Down to the Wire
I don’t think there’s any doubt that the BBC is value for money as it covers a wider scale of genres and formats. HBO, which specialises in drama and comedy, seems to be streets ahead of the BBC at the moment though with programmes such as ‘Curb Your Enthusiasm’going from strength to strength. Still, Jack Dee’s ‘Lead Balloon’ and Lee Mac’s ‘Not going Out’ are examples of great British comedians making the most of what is available for them to showcase their work. When used by the right talent, the BBC can do some amazing things. If Lead Balloon doesn’t have you it stitches then you’re more miserable than Dee himself!
One of the biggest gambles US giant HBO ever invested in was the award winning television series ‘The Wire’. It was a show that displayed immense maturity and gritty realism, arguably something that was absent in other crime drama series’, though let’s be honest was never really sought after.
The Wire went from being a relatively low budget affair (compared to other HBO capers) plodding from one series to the next, fleshing out its storylines non-chronologically – sometimes painfully so – without ever losing sight of what it was supposed to represent. Gone were the clichéd cliff-hangers to end each series along with in your face writing techniques that tend to hit you with all the subtlety of a brick. The Wire was a show in which you had to focus. And that’s precisely why HBO were dealing a hand full of aces to an audience who didn’t really know what to do with them. Knobs.
Eventually though it found its audience and became the success story it was destined to be. If not during its time on HBO, then certainly through colossal (and I mean millions) of DVD sales. I was one of these people who heard of The Wire through word of mouth. Well, I say word of mouth; it’s usually a string of mumbled words and raised eyebrows from a speechless fan whom can barely contain himself every time the subject comes up. Putting plot before profit is something that rarely occurs in TV land these days, hence why dramas like ‘The Wire’ are rarely commissioned. Even HBO almost cancelled ‘The Wire’ after its first series due to low ratings, but something made it stay. Someone had the audacity, or for want of a less academic word the balls, to stand up and say — this is a damn good show and it needs a chance. Whether that was the creator David Simon or an executive on HBO, we’ll probably never know but it seems America gave it more thought than the BBC ever would have.
David Simon wanted to bring us something that had neverbeen done before. Never before in TV drama could one of your favourite characters get blown away with no prior warning signs. Never before could an episode feature up to ten different sub plots involving a plethora of different characters. Never before was the plot less black and white; more black and blue. Never before was it as hard to pin point the definition of heroes and villains. The politician wearing a flash suit in comparison to the drug dealing gangster in their matching suits, the line was impossible to draw. Both archetypes contain antagonistic natures within, and the only difference is who’s on the right side of the law. David Simon created TV history, a legacy which is still only filtering its way through to some today. But without a platform, Simon might as well have been writing into the wind. HBO offered him that platform.
