Good evening, and welcome to another week of Watch With ..., the weekly feature in which we take a hour of UK television and review it in real time, and try and decide if it's all worth it or not.
This week, we'll be lapping up the adventures of Kevin McCloud and his merry band of invariably self-assured and unrealistic self-builders in Grand Designs, from 9-10 on Channel 4. If you have any opinions on the show or the episode, during or after the event, any observations, wittisations, dissertations or condemnations - do leave a comment - otherwise press refresh for updates and new comments....
You know, I really very much wanted to call this week's blog 'Watch with......another overpaid, under-worked Guardian writer for whom they have to find something to do' in honour of the nice commenters who sadly have missed the programme in question but make the time to turn up and comment on the feature in theory anyway, but I couldn't. Still, I want you to know you're appreciated, all of you. Thank you for reading. In reference to the above substitute title, though, it's correct in everything but fact. But, again, thanks for the thought.
This week, as Jason mentioned earlier, I have a stinking cold, which has little bearing on anything apart from the fact that I'm far grumpier than usual. Luckily, I will find it hard to be grumpy this evening, because we are dealing with the lovely and terminally over-enthusiastic Kevin McCloud, and Grand Designs. Also, it will be easier for a person with a head full of snot and cotton wool to keep up with, because it's just all so fabulously and desperately formulaic.
1. Kevin thinks it's overambitious and can't see how it will work. 2. The build starts well. 3. It all goes a bit wrong. 4. They somehow finish it, and Kevin thinks that it's NOT conventional, it's NOT traditional, and it SHOULDN'T work. But somehow ... it does ... [direct quote, circa almost every week]
And that's it! Every episode! Hurrah! Still, maybe this week will be different. Maybe. Back at 9.
8.58: Good evening all. First, of course, RIP Jeremy Beadle, or, as you'd have thought was his full name from looking around the newsfeeds this evening, Prankster Jeremy Beadle. He may have scared the hell out of me as a child, but, on the other hand, he had an enormous body of work, and is rightly respected for that. Respect - and no tasteless jokes in the comments, please. Ooh, it's starting.
9.02: Kevin wanders around a business district, casting his practised eye disdainfully over office blocks. "And the person who designed THIS" he snarls, pointing at a bog-standard building "... is now using the same techniques and materials to build a HOUSE", by now almost spitting, "...for his FAMILY", at which he's so incredulous you worry he might vomit.
9.06: Kevin meets commercial architect Jeremy and his wife, Katherine, who have so far bought a plot in some posh part of Bristol, and are building a large minimalist cube with one completely glass wall - which, frankly, could describe about 58% of the houses on Grand Designs, discounting the people who are putting a large minimalist block inside the old walls of a church/barn/delete where appropriate.
The bedrooms will be walled in glass which turns opaque at the flick of a switch. Because that's what your kids will be wanting really chuffed with as they turn into teenagers. "Don't come in, Mum, hang on, OH! No! Not the switch!"
Kevin is surprised that they want a house that is all glass and open and minimalist and white with two kids and two dogs. He thinks this is unrealistic. Chapter one, close. Let the build begin.
9.09: The build begins. It is harder than they think! There are delays! There is little chance of their sticking to their £350,000 building budget! Cripes, they're starting chapter three early this week, there must be some real disasters in store. Hurrah.
9.14: Blimey, I've just realised. They've spent (or planned to) 800,000k so far. I'm an overpaid and underworked writer and I can't even afford a one bedroom flat. Stupid bloody property market. Oh, righto, we're back from the break.
9.16: "Despite terrible conditions, the work carries on..." He says. As usual. There are ALWAYS terrible conditions, and work always carries on. It's so comforting, this programme. It's exactly what I would have been watching even if I wasn't currently underworking and live-blogging it, because it's like a big warm lemon and honey drink with a wee dram, or a hot water bottle. It's so formulaic, yet somehow intriguing too, because you always want to see how it will 'Only just' work this week.
9.19: "This isn't just any timber frame, this is a monster!" says Kevin, as the prefabricated walls come floating into place. He is after an M&S food voiceover job. I'd give him one. A job, I mean. Oh, that sounds almost worse.
9.21: "It's such a pleasure to see a build going so smoothly that the family involved can calmly go shopping for kitchens" says Kevin. What? No it isn't! It's very dull, and not how things are meant to go at all. Something else must go wrong! I demand it!
9.23: Even the kitchen designer is unsure of the idea of having a white kitchen with white fittings and white fixtures against white walls in a white house. With children. Meanwhile, I have just realised that one of the children is a girl. Oopsies.
9.27: Seriously, who actually wants or has time to clean that much? Katherine is looking at £1000 taps, and Kevin is walking through the pristine shell of their soon to be 'house' bemoaning the fact that it's all too perfect. All the joists are the same length, apparently. I want to insert a crude gag here about Kevin and joists and lengths, but I don't think I should in case I'm confused what joists are in my cold-addled mind.
