspiracy theorists will note that all these time-deniers are men, and it is unarguable that, historically, two different rules seem to have applied to male and female broadcasters once the expense accounts of their managers have been charged for a certain number of birthday cards. The case of Selina Scott – who successfully settled with Channel Five for age discrimination – suggested that some men in broadcasting have the attitude to women presenters that business tycoons have to wives: swap frequently for a younger model. Surprisingly, America is an exception to this practice. Television audiences can be sexist – as shown by the difficulty of Katie Couric, the CBS evening news anchor, in establishing herself against male rivals who are in no obvious way superior – but there are many surviving performers of both sexes who remember when Roosevelt was president. The reason for this is not altruism but the fear of writs, which overcomes the executive desire for younger flesh. But the result is an equal opportunities policy: those men and women can even be seen to have had an equal amount of work done on chin reductions and hair extensions. But in Britain, with its history of women vanishing from the screen once they can count their age on the fingers of five hands, there will inevitably be deep suspicion about Ms Phillips's replacement by two younger women. We will only know the truth if the emails of the relevant BBC departmental managers are released under a freedom of information request or if their voice-mails are published in the News of the World – and not even then if the executives in question have been careful. Jay Hunt, the controller of BBC1, insists that the choreographer's weakness was not her seniority; but broadcasting is increasingly a branch of politics, in which denial and counter-argument can do little to overturn perception. And, whatever they say to and about Phillips, the perception stinks. guardian |
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| Author: | Madeline [ 12 Jul 09, 20:27 ] |
| Post subject: | Re: Alesha to replace Judge Arlene |
Strictly dancers furious at appointment of 'gimmick' judge Alesha Dixon By NICK MCDERMOTT and LIZ THOMAS Ch4 |
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| Author: | Madeline [ 13 Jul 09, 8:14 ] |
| Post subject: | Re: Alesha to replace Judge Arlene |
Fans blast 'sexist' BBC in Strictly backlash Sun |
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| Author: | Madeline [ 13 Jul 09, 23:49 ] |
| Post subject: | Re: Alesha to replace Judge Arlene |
Arlene Phillips should be Strictly Come Dancing's head judge If anyone on judging panel needs replacing it's Len Goodman guardian |
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| Author: | Madeline [ 15 Jul 09, 23:46 ] |
| Post subject: | Re: Alesha to replace Judge Arlene |
Bring back Arlene Phillips or I won't pay my licence fee By ALLISON PEARSON |
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| Author: | Madeline [ 16 Jul 09, 20:53 ] |
| Post subject: | Re: Alesha to replace Judge Arlene |
Axed Strictly judge Arlene Phillips is victim of 'age discrimination' says Harman DailyMail |
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