The Bolt and the Beautiful

Today the news filtered through that there was more to Andrew Bolt’s “all about me” tip and prediction at the end of yesterday’s Insiders. It was reported by Amanda Meade in The Oz that he was in talks with Channel 10 for his very own show!

Well done Andrew, finally you get a chance to come about from under the bushel where you’ve been hiding all these years, as Les Kendall would say, “You’ve got a light in you boy. Let it shine!”

Very quickly after the news came through , Possum on Twitter, fresh off his success last week starting up the #TonyTonight Twitter meme, came up with #boltsnewshow – which allowed the obviously biased evil leftist Twitter to go slightly mad with suggestions for what Bolt’s new show would be called, and it quickly became the top trending topic on Twitter in Australia.

Given I’m a bit light on things to write about today, I’m taking the standard MSM line of just grabbing stuff from Twitter. So in that vein, some of the best were:

@B_Natural: Australia's Got Malice
@matthewbevan: Border Insecurity
@AusDude71: Against the Wind Farm
@upulie: Talkin' 'bout my Not Stolen Generation
@KathyReid: Incite
@Bor_Seyah: Top Fear
@madcatjo2point0: Steve Price Is Right
@alexmillier: Who wants to be a dill on air?
@crazyjane13: So You Think You Can Rant
@jonaholmesMW: Emission possible

Apologies to those missed – there were over 4000 of them, and there were a few repeats, (Top Fear got a few mentions), so apologies as well if you think I’ve given a line to someone else.

Personally though, I think such shows are aiming too low. Indeed I hope Channel 10 seizes this opportunity to give Bolt a chance to branch out and show off his thespian chops. I see Bolt playing a detective – sort of Bolt P.I. – where each week he has new and exciting sexy adventures where the culprit is invariably a Somali warlord living the high life on the dole in a two bedroom flat in Footscray.

If detective work ain’t his caper, perhaps Bolt MD, would be more his style. Instead of the tired old “lupus” being the standard cause of illness, the team of highly trained physicians at Robert Menzies Memorial Hospital would be stumped each week until the patient casually announces, “Hey you know, I really only started feeling ill when this family of asylum seekers moved in next door”.

And if all else fails, The Andrew Bolt Variety Hour would be sure to get the ratings soaring. Where Don Lane had Uri Gellar, Bolt could get in his very own climate scientists who could show us how if you hold a graph a certain way the curve magically starts to bend down. His slightly flirty repartee with guests Miranda Devine and Janet Albrechtsen each week would be sure to be the topic of giddy conversation at the water coolers the next morning. And with Andrew ending each night singing one of his favourite tunes – “A Whiter Shade of Pale” perhaps – well heck, I doubt you could get better entertainment anywhere this side of a Blankety Blanks repeat (the Daryl Somers version).

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So seriously (really – you want to be serious about this?), will his show be a success? Well who the hell knows – for a start we don’t even know what it is to be. If his MTR ratings though are anything to go by, Channel 10 is taking a big risk. Bolt on TV seems to be best suited when he is the second banana – the guy who is there to say something outrageous and have a go at someone else – sort of the political equivalent of Sam Newman on The Footy Show. Now there may be lots of people who watch The Footy Show who say Sam is the best thing about it (and equally many who say he is the worst), but I doubt The Sam Newman Show would rate – and you have to figure if such a show would rate Channel 9 would have given it a shot by now.

I’ve watched Bolt on Insiders these many years – and I have no doubt he gets more of a reaction than other panellists – but I have only watched him on Insiders because he was on Insiders – ditto Piers Ackerman and others. I don’t watch the 7pm Project, (ABC News is on), and so when I see announced on Twitter that he is on that show I don’t feel any need switch over to be outraged. Ditto his appearances on The Today Show. If he started appearing on ABC Breakfast I’d probably make a comment, but I don’t ever switch over to Channel 9 to see what zany hijinks he is going to be up to today with Karl Stefanovik.

So if is to be a success I think he is going to need a bloody good support act – Bolt leading the discussion is pretty dull, because as you can see when he has been on Insiders, Bolt leading the discussion means “enough about you, here’s what I think”. No doubt a few (and probably me – if it doesn’t clash with something I usually watch) will tune in to the first episode for curiosity value, however it is amazing how a big reputation and audience in one medium does not transfer to TV – think Alan Jones Live, which lasted a whole 13 weeks.

But hey let’s not pre-judge a show before it has even been officially announced!

Good luck Andrew – here’s hoping you can be our very own Glenn Beck.

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In a bit of house keeping – there won’t be a blog post tomorrow, I’m meeting up with a mate who has spent the last 4 months touring round the middle east. Apparently some interesting things have happened in that area of late…