Whilst reading the MediaGuardian supplement on Monday afternoon I was shocked to discover that the new head of Channel 4 is planning to cancel one of my favourite shows, Fifteen to One. For those of you who are unaware, Fifteen to One happens to be, in my humble opinion, the greatest general knowledge quiz show in the history of television. It is a beacon of light amidst an ocean of mediocrity, and yet the new Channel 4 boss Mark Thompson is conspiring to remove it from its rightful place in the weekday afternoon schedules to make room, most likely, for programming representative of that most loathsome of contemporary television genres: I’m talking about _house porn_. Yes, house porn; where television shows about other people’s homes and gardens seem to have propagated a new religion, one of soulless aesthetics and blatant materialism. House porn. Day after day, if it isn’t living room makeovers and garden landscaping, it’s hour-long infomercials for architects and estate agents. And the schedules are full of it — this week alone, at least _thirteen_ hours of programming on British terrestrial television is dedicated to barely-differing variations of house porn (and please note, that’s not counting digital satellite or cable channels, or the endless repeats of Cribs on MTV, which would likely triple this figure, at least). I remember when house porn wasn’t such an endemic nuisance. When I was a lad I enjoyed shows like Through the Keyhole (with Lloyd “Who lives in a house like this?” Grossman) as much as the next person. At least there was some sort of logic to it. But then Changing Rooms came along, and ruined it for everyone. Suddenly gardening and DIY became prime-time material (much to the delight of hardware superstores, garden centres and builders suppliers everywhere, I would imagine) and competing channels scrambled to outdo each other in the home renovation stakes. Night after night of nameless, faceless mugs staring back at us through the TV screen as so-called interior designers prance about gaily with paint rollers and masking tape. Andy Warhol would be pleased, I guess. But I’m not. It’s time for and end to this pornographic portrayal of property on prime-time TV before other, much more worthy programming gets washed away in its wake. At present I still have University Challenge to fulfil my general knowledge quotient; yet at the rate things are going, for how much longer?

Sun 21 Sep 2003 at 22:41   ·