I hate to start things off with a character assassination - but this one's been overdue for quite some time...
Australian talk show host and cardigan wearer Rove McManus is not funny. Nor - on the whole - is his show. I've given it a lot of thought and I've done my research - forcing myself to sit through several episodes in the pursuit of fairness and thus ruling out the slim chance that I was 'catching him on a bad night'.
There are some amusing moments on his show, on occasion, but they usually don't involve Rove or any of his regular guests who like their host, are unfunny. Roves mate Pete (and I'm guessing this is how all the regulars got to be on the show, cause they're Roves mate) is decidedly unfunny. He is rotund and looks like he should be funny, but isn't. His biggest claim to fame is the voice over he looped through the annoying James Blunt song that just made it, well, more annoying. Pete gets a lot of camera time on Rove. Shame he's not funny.
So why is it that so many people think Rove is funny?
You see here in New Zealand we have a group of people who like to spend their time imitating our most populist creatures - sheep. This group of 'trendsetters' (a group predominantly made up of whats left of the Friends TV show fan base) like to have whatever is being marketed as the next big thing and thus buy / watch / follow it in such numbers that it does indeed become the days hottest property. Not by quality, but by sheer weight of numbers succumbing to its marketing.
Rove and his TV show is a big hit with this crowd. I suspect they download him onto their iPods so that they may watch it in between periods of listening to their favourite radio station, 91zm. A station that unashamedly promotes itself as being a big fan of Rove.
Which in itself would be okay, if their influence didn't force itself over into the mediums I enjoy - all of whom do their best to play it cool and act all independent but are so subconsciously scared of missing out on what ever threatens to collectively float the boat of this small country that they almost inevitably buy into the hype too.
No one has any balls over here anymore.
One man who made like he did for a wee while was a current affairs presenter by the name of John Campbell. Now I like John - he's a local lad, is quite funny at times and makes a good argument. Well he used too, when he was the heir apparent to the 7pm current affairs viewing audience crown and was fighting tooth and nail to get it. But now that he has his hands firmly on the jewels, his have almost disappeared, leaving a pale imitation of the street fighter that used to ask the hard questions of his guests. Those guests have been bumped from the lineup and their places taken by regular appearances on the Campbell Live show from the likes of - wait for it - Rove McManus.
The two have quite the affinity for other it would seem. John wishes he was as popular with the sheep as Rove appears to be. Rove likes John because 'there's no one in Australia like him' which to me lends itself to more questions than it does answers on just why Rove digs John so much.
The irony to all this is that once upon a time we Kiwis found nothing more annoying than an unfunny Australian. If that unfunny Australian was annoying too than that meant instant removal from the Christmas card list. Personally I think Rove's unfunniness makes him annoying, so he's off my list for this year.
So both men get the big channel change from me these days when their respective shows come on the telly. It is after all the simplest way to avoid the subject, but with so may sheep wanting to be in on the hype in this day and age, is it really that easy to escape the celebrity any more?
If enough sheep tell you you're 'soooooo funny', does it actually make you funny, even if you're not?
No comments:
Post a Comment