“These are grim times.” At the beginning of Sunday evening, Paul Witteman summarized the mood in the country and in the world. “We hope that music gives you some guidance,” he continued. In his program Podium Witteman (NTR) the presenter then asked how his first guest, the Ukrainian pianist Anna Fedorova, was doing. Her answer was clear: she and the Ukrainians are not well. The destruction of the land she comes from and loves affects her deeply.
Before going to a benefit concert for Giro555 in the Concertgebouw, she played the piece ‘Melody’ by composer Myroslav Skoryk with violinist Diana Tishchenko. The short but beautiful performance of the two illustrated what music can do. A little hold, indeed. For the rest of the evening, the TV news kept us mostly face to face with the facts, sometimes with shocking images. An explosion in the suburb of Irpin was among the NOS News and at talk show ON 1 to see. One minute you saw a man walking down the street, the next a grenade exploded near him. Fedorova already said it with Witteman: “It is unimaginable, all that pain.”
The news makes many things on television feel small. The upcoming municipal elections are also not really alive with this TV reviewer. That feeling didn’t change much after seeing Toothache (NTR) on NPO3. In this election quiz with a wink, two teams of celebrities (left and right) have to answer questions about politics. Presenter and quiz leader Diederik Ebbinge has previously met Promenade made one of the best TV shows of recent years. The satirical touch of Promenade is sometimes present in the quiz, but not nearly enough to make it something special.
Wristband
Toothache can in any case still be seen as a well-intentioned attempt to present politics to the TV viewer in an accessible and amusing way. To the added value of Million Dollar Island (SBS6) it is much more searching. The new survival program from John de Mol can be described as a kind of Expedition Robinson in overdrive, with a touch Squid Game (without deadly games of course).
In the first episode, which was heavily hyped in advance, hundreds of Dutch people are dropped together on an uninhabited island. Each participant wears a wristband with a value of ten thousand euros, within the rules of the competition. Are you leaving the island? Then you give the wristband to another participant, who has collected twenty thousand euros with it. The eventual winner of the program can win a lot of money after two months. In the meantime, the participants must ‘survive’ together on a tropical island. Obviously, different camps arise and conflict is guaranteed in such a formula. The distribution of food and other necessities was immediately chaotic. And during a meeting with all the islanders, one participant summarizes the essence: „Everyone likes it fucking fat to survive together. Don’t take that dream away from each other by not feeding others.”
The recordings of this program took place long before the war and the makers can’t do anything about the timing of the broadcast. But the emptiness of Million Dollar Island stands out more now.
This section will be written by various authors until April 25th†