Thursday, January 22, 2009

Working the night desk

Margaret Simons has been all over the Michael Backman incident at The Age this week. Her column in Crikey today discussing how the paper could publish a piece like that in error reminded me of the scene in The Thick Of It (Spinners & Losers episode) where the night desk at the Daily Mail is trying to follow Labour hacks' twists and turns in positioning a replacement for the recently departed PM.
Night Editor: You know our coverage tonight has either been wrong or guesswork. Which was wrong. So all we have now is a story shaped hole.
Angela: Seriously, your blood sugar's low and it makes you very irritable.
Night Editor: No. What makes me very irritable, Angela, is having no f*&*ing story and having to fill an entire newspaper with just f*&*ing prepositions.



(Yes, I know the examples are different, and the TV version of the night desk bears no resemblance to a real newsroom ...)

2 comments:

Laurel Papworth said...

The funny thing is, whenever I have pulled a journalist up on naughty behaviour - and on one occasion sic'ced Mediawatch on 'em :P - they blame their editor. "I had to, my editor made me".

Now the editors blame... production?

Completely off topic, have you seen Frost/Nixon movie yet? I refuse to watch the trailers -they ruin it for me - wonder if it will live up to it's promise?

Ah for the good ol days when there was respect for journalists. I'm thinking "All the Presidents Men". What recent piece of journalistic effort would you sell to Hollywood Hugh? *thinking out loud* what was the one with Angelina Jolie and the journo killed that was recent. Never saw it, should I?

TV can be as bitchy about newspaper reporters as bloggers can. *end ramblings*

Laurel Papworth said...

I forgot to tick "email follow ups"
*TICK*