The Sigla Blog

As RTE’s Arts Lives series returns tonight, Arminta Wallace asks in today’s Irish Times (subs required) if Arts programming in RTE is a victim of late night scheduling. She quotes a recent Arts Council survey that says that people’s first port of call when they get home from work is “the PC, not the TV” and asks:

“Could this be why arts programmes - especially those which engage critically with the arts - are moving into later and later slots in the schedules? There are a few honourable exceptions… but, by and large, you need to be something of a vampire to keep up with the arts as they are broadcast in 2007.
Gone are the days of cosy afternoon cups of coffee with Rattlebag, presented by Myles Dungan. Serious amounts of caffeine are now required to keep awake until the end of, say, the music programme Other Voices, or Rattlebag’s replacement, The Eleventh Hour, both of which gravitate towards midnight. Even the unfailingly jaunty Páraic Breathnach - who hosts The Eleventh Hour as well as Soiscéal Pháraic - must surely be aware that his audience may drop out - or drop off - before the final credits. As for John Kelly’s The View, you need to be pretty alert to catch it at all, since it has shrunk to 40 minutes, on 36 weeks of the year.”

The Eleventh Hour on RTE Radio 1 is a case in point. An excellent show, it seems marginalised (and as a result, often forgotten about) going out at 11pm. Thankfully there are podcasts available of the show, and a recent programme on the short story proves why it’s worth listening to.

Arminta also has another feature in today’s Times (subs required) about the volume of programmes made by Independent Production companies for RTE. She points out that all but one of the 12 Arts Lives programmes is made by an Independent company. The piece closes with a quote from an anonymous RTE programme maker who says, “Music and arts are at the bottom of the food chain in RTÉ,” says one disgruntled producer. “They want budgets down and production standards up - and they want total control.”

Tonight’s Arts Lives kicks off with “Charles Haughey - Patronising the Arts” and according to the brochure the programme “comes partly to praise and partly to ask if in the end Haughey did the state of the arts some service”.

Watch out for the “Pop Fiction” programme in the series coming up in a couple of weeks where I’ll be threatening jihad on chick lit. Well no, I’ll just be giving out about it a bit…

Arts Lives is on RTE 1 tonight, at 10.15pm
Link: The Eleventh Hour