After all the speculation, when tv3 finally took to the air at 5.30 p.m. yesterday we could see what the State's first "wholly commercial television channel" (as they describe it themselves) actually looks like. It doesn't come as much of a surprise to find that it looks much the same as any other privately-owned, middle-of-the-road station. Last night's schedule, with its preponderance of home-produced programming, was far from representative of what an average evening on tv3 will be like. It started very awkwardly with a half-hour This Is tv3, in which an (excruciatingly embarrassing) comic family was shown around the station's Tallaght premises. After that it was a relief when the regular schedule kicked in, with the first Six O'Clock News.
With the station's domestic output dominated by news, this is one of tv3's key programmes. Leading with the Clinton crisis the programme went to Dalkey for vox pop interviews on whether the US President should resign. (Dalkey resoundingly says no). Was this the News Lite that some commentators have predicted?
Other stories followed in quick succession, some quite solid, others very one-dimensional: the effect of the closure of an Army barracks on soldiers' families in Fermoy; the collapse of the Big Issues magazine; a new attempt by retailers to combat shoplifting. This was a first night, after all, and a certain stiffness was only to be expected, along with a few fumbles, but anchors Alan Cantwell and Grainne Seoige are competent and presentable, if a little more formal than the pre-publicity would have had us believe.
One of the few home-made productions which figures in a primetime slot, Messrs Tylak And Rooney, took comedians Paul Tylak and Joe Rooney on a jaunt around the Galway Races E's table for years and it's good to see them finally getting their own show, which is for amiable and harmless fun.
Following Just Shoot Me, one of the many B-list American sitcoms in the schedule, Cantwell and Seoige were back again for 20/20, tv3's weekly current-affairs programme, which carried an interview with the President, Mrs McAleese. 20/20 is linked to the ABC-produced American programme of the same name, so we got a report on a sinister American cult and on grungey computer hackers, which sat rather strangely with the strait-laced interview with the President.
Merlin, a lavish, star-laden mini-series of the Arthurian legend, is the kind of thing that tv3 will be hoping will take viewers away from the more established channels. One wonders how many people were watching television on a glorious Indian-summer evening, and the likelihood is that most of those who were had their sets tuned to Mrs Doubtfire (sneakily programmed by RTE to coincide with its rival's opening).
Last night's start was low-key with none of the razzmatazz that accompanied the opening of TnaG or Radio Ireland. Similarly, the overall impression was of a cautious, even conservative approach. These people are in it for the long haul but they may need to excite us a little more if they want us to take any notice.
