Can Stephen and Debi take on Richard and Judy? TELEVISION: NEW SHOW

0 Comments | Sunday Herald, The, Jan 27, 2008 | by Peter John Meiklem Media Correspondent

STEPHEN Jardine, the smoothtalking veteran presenter from Scottish Television, has made a career out being the kind of affable bloke your granny wouldn't mind inviting in for a cup of tea.

Jardine's everyman charms put to equally good use when reporting upon a murder for Scotland Today or a nice swimming pool on travel show Scottish Passport are exactly what his employers at STV are banking on this week, as the station prepares to launch its new magazine-style current affairs programme.

TV bosses hope The Five Thirty Show which begins tomorrow and promises to show more imagination than its call-aspade-a-spade title would suggest will turn Jardine and his fellow presenter Debi Edward into unofficial tea-time guests in homes across the country.

But competition for viewers in the 5.30pm to 6pm time slot is fierce; The Five Thirty Show will be going head-tohead with daytime television's royal couple Richard and Judy on Channel 4, Neighbours on BBC One and The Weakest Link on BBC Two.

Broadcast live from STV's Glasgow headquarters at Pacific Quay every Monday to Friday, the show will fill the half-hour before STV's flagship news programmes Scotland Today and North Tonight start at 6pm.

The show will take a more relaxed approach to the news, and include many of the lighter stories from across Scotland which wouldn't have made it through the pitching stage in the past. Expect to see reports from a kid's camp being held in NASA headquarters in Houston and the inside track on how Arbroath smokies are made. So excited are staff claim STV's public relations people that many of the Pacific Quay team not involved with the project are planning to stay late on Monday night to watch the first show being broadcast.

Jardine, The Five Thirty Show's most recognisable face, says he has been involved with the programme since December and has fed in ideas at every level of its evolution. Speaking to the Sunday Herald only days before going live for the first time, he claimed the programme is what Scotland has been waiting for since devolution.

"So much has happened here over the last seven years but you look at the broadcasting landscape and what, in terms of programming, has happened to reflect that? The news programmes on both channels [Reporting Scotland on BBC One and Scotland Today on STV] are really the same. This is the first new programme in many years that will give us the opportunity to reflect how Scotland has changed and is changing." So, no couthie news presented live from inside a tartan shortbread tin, then?

"I think people now have very high expectations from Scottish programmes. Scottish people talking to Scottish people will make us very distinctive. We [he and Edward] live here, we work here, our families are here and we know what matters to people up here. And that's not necessarily the same as for programme makers in London and Manchester." David Shearer, deputy managing director of Mediacom Scotland, which buys advertising space on STV, is one who is not convinced, fearing the show could be a little "bland".

He says: "When Richard and Judy moved to Channel 4 it was their personality that carried the show. With no disrespect to Stephen, I can't see him developing a cult of personality." Shearer is happy that STV has decided to make a new programme in Scotland a move that would have been highly unlikely before Rob Woodward became the managing director of STV parent company SMG and stated his support for more new Scottish produced programmes (although this is the first STV is paying for). However, Shearer fears STV is putting too much faith into its new programme: "It will do OK but it is not going to be the schedule saviour they are making it out to be. I don't think it is going to set the heather alight." Bland or not, the heads of STV believe they have the right show on their hands to capture what they feel is an untapped Scottish audience. Aimed at a slightly younger and more female mix than Scotland Today and North Tonight, they believe the new programme's blend of watercooler chat, offbeat stories and celebrity interviews will do the job. It is certainly hard to deny that the ratings rise when Scottish programmes are shown to Scottish people.

Gordon Macmillan, STV's head of news, says the 5.30pm to 6pm slot has under-performed in the past but he believes it has great potential.

"There have been a number of shows in that slot over the last 12 months.

Golden Balls [the Jasper Carrot quiz show currently in the slot] has performed better than some others: it might get low teens, other programmes get eight or nine per cent. So clearly at that level of audience share we think there's room for improvement." On exactly how high a level of audience share growth, over how long a period, Macmillan refuses to commit himself. Better than the current audience share for that time slot is as far as he will go.

Key to the show's success will be the audience's reaction to its super-friendly style. The programme's promo video is brighter and more welcoming than a weekend camp for Christian cub scouts, and the show's producers hope the audience will interact with the programme through the web, helping to shape its content.