So they slide Penny Smith off from reading the news. Penny who in my opinion had the perfect balance of skills. She kept it straight until the ‘and finally’ when she had some fun at the end of the bulletin. So why was she moved over? Too old? Too expensive? Too bloody good? New boss, new broom? Something I know all about. Whatever it was it was wrong. And that has never been so obvious than when I wtached the 8 o’clock bulletin this morning with the new girl.
Glamorous? Yes. But a few things that caught my eye and got my goat hence