8504/21423
Newsround may look like it is just thrown together by an incompetent idiot who has no idea what he is going to say next and more worryingly has no idea what his ventriloquist dummy is going to say next.
I have nothing to add to that sentence. Felt like there was a but coming when I started.
Wait.... BUT, as with its precursor Twitch of Fun (will it ever return so we can produce that 100th episode?) I sometimes spend much too much time searching for the right news story. Time I could be using for actual work.
The story needs to be one that I am confident will spark some funny improv. And I am not just thinking of myself here. I have to work out if it's a good story for Ally, who refuses to take any part in show prep. Often of course, I also need to arrange for one of my reporter puppets to be transported round the globe so I can chat to them on the scene.
Today I kept going back to all my news sites trying to find something to talk about with a 134 year old ventriloqist dummy and there was NO NEWS. The lame stream filled their space with trivia and rubbish about some minor conflicts in the world or some nonces but was there a subject worthy of the analysis that Newsround provides.
There was not.
So I didn't do one.
It's not like I plan what's going to happen - there's no point because Ally will not work with scripts- but I get a feeling that some stories will have a door I can open to find some (hopefully) comedy inside and some do not.
Sometimes I am wrong, but that's what makes it exciting. But just like writing Emergency Questions, choosing the right story for Newsround is a weird skill.
I was inundated with emails and social media messages asking where today's episode was. To such an extent that all email and social media accounts collapsed under the weight of it all and none of them actually made it to me.
But seriously, what's more likely - the collapse of communication or not a single person noticing I hadn't posted today? Get real sheeple.
Anyway, I missed doing it. Maybe it wasn't just the lack of news, maybe the mood had to be right for the magic to happen, like it's Tom's Midnight Garden or something. I genuinely and unironically think the puppet work is the best thing I've done. Some people actually think I have gone mad because I am posting unhinged videos of me arguing with an ancient chunk of wood and papier mache. I think I would know if I had gone mad.
I love how this project confuses people, even some of the ones who really love it. It works for me because you can't be quite sure if I am having a breakdown or not (and maybe because I am not quite sure either), but it's playing on a lot of levels. There are other people doing ventriloquism, but no one is doing it like this. There might be a reason for that.
Once upon a time I might have been frustrated if I was creating work that was flying so far under the radar, but I have got use to creating work that flies under the radar and am now working entirely for myself and whatever idiots get what I am doing and want to come on the flight with me.
Somehow it is working for me. Somehow I have created so much material that I'd say it is actually impossible to be a dedicated fan of mine. There are barely enough hours in the day to create all this stuff, let alone ingest it.
I know more about comedy than you and you'll just have to trust me that Rich and Ally's Craven Newsround is one of the world's greatest comedic achievements and the longer it goes on, the greater that achievement becomes.
Hop on board if you can cope with flying so close to the ground. Just not today because I couldn't think of anything to talk about.
Long term viewer, (like all my best fans) largely disparaging fan and uniquely Tom Cruise lookalike, Vaun Earl Thomas (
see him here)
gave the best review of the show so far-
"Again, your uncle who seemed so cool when you were young cos he do card tricks and won a mini metro on 3-2-1, now sat desperately trying to be hip at your nana’s funeral, but underneath the mega cringe, is a sweet , warm, engaging man who just wants to be back on the telly."
All true. Except the uncle actually thinks he is back on the telly.
