The Moon of Liberty

Autumn TV is in full swing, and between Strictly Come Dancing and the X Factor Saturday nights will be dominated by these two particular shows. At some point I may be inclined to write about Strictly Come dancing, but now I'm going to concentrate on the X factor, and the dilemma facing Simon Cowell this year in particular.

The X Faxtor is of course the successor to Pop Idol, the original show to find a star of the future. These shows, despite their huge audiences have had mixed success. Pop Idol scored one out of two, Will Young still sells plenty of singles and albums today, the original Pop Idol in the never to be forgotten contest head to head with Gareth Gates. The the following year came the flop, Michelle McManus was the one hit wonder Simon Cowell and BMG records must have feared a second series would create. Michelle McManus proved all winning gives you is one guaranteed number one, but if you don't have the appeal, nothing more than that.

The X Factor was the revamped version, created to also include groups, although a group has not to date ever won, and probably won't either. It also played to the egos allowing the judges to mentor a category and become competative between themselves. The first series was the worst for this, Simon Cowell's determination to defeat fellow judge Louis Walsh in series one landed him with Steve Brookstein, when G4, the group mentored by Walsh, should have won. Brookstein, like McManus, had one hit, then fell away into obscurity, while G4 did reasonably well, and sold more albums than Brookstien could have dreamed of.

In series two Cowell realised he needed a star. He was given a weak group category anyway, Louis Walsh on the other hand had Shane Ward, a potential star. When he won the final Cowell admitted that while he hated to lose to Louis, the public had got it right. When marketed well Ward can still sell plenty today. The following year public got it right again did again, Cowell had landed the category with Leona Lewis, one of the biggest pop stars in the world today, including in the United States.

So to last year, and the big reason Simon has a huge dilemma this year too. Last year was not a strong year for the show. There was no obvious 'star.' Cowell tried to exploit this to push his cheesy, fun act 'Same Difference' to victory. He failed to pull this off in the process left the one man who could have made Cowell some serious money and become a different kind of star, all be it in the opera style of music rather than in the pop world, Ryddian, high and dry, leaving the field open for the OK, cute but nothing special Leon Jackson from Scotland to take the crown. It was clear he would struggle to sell outside of Scotland however, which was proved with a number 1 single that did not sell half as many as either Shane Ward or Leona Lewis before him.

Yesterday any resonance of hope Leon could turn into a big star died when his new single, with the full backing of a performance in the safety of the X Factor studio, flopped to number 3 in the charts, being beaten to the number one spot by Pink and a spoof rip off of the very X Factor concept Leon was supposed to benefit from. Jackson's career is effectively over in terms of him making it big, surely the X Factor this year needs another star?

Which is why Cowell has a big problem. He no doubt would love to win the show again, and he could. He has the boys category, Austin and Scott both will go down well with the girls, and 16 year old Eoghan from Ireland has a very good voice, and looks very sweet on stage. So yes, Simon could find a winner from that lot. Out of those three however, are there really any starts, there is no evidence of a Shane Ward type standout performer. The girls mentored by new girl Judge Cheryl Cole however, have 3 huge potential stars. Alexandra has enetered before, did not quite make the finals then, and has come back better than ever, an outstanding singer. Laura White has huge charisma and a big voice on stage, and Diana Vickers, Cheryl's other contestant, seems to be able to take any style of song and make it totally unique.

Cowell's boys can still pull it off, but can he sell any of them beyond the fact they may be cute to young girls. That is not enough in itself to make it big. This is particularly an issue given it is Eoghan who appears to be Simon's best chance. He can sing, he looks sweet, but like Leon outside of Scotland, could they sell him outside of Ireland? The stars are amongst the girls this year, much as it may hurt Cowell to lose this year, he needs to decide if he can afford another winner of the cute factor who flops? or will he allow the girls to fight it out to see who emerges as the X factor, and has a huge future ahead of them to boot. Success of the show, an artists career and your companies success, or your ego and short term desire to win the show? That is Simon Cowell's dilemma this year. 

