Are We Live? (11 page)

‘The Arch Bitch of Canterbury.’

BBC News reporting on the baddest cleric in Christendom

‘The Clown is starting to break, the skies are starting to look Clare.’

BBC News reporting on the circus …I mean, the weather

‘[The government] are making holes for surgeons.’

BBC subtitles that should have read ‘making helpful decisions’

‘I do not believe in soliciting myself.’

British broadcaster Andrew Neil on the BBC’s
Daily Politics
(he actually said ‘shortlisting’)

‘The Island rugby team.’

The BBC live subtitling system apparently does not care for
Irish
rugby players

‘They will be toasted to their limits.’

Phillip Schofield describing the challenges facing the contestants on
Dancing On Ice

‘The sale of millions of puppies in Britain.’

BBC subtitles when covering Remembrance Day – poppies, it seems, are so passé

‘Engle Bert humper distinct.’

Engelbert Humperdinck, as announced by subtitles on ITV1’s
Loose Women

‘We will now have a moment’s violence.’

BBC News 24 live subtitles, during the Queen Mother’s funeral in April 2002

‘Mr Beryl Beryl.‘

Live subtitles give Silvio Berlusconi, former Prime Minister of Italy, a whole new name

‘Jesus Christ.’

Live subtitling interpretation of ‘GCHQ’ (Government Communications Headquarters)

‘There will be little silence out of the Emirates today, but both teams mock the fact that tomorrow is Remembrance Sunday.’

Match of the Day
subtitling referring to a football match at the Arsenal Emirates Stadium – it should have read ‘mark’

‘“Very Super Tissues” – Stevie Wonder.’

BBC live subtitles, trying (but failing) to indicate the use of Stevie Wonder’s ‘Superstition’ lyric as background music

‘Across the ice and the Samaritans and speedo you …The choreography for this routine it’s quite a blasphemy …dolomite go horribly one when you got your Blades Court …I am begging you not to dealers list.’

Subtitles on
Dancing on Ice
, which bought a whole new meaning to the word ‘baffling’.

It might be a hard-rock number or a perhaps a heart-wrenching ballad, but whatever the tune chosen, background music is used to great effect by broadcasters to heighten the dramatic feel of a piece, or just to illustrate a point. But there have been times when the choice of music hasn’t just been inappropriate, it’s been downright offensive.

‘Precious Things’ by Tori Amos was used as backing music on a daytime antiques show, even though the song – and in fact the album – largely examines Amos’s sexual assault as a young woman, feminism, and quite a lot of bleeding.

‘Brick Shithouse’ by Placebo was played over footage of rugby match highlights.

In May 2010, during a CNN news report celebrating the fact that one-hundred-and-three-year-old pensioner Gladys Flamer was still able to drive herself around, the production team accidentally played the wrong music. As the tape of an elderly black woman rolled, rapper Coolio’s ‘Fantastic Voyage’ accompanied the segment. With a lyric that included ‘Everybody’s got a stack and it ain’t no crack,’ poor Gladys’s piece went down with some aplomb.

News anchor Kyra Phillips was later forced to apologize:  ‘It was the wrong music that aired, and we apologize for that. It was a terrible mistake, and we’re working very hard to make up for that.’