9.30: They paint the big box pristine white with a paint that's either developed by aliens or Apple. Mud runs off it. Water bounces off it. If there were a nuclear explosion in the next street, it would still be standing. And white. Kevin thinks this paint is 'The Devil's work' (which cheers me, as I'm reminded that I can watch a new episode of Reaper later) I think these people are just plain odd. Are they all colourblind and in denial?
9.33: As Scrittipoliti says in the comment box below:
"It won't [fail] though because he's an architect, a man who can't entertain failure -- I hope Kev gives him a one of his damning with feint praise critiques and we can all return to our slightly less perfect houses and lives..."
Oh yes, those are great. "Well!" (curl of lip) "You've certainly achieved what you set OUT to achieve, didn't you? ... Mm."
9.37: There are sixteen metres of kitchen units. Seriously. There are 16m of pure white 'I'm going to show every single fingerprint' units, which are very white and minimal and clean-looking. There is also, Katherine proudly displays, the £1000 kitchen tap. Which Is A Tap.
9.39: The whole structure of the house is up. You can see the little details, like the 'floating stairs' and the bedroom which is completely open, bar a balcony, to the family room below. Nice. Having a master bedroom open to the living room in a family house clearly says two things, surely. a) You're never staying up or having a mates round in private, kids and b) We never have sex, really. Bless.
9.41: They're marvelling in the windows of the children's bedrooms - oh, of all the bedooms, I think - which change from translucent to opaque at the flick of a switch (at the cost of £1000 per metre)
"It's FUN! It's theatrical FUN!" Says Kevin, somewhat strained. It is kind of fun. I would like to come back in a few years and see if the children have turned into mardy teenagers who have found a brand new way of making the glass opaque - by sticking posters all over it.
It's all still going swimmingly. They've finished a month or two early, they're all on budget. Oh bother, why did we choose this week? I'm just going to talk about Kevin for the last 15 minutes. That will be more fun.
I bet they don't have any books, either. Probably too messy. Grumble grumble. A-choo!
9.46: "What I wonder about this project is if the is whether the geometric and the simple will result in symmetry and beauty, or in the repetitive and the mundane..." says Kev, going to break. Yeah, McCloud - suck it to'em with barely disguised distaste for their ostentatious minimalism! As my grandmother used to say.
9.52: "It doesn't feel sterile and cold, it feels warm and welcoming", says Martin, showing Kevin around the clean white box, with the white walls and the white sofas and the white stairs and whitewhitewhitewhite, pure and clean and bright. It's like the inside of a hospital, or inside the mind of the baby Jesus. There is nothing impure here.
Apparently the walls have smell-absorbant paint on. Well, of course.
9.55: The children's bedrooms are small and square and white on white on white, with some designer toys tucked away into a corner and glass that turns opaque, like a meeting room. And makes it feel like a very classy executive office. It's all very neat and tidy and clean and minimalist - and I know many many people like those things. But I just can't imagine, you know, living here.
9.58: Kevin's doing the final interview, after which there will be the final speech.
"Where's the emotional involvement here?" He asks. They say the house is ALL them, which is interesting.
But more importantly - after the final speech to camera - WHICH WAY WILL KEVIN WALK OUT OF SHOT? LEFT? RIGHT? Bids in NOW, please. Damn, I should have said this earlier. We could have put money on it. Is that illegal?
10.00pm: Left? Left? Left? No! Right!
Gosh, that came out of nowhere.
I wish someone would make a collected video of Kevin's last speeches and walks out of shot. Like with Horatio Caine and the sunglasses That would be great. No one's with me, are they. Damn.
10.05: So - as we always ask at the end of this feature - What have we learnt? 1) If you plan precisely, perfectly, and down to the very last millimetre, you can have your perfect house built within one year. 1b) (You will also need up to £1,000,000 and for your perfect house to be a large white cube. And no architect. You will need to be an architect. But other than that it is entirely possible) 2) Money can't buy you taste. But it can buy you taps. 3) People like different things. 4) Some people have seemingly NO books. Whatsoever. That's not a problem, I just find it odd. 5) Grand Designs is not alwayscompletely formulaic. Sometimes everything goes right. Which is dull. The producers should do something about that. 6) Minimalism is a lifechoice. These people like it.
(The majority of the Organ Grinder comment box, however? They say [makes the noise from Family Fortunes] )
Still, hey ho, each to their own. Anyway, the owner is intimidated by Gordon's height, and ... whoopses. I almost started liveblogging Gordon Ramsay there by mistake. Not NOW, Anna. Maybe another week...
I'm going to go and drown in snot now. Thank you all, and goodnight
