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BBC TV show Tumble, featuring Amelle Berrabah and Doug Fordyce, hit a new low
At first it seemed strange but not particularly significant that Tumble, the new centrepiece in the BBC's schedule for Saturday night, was preceded by a trailer celebrating the venerable history of CBBC.
'Made for children, with children,' it said simply.
Whether Tumble had actually been thought up 'by children' too we don't know, but the implication that it might increase Tumble's appeal if the viewer's age, or IQ, was in single figures was clear.
'Tumble' certainly sounded like a children's show, possibly about animated clothes and their crazy adventures in a washing machine (copyright Jim Shelley, if Pixar are reading).
Jettisoning its original title, Let's Get Ready To Rumble was a mistake.
Tumb le definitely treated the viewers as if they were either young kids or just idiots.
'TEN CELEBRITIES', a message on the screen screamed, 'TAKING GYMNASTICS...TO A NEW LEVEL.'
This was either deliberately, pointlessly, ridiculous or just insulting - a brazen breach of the Trades Description Act.
Tumble wasn't going to take gymnastics to a new level, except down to a new low.
At best, Tumble was criminally unimaginative, blindly following the formula of Reality TV shows such as Splash ! and The Jump and Splash ! which featured desperate D-list 'celebrities' diving/belly-flopping into a swimming pool and jumping off a children's slide in Austria.
And to think people questioned whether the Olympics would imbue British life with its 'legacy.'
For the BBC, a version of The Jump and Splash ! based on gymnastics was a no-brainer (literally), particularly as in Louis Smith they had their own hugely talented, popular, and charismatic equivalent of Tom Daley on the panel.
'I am a badass on the pommel horse,' Louis asserted stylishly.
In 2012, Smith had also won Strictly Come Dancing of course.
The temptation of simply transposing ballroom dancing to gymnastics was too strong for the BBC to resist. Tumble adhered to Strictly's format with no variation or imagination whatsoever.
All the great/tired Reality TV clichés duly came, well, tumbling along.
First, we had the frustrated ex-pop star (Sarah Harding), unashamedly crazed with ambition, declaring: 'I do want to win.'
Anyone who was naïve enough to think the former Girls Aloud singer was referring to the honour of winning the first Tumble gymnastics contest was mistaken. Harding really wanted to win the real competition on the s how, namely who could wear the skimpiest outfit.
Round One, I mean Episode One saw Harding mercilessly upstaged by Lucy Mecklenburgh. Even her trainer complained that she was more interested in taking selfies to tweet than work on her routine.
New BBC show Tumble treated the viewers are if they were idiots or young kids
The next classic cliché was the preposterous claim from a sporting great (boxer Carl Froch), insisting: 'gymnastics is something I've always really wanted to do. I am more nervous about doing this than for a world title fight.'
We also had blinding examples of: * blatant false modesty (Andrea McLean): 'Me in a leotard? That's ridiculous !' * overt stupidity (Bobby Lockwood): 'gymnastics is hard.'
And the most unintentionally amusing, apt, assessment: 'this has been the hardest thing I've ever done' – by Lucy Mecklenburgh from The Only Way Is Essex. You don't say.
As for the most preposterous, pompous, drama queen, that distinction went to Christian from EastEnders, who trembled: 'It's such a huge mountain to climb. God, I've got to do this in front of the nation !'< /p>
Nobody had had the heart to tell Christian that most of 'the nation' was not actually watching but was on holiday or outside enjoying the sun.
Sadly, presenter Alex Jones was suffering from the same delusion.
'Tonight ten daring celebrities will perform dazzling gymnastic and circus-inspired routines live, to you, the nation,' she trilled brainlessly.
Heaven knows who told her that 'circus-inspired' is regarded with anything less than horror.
'Welcome to Tumble, the brand new show that will have you right on the edge of your sofa and, who knows, maybe cart-wheeling off it !' she continued.
Well I knew. That was not going to happen.
There's a reason why gymnastics, performed by professionals, doesn't have a prime time TV slot - it's just not that exciting
There's a reason why gymnastics – even when performed by the professionals partnering the celebrities – don't have their own TV show at prime time, or any time. It's just not that exciting.
Jones gamely padded out the ninety minutes by introducing the celebrities' partners, their trainers, the judges (which featured the fabulous Nadia Comaneci), and the commentator, who we cared even less about them than whether Harding or H from Steps was winning.
Ironically, the most entertaining of the celebrities wasn't actually one of the ten competing.
It might have been enjoyable, not to say enlightening, to experience Mr Motivator, a legend of breakfast television in the 1990s, again and re-visit philosophies like: 'remember, it's only in the dictionary where 'success' comes before 'work.'< /span>
Ah so...
In the absence of Mr. Motivator, first up was Amelle Berrabah, who I had thought played for West Ham.
'My name is Amelle Berrabah and I'm best known for being in a band called The Sugababes,' she revealed helpfully.The word 'best' was superfluous. And the word 'known.'
'My name is Amelle Berrabah and I'm... in a band called The Sugababes,' she could have said - except she isn't anymore.
Ironically, the most entertaining celebrity - Mr Motivator - wasn't even competing
Amelle's performance was a routine on 'the aerial hoop' with her partner (Doug Fordyce).Even though they were all professional gymnasts, and one even a world champion in 'acrobatic gymnastics', the experts were not afforded the respect of being called by their surname, purely adjuncts to the 'celebrities.'
'Amelle Berrabah and Doug' fumbled around on a huge hoop, as if they were playing a game of Twister, only upside-down and in mid-air.
