There is no doubt that this is a fabulous idea – make a soap, and then record a fake and funny documentary about the making of that soap. It is the sort of innovative idea that we expect from one of the brains behind Life On Mars (Tony Jordan), and we have to applaud ITV for giving it a go – it really isn’t the sort of thing we have come to expect ITV to come up with.
You can feel a ‘but’ coming on, can’t you? Well you are astute and intelligent readers and I’m afraid as such you are absolutely right. Yes it was a great idea, but what’s the point in a great idea if it totally fails to come off in the end? Very little, to be honest, and these two programmes added up to an hour’s worth of television that just didn’t deliver. On pretty much any level.
The hour started with Moving Wallpaper, the mockumentary showing us what goes on behind the scenes of ITV’s new soap Echo Beach. Actually, the soap started off as a worthy, issues-based drama called ‘Polnarren’ – the name of the Cornish fishing village in which it is set. But the opening scene shows the producer getting sacked (and headbutting a photo of ITV boss Michael Grade – one of the few smile-inducing moments of the whole show) and hot-shot producer Jonathan Pope is brought in. Echo Beach, Hollyoakes-meets-Dynasty, is born.
At this point, it became terribly obvious that this really isn’t a comedy mockumentary in the style of Spinal Tap or The Office at all; there is no attempt whatsoever to make this look or feel ‘real’. It is scripted in a very obvious way – especially Jonathan Pope’s self-aggrandising speeches – and it looks just like a traditional sit-com. And this just felt… weird. Ben Miller, who plays Pope, was clearly having loads of fun being as hammy as possible – but who can blame him? No-one else is making any attempt at reality so he may as well go as far as he can with it.
But because Moving Wallpaper felt so artificial, that just meant that Echo Beach felt completely artificial too. I just can’t care about the characters in this soap because all I’m thinking is “It’s not even a real soap!” It falls between two stools: it tries too hard to be a proper drama to be considered a parody, and it’s too ridiculous and, well, ’80s to be considered a proper drama. The fact that Martine McCutcheon and Jason Donovan are two of the most wooden actors I’ve seen in a long while is the least of its problems, but doesn’t help either.
Moving Wallpaper was, I suppose, somewhat more enjoyable than Echo Beach, but it would probably work better if we could just accept it as a standalone sit-com. Nice idea, then, but one that totally fails in delivery.
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