Straight Talk - BBC News 24 22:30pm

Andrew Neill Interviews Dame Shirley Williams

Dame Shirley Williams, former cabinet Minister, one of the gang of four who set up the Social Democrats, now a Liberal Democrat peer in the House of Lords. Also a controversial figure as she is extreamly proud in her role pushing the Comprehensive school system, a truimph to most on the left, a disaster to most on the right.

We begin with Dame Shirley's early life. Her mother was a feminist and a Labour activist. Shirley stated it was her who inherited her mothers political passions, apprently her brother had little interest and in what little he did have, he tended to side with the Conservatives.

She went to the United States during the war and spent time in Minnesota. She states in that part of the USA in the 40's there was virtually no class system, she believes this is where her passion for Comprehensive education came from as she came to dislike the class system in the UK, and saw a classless education system as key to changing this.

Dame Shirley joined the Labour party at 16 and eventually became an MP. She states she encountered little sexism in her early life and does not consider herself on a feminist mission. Eventually she became a Cabinet Minister and was passionate about pushing Tony Crossland's comprehensive school agenda on.

She stated she is proud of pushing this. Then she encountered the weakest point of the interview, she said she regretted that this had become a political football in England, and pointed to Scotland, where it was less so, as the true triumph of comprehensivism. Andrew Neill is a Scot who knows plenty about he Scottish system. He pointed out Scottish results had risen recently, in line with a huge increase in private education, and the two biggest universities in Scotland, Edinburgh and ST Andrews, were dominated by priviately educated pupils. During this part of the interview Dame Shirley was on the defensive, her critics will argue this is proof the Comprehensive argument does not stand up to scrutiny.

They move on to her leaving the Labour Party after the 1979 election. She stated 3 reasons, the Labour Party were becoming anti EEC (now the EU) which she was not, they wanted to leave NATO which she was against, and the left wanted MP's to be accountable to the party not the electorate. She pointed out it is amusing how some of these people parade themselves as great parliamentarians because they oppose the party whip today, when they used to condemn those who did so back then.

She stated she believed it took the Derek Hatton issue in Liverpool before Neil Kinnock saw what was required, and even then it was another 10 years before the battle to move the party back to sense was won. She does not regret not going back to Labour at that point.

Dame Shirley confimred she would be available to advise the Governemnt on issues that go beyond party politics in her view, as long as she retained her independence. She would advise the Government on nuclear issues as long as certain conditions about the direction of policy were met, but this would mean a commitment to eliminate neuclear weapons at the earliest opportunity.

We finish with Dame Shirley admitting her weakness was her love of detail and taking on too much. She accepts Neill's premise that this may have cost her the chance to be Britain's first female PM instead of Margaret Thatcher. 

News Knight 22:00 ITV1

Hosted by Sir Trevor McDonald

The idea is Sir Trevor McDonald does the news in a comedic way. The first thing to note is it has an 'Have I got News For You' feel without the Gameshow element. Sir Trevor is reading his jokes from an autocue. He begins with a joke about where were you when you heard about 9/11. Sir Trevor was of course telling us about, so what a stupid question.

He has a panal of guests to add some off the cuff comedy, this week featuring Marcus Brunswick, comedian Frank Boyle and a welcome return to a TV screen for Clive Anderson, who I have not seen on the box for a while.

They discuss the terror attacks in Glasgow. Boyle, a Scot, points out how silly it is to try and bring holy war to Glasgow as it has been happening there for 100 years already. This is followed by strange features on fury animals and children who are 'idiots.' This apprently is a regular feature of the show.

Next up for lampooning is Cherie Blair, her interview this week is ridculed and they make fun of her hairdo. Sir Trevor then tells us about security measures at Wimbledon, and how one concrete block that has been erected beat Tim Henman in the 2nd round. Prince Charles visit to flooded areas is discussed, including charles on his own personal dingy.

We finish with the Serena Willimas award for over doing it, an NBC reporter falls and milks the injury for all it's worth, and she is awarded the award by Sir Trevor.

This is mildly amusing, low budget entertainment. Worth a look if you can't find anything else on. I doubt it will take off and make it to the big time however.