The studio audience clapped and whooped obediently, even though they had no idea if she was doing the routine properly.
'We have a saying in circus...' the judge Sebastien Stella said, a disastrous start to any sentence. The poor soul compounded his shame by confessing he had been in Cirque Du Soleil.
'We say: you have to be in control of the 'oop. I didn't see the 'oop swing.'
Seeing the 'oop sounded much more exciting but Stella meant it as a compliment.
Another judge, Craig Heap (who back in 1998 had lead Great Britain to their first ever commonwealth games gymnastics gold medal) compared Amelle's routine to 'a washing machine going round and round.'
I imagined that this was exactly how the viewers felt about it too.
But he claim he found it as 'mesmerising' as he found watching the washing machine – as a child that is.
Like most other reality participation shows, the judges' marking was nonsense
The next 'celebrity', Peter Duncan, used to be a presenter on Blue Peter. I don't know if he mentioned it. He was 60 years old now apparently, and relishing the chance of luring his rival celebs into a false sense of security, and thinking: 'how will he ever catch up? This ancient God of a man !'
At least he didn't have any problems with modesty.
'Our next celebrity has come a long way already. In fact you could say he's made some great Steps,' Alex Jones winked.
Who could it be?
'I've worked so hard I just hope it's going to be enough,' said H from Steps. Oh the sacrifices these 'celebrities' make (to get on television).
H's performance inspired Louis Smith to utter the immortal words 'for me, that IS Tumble !'
Craig Heap stood on his chair, raving how H's effort had made him feel like joining in.
He then awarded him a mark of 5.5.
This was another classic cliché of these Reality shows – that the judges' marking is nonsense.
When Comaneci commented coldly that she didn't think Lucy Mecklenburgh had 'connected' with her partner, Heap declared: 'Nadia is not going to like this. I have to disagree with her...' His mark of 5.5 was then lower than Comaneci's 6. Amelle's 'mesmerising' washing machine throwback received 5/10.
Even Alex Jones was forced to remark to the studio audience: 'Do you know what? We seem to know another Craig like him don't we ?!'
Viewers had to suffer exaggerated claims about how complex the gymnastics routines were
Anyone would think he was just fulfilling the show's role of obligatory pantomime villain, practised so expertly/lucratively by Craig Revel Horwood.
All the familiar ingredients were there.
We had to suffer the exaggerated claims of what great complexity the routines had when they clearly didn't.
Emma Samms' 'dancing' was WTW: Worse Than Widdlecombe. For the most part, she just stood still on the male gymnast's shoulders.
So the 'bluebird lift' in her routine consisted of her being lifted up, and her 'back angel spiral' the same.
Then there was the inevitable appearance of a celebrity despairing how 'impossible' it was – and then, amazingly, heroically, doing it perfectly well.< /p>
Christian from EastEnders made a speech worthy of an Oscar winner, saying 'I just want to thank my team, I couldn't do any of this without them' – which we knew as it was really the point of the whole show.
Andrea McLean meanwhile explained how she had always suffered from debilitating dizziness after spinning around. This was the cue for much heartache and a quick burst of (you've guessed it) Kylie Minogue's Spinning Around.
'If I can't get over this spinning problem, I might not be able to tackle the hoops on the live show,' McLean sighed, with Sad Music now playing in the background.
'It's a live performance ! I could be spectacularly ill and become a YouTube sensation ! Or it could go really well!'
It obviously hadn't occurred to her or the producers that for the viewers, the first of these sounded fantastic and the second really boring.
The fact that she performed her routine to Donna Summer's No More Tears (Enough Is Enough) rather gave it away.
'Absolutely no sign of the phobia there!' cheered the commentator. Strange that.
The idea anyone will care about seeing the celebrities doing the routine well is unlikely
Other celebrities stressed the false danger or fake nobility in what they were doing.
Peter Duncan seemed to regard a routine segueing from a 'front angel' into a 'pigeon' as involving life-threatening peril for his poor partner.
But when the big moment arrived, the commentator dampened the tension though by cheering: 'he's got someone balancing on his head! And he's loving it!'
As for Sarah Harding, she insisted: 'part of the reason I wanted to do this was I've missed performing' – inadvertently confirming that public demand for a solo tour was zero.
'I'm just glad it's over!' she said when she had finished, suggesting that she hadn't missed performing as much as she'd thought.
If there had been any incentive to sit through the whole ninety minutes, it was the prospect of the two competitors with the lowest scores having an eliminator. The X Factor for example has a 'Sing Off', although 'a Tumble Off' probably sounds too saucy.
The real appeal of The Jump of course was not to see who won but to watch the losers having to do the ski-jump.
The loser of the eliminator in Tumble has to endure the ordeal of attempting 'The Vault' – which sounds scary but is something kids at school do every day.
Andrea McLean had actually claimed (disingenuously): 'my main goal is to do a roly poly.'
Tragically, we were treated to judge Craig Heap performing a vault for the first time in several decades with Alex Jones making the Partridge-esque announcement 'let's unleash the Heap-ster !'
Ingeniously, the prospect of watching Emma Samms from Dynasty and Lucy Mecklenburgh from The Only Way Is Essex having a Vault Off had been postponed until next Saturday.
Why they thought anyone would be interested or entertained by seeing Heap do it (badly) was bewildering.
The idea that 'the nation' is going to care much more about seeing any of the actual 'celebrities' doing it isn't much better.
The main thing that is going to be taking a 'Tumble' is the ratings.
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