It will have been coming for a while: the departure of Angela de Jong as a TV columnist of the AD. It was also no surprise for Victor Vlam. “Her influence was waning,” he says.
It is almost a year since Yvonne Coldeweijer stopped her juice channel and now the showbiz is again lost a controversial opinion maker: Angela de Jong. She stops with her much-read TV column, which caused a lot of controversy, especially in the early days: the Dutch celebrities were not yet used to those razor-sharp pieces.
Angela not elitist
Angela is the most famous TV reviewer that the Netherlands has ever known. How is that possible? “She watched TV like the ordinary viewer,” explains MediaCiticus Victor Vlam in the podcast Victor explains TV. “Many reviewers watch television with an elitist look. They especially like inaccessible documentaries, late at the evening of NPO 2.”
“But Angela de Jong, who wrote about, for example, I love Holland and that is something that was very appealing. That was actually quite new, you could even say.”
Influence
By giving opinions about entertainment TV and its presenters, Angela became a factor of interest. “And at the same time that is also a little bit why her influence was waning lately,” says Victor. “I think you can say that the past three or four years that had been greatly declined.”
Then why? “Because a lot of other people have taken over what she did. I think that applies to Tina Nijkamp. I think that applies to myself. And that is why it became a little less unique. But for years she was the one who actually did that exclusively and that ensured that she simply built up a huge influence in Hilversum.”
Major consequences
Angela’s departure is a loss for the AD media editorial office, Victor thinks. “I think that this has major consequences for the AD as a whole, but for the media editorial in particular, because they lose a figurehead. The media editor, which really was dependent on her. She was the cork on which that entire editor was driven.”
He continues: “Because of her column, people took a subscription to the AD and so the big question is who is going to follow her. I am really very curious about that. It is important for the AD to make a knot about it, because the AD and De Telegraaf are still in a big competition at the moment.”
Tierelier
De Telegraaf has made a major catch up in the past period. The newspaper has given the media section with columnists Mark Koster and Tina Nijkamp again.
“So they go like a Tierelier. In other words: it is very important for AD that there is a strong successor to Angela,” concludes Victor.