In these days of Netflix and TikTok, it can be hard to remember the golden age of television – when tens of millions of people sat down at the same time, to watch the same celebrity present the same show. It’s an era nostalgically recreated in Rory Cargill: Television 1, which combines live action with pre-recorded video in a series of TV-themed sketches, guiding us from the 1970s right up to the present day.
The concept’s straightforward and promising: we’re at the filming of a tribute show, starring washed-up former gameshow host Beau Crème, celebrating the hundredth anniversary of TV channel Television 1. A parody reskinning of the BBC, Television 1’s archives are filled with shows and presenters that might seem familiar from your youth: there’s a kids’ show called Red Paul, an alternate history of TV that owes a little to Look Around You, and an eerily accurate reconstruction of the 1980s Six O’Clock News.
A lot of love, and a lot of skill, has gone into these video segments. The parody idents are a particular highlight – BBC1’s globe is enhanced by a goofy grin – and they nicely capture the milieu of talking-head documentaries, particularly as an array of luminaries reminisce about an underwhelming comedy double-act called Pots and Pans. If you remember the first series of Big Brother or the absurd microphone Terry Wogan used on Blankety Blank, there’ll be plenty of references you’ll enjoy.
But sadly, it doesn’t come together as a show. The story of how Beau fell from grace is convoluted and laboured, and his live appearances on-stage often repeat a single joke a few times too many. On the day I attended – admittedly, towards the end of a marathon Fringe run – the show wasn’t as slick and snappy as it needed to be to tie the sketches together, leaving the pace frenetic at times and flagging at others. And while the mood as a whole is silly, a couple of the parodies lead in faintly horrific directions, made all the more jarring by the fact we are completely unprepared for that swerve.
Towards the end, the tone grows more sincere as we’re invited to consider the future of TV – and more broadly, how technological change might impact on all of us. Though a commendable attempt to bring the subject matter up to date, it does highlight a tonal imbalance that’s been latent throughout the show. At its best though, Television 1 is a beautifully nostalgic and uncannily accurate pastiche… and a work of love from people who truly appreciate the motifs of a fading age.
Comments