They've gone through to the other side (Richard & Judy)

Member Name: west_jenn

Product:	Richard & Judy
Date:	02/11/02 (369 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: light entertaiment, varied

Disadvantages: easy to forget after about an hour

So the king and queen of daytime T.V have upped sticks and moved to the ungodly hour of 5pm on channel 4 leaving This morning Richard and Judy less.

Their new show is called Richard and Judy and is shown between 5 and 6pm on weekdays. I've been off work after an operation for a couple of weeks, so I've been watching lots of daytime T.V. So I've been able to watch this programme, usually I'd be just getting home from work when it's nearly finished.

Which brings me to the point that the 5-6 time slot is a strange time for a talk show, it's not quite daytime T.V or an evening slot. Thinking about Richard and Judy's former incarnation on This Morning, I'd say that the first difference I noticed was the set. The studio is very blue and turquoise with an art deco look. Judy has been vamped up, for want of a better word: plunging neck lines, short skirts and knee length boots. Richard wears a jacket and t-shirt, but without a tie.

But What is the show like? Well it's a bit like a mixture between a daytime and evening show. Like all good daytime T.V shows you can put it on as a background programme and forget what the show was about one hour later. However, it's more of a chat show than This Morning there are no problem phones ins with shrinks, no cooks or bad diets. Instead there's more of a focus on discussing 'serious?' topical issues.

Taking today's episode (Friday 1st November), the first quarter of an hour was taken up with a discussion between a journalist, human rights lawyer and royal biographer (and of course Richard and Judy) about the technicalities of Paul Burrell's prosecution and whether the queen should have come forward with her information about the case sooner.

Next there was a slot showing peoples home made UFO hoax videos. So there's quite a range of things they target. Also on todays programme there was an interview with a family who for an exp

eriment had seen
how they would cope without T.V for a week, they seemed to get on ok, even if they did rather overdo the board games. There's even a phone in game kind of thing, where a member of the public has to give clues to what the picture behind Richard and Judy is and they have to guess from these clues

There was also an interview with a Coronation Street actress, the one who plays the busty barmaid. They?ve also had Billy Mithcell and Jimmy Corkhill on the show earlier in the week. Thats quite This Morning I suppose, the interview of the soap actor. Richard and Judy aren't 'put them on the spot interviewers'. They?re friendly and chatty. Judy is a bit giggly and can be a bit mumsy. Richard is terribly earnest. Judy still gives Richard withering looks as if she's thinking 'what on earth is that drivel coming from your mouth?' As a presenting team they do seem to gel well together, being married probably helps.

It is still light entertainment with a daytime T.V feel, although I think that could be something to do with Richard and Judy presenting it. It does cover lots of ground. The other day they got a couple to see how long they could hold their breath for their best friend, mum and partner (each of these will receive £100 for each minute of breath held). The theory being the closer your genes are to a person the more effort you?'l expand for them. It does have some interesting pieces, but I don't think I'll be setting the video for when I'm back at work

Summary: