Live into 85
| Live into 85 | |
|---|---|
| Genre | New Year's television special |
| Presented by | Tom O'Connor |
| Country of origin |
|
| Production | |
| Production company | BBC Scotland |
| Original release | |
| Network | BBC One |
| Release | 31 December 1984 |
Live into 85 is a New Year's Eve television special that was broadcast by BBC One on 31 December 1984. Broadcast from the Gleneagles Hotel near Auchterarder, Scotland and presented by Tom O'Connor, the special was themed around Scotland's Hogmanay festivities.
The special was a retool of the BBC's then-traditional New Year's specials from Scotland, with its producers aiming to produce a show that would have a broader appeal after years of increasingly downmarket and perfunctory shows. The special would feature appearances by pop band Modern Romance and singer Maggie Moone, who would be joined by other Scottish performers and guests.
Facing a number of production setbacks (to the point that the programme went off the air sooner than planned), Live into 85 was poorly received by viewers and critics in England and Scotland alike. The poor reception to the special prompted the BBC to end its networked Hogmanay specials after 32 consecutive years, replacing them with different formats and mostly relegating Hogmanay coverage to a special broadcast as an opt-out on BBC One Scotland.
Background[edit]
From 1953, BBC One broadcast increasingly perfunctory Hogmanay-themed specials to see in the new year, which increasingly comprised drunk faded popstars and old-fashioned comedians making in-group and out-group jokes about other home nations in increasingly dilapidated studios and venues. Regular participants included Jimmy Logan, Kenneth McKellar, Andy Stewart, Moira Anderson, and the City of Glasgow Police. ITV got in on the act in the late 1950s, airing its own similarly themed Hogmanay specials, to which Stewart later defected.[1]
Production[edit]
In 1984, the programme makers were reinvigorated by the English National Tourism Board making "Make it Live in 1985" their slogan and set about making that year's broadcast more inclusive towards English viewers. Hiring the Bootle-born entertainer Tom O'Connor as presenter, the English band Bucks Fizz, and the Birmingham-based singer Maggie Moone, a dwindling budget meant that the remaining acts comprised Moira Anderson, Chic Murray, Buff Hardie and Stephen Robertson, John Grieve, Bill Torrance, the Pipes and Drums of British Caledonian Airways, the Jim Johnstone Scottish Country Dance Band, and the Tom McShane Dancers, all from Scotland; Murray was in poor health at the time and would die a month later, while Bucks Fizz were taken out of action by a tour bus crash on 11 December and were replaced with Modern Romance.[1] That year, ITV mounted The Hogmanay Show,[2] a po-faced Hogmanay special similar to those aired in previous years, which featured Andy Stewart and other Scottish acts.[1]
O'Connor visited Gleneagles Hotel, the recording location, the day before broadcast, to recce the scene; disgusted by the lack of emergency tape, he badgered the producer until he agreed to film one of the bands and some other segments. The day of broadcast, temperatures were no higher than 4 °C (39 °F), conditions were hazardous, and several acts were late arriving. It also became apparent that the producers had failed to secure the venue for exclusive use, resulting in an audience of rowdy revellers who were often seen staggering into shots, disrupting cameramen, and caught on microphones; a drunk audience member attempted to peer up Maggie Moone's skirt while she was performing,[1] and another sexually assaulted her.[3]
Over the course of the broadcast, a drunk John Grieve forgot his lines and stumbled into laughter when attempting to recite a poem, the kilted Pipes and Drums of British Caledonian Airways refused to return to the venue's freezing cold car park after their performance, and Chic Murray (who was meant as the traditional first-foot) was so flustered by the continuing presence of the Pipes and Drums that he became too bewildered to perform and spent his set berating the floor manager; eventually, the programme was taken off air early after Modern Romance performed "Best Years of Our Lives".[1]
Reception and aftermath[edit]
Live into 85 was poorly-received by critics in both Scotland and England; writing for the British Comedy Guide, comedy historian Graham McCann wrote that "the Scottish newspapers appeared to be inaugurating a period of national mourning", and observed that the special "[was] so stupendously awful that it killed that deeply dubious broadcasting tradition [of Hogmanay] stone dead".[1]
Norman Harper of The Press and Journal described the special as "an hour of televised tripe", writing that "you could hear the toes curling; you could feel the heat of embarrassment as the whole show whirled gaily down the plughole. Putting it out on the national network compounded the felony. The whole of Britain was watching us make fools of ourselves."[1] Dennis Hackett of The Times described the special as "a shambles in content and production", though felt that ITV's offering wasn't much better,[2] and many viewers complained about the programme's poor quality.[4]
Retrospective reviews were not much better; Scott Murray of The Guardian wrote in December 2008 that the special was a "spectacular car-crash" and singled out Grieve's attempted contribution as "bloody awful doggerel",[5] while the Daily Record described it in December 2012 as "one of Scotland's most embarrassing telly gaffs"[6] and Andrew Roberts of The Independent wrote in December 2014 that O'Connor "merited a special television award for maintaining his sang-froid".[7]
The following year, the BBC repeatedly reassured viewers that that year's offering would be free from bagpipes, accordions, and kilts; 1985's show began with Terry Wogan walking on stage with his flies down.[5] No official end-of-year show was mounted for some years; 1987 featured a special New Year's episode of the BBC's soap EastEnders,[1] while Clive James filled in seven years between 1988–89 and 1994–95 with his own scabrous rantings[8] and Angus Deayton took over thereafter.[9] Hogmanay would not ooze into a BBC New Year's special broadcast outside of Scotland again until 1998, when BBC One simulcast New Year Live '98, an equally shambolic production presented and promoted poorly by Carol Smillie and Fred MacAulay, and BBC Two aired a documentary about Live into 85 presented by Mark Lamarr.[10]
References[edit]
- ^ a b c d e f g h McCann, Graham (30 December 2021). "Gang Aft Agley: The Day TV Broke Hogmanay - Comedy Chronicles". British Comedy Guide. Retrieved 22 April 2024.
- ^ a b The Times , 1985, UK, English. Archive.org. Retrieved 22 April 2024.
- ^ Smith, Aidan (24 September 2019). "Jackie Bird won't be on TV, so cancel Hogmanay". The Scotsman. Retrieved 22 April 2024.
- ^ Corporation, British Broadcasting (1985). BBC Annual Report and Handbook 1986: Incorporating the Annual Report and Accounts 1984-85. B.B.C. ISBN 978-0-563-20448-0.
- ^ a b Murray, Scott (24 December 2008). "Joy of Six: Memorable Christmas and New Year TV events". The Guardian. ISSN 0261-3077. Retrieved 22 April 2024.
- ^ "Square eyes Live into 85; Each week we look back at our favourite TV shows. From soaps, dramas and reality telly to quiz, cop and kids' shows, some have become our friends. - Free Online Library". www.thefreelibrary.com. Retrieved 22 April 2024.
- ^ "New Year's Eve television: Should old debacles be forgot..." The Independent. 28 December 2014. Retrieved 22 April 2024.
- ^ Cream, T. V. (27 November 2019). "Clive James, on television – TV Cream". Retrieved 22 April 2024.
- ^ "Five… Four… Three… Two… One! : Off The Telly". web.archive.org. 21 July 2021. Retrieved 22 April 2024.
- ^ McCann, Graham (31 December 2023). "Hogmanay Hell: The BBC's New Year Live 98 - Comedy Chronicles". British Comedy Guide. Retrieved 22 April 2024.