9th August 2006, 12:05 PM
Quote:quote:Originally posted by BAJR Host
...remember this is TV... it has to be exciting, it has to be larger than life to get the ratings...
I'm not sure I subscribe to this point of view Mr. Hosty. One of the things that constantly gets on my nerves about archaeological TV is precisely that it seems it has to conform to these principles. Why??? Iain Stewart's geological series' don't involve him dressing up as rocks and jumping up and down to describe vocanoes. He is an expert in his field and can use his knowledge to make both educational and interesting television. David Attenborough doesn't pretend to be a Gorilla or a Giraffe to go and interact with them and present them to the public for a wildlife programme - he is an expert and doesn't need to. Similarly David Starkey didn't dress up as Henry VIII and perform comedic recreated executions of Anne Bolyen and Catherine Howard looky-likeys in his series on the Tudors. Why should archaeological experts be thought of any differently?
I'd be really interested to see a decent archaeology series on the TV, but if all I get are some fools firing cannons for a laugh in the middle of a field, or someone running about a site shouting and waving his arms around telling me how exciting something is, without telling me why or placing it in a proper context (and at the same time knackering it with a machine), then frankly I'm not interested, and I don't see why the public should be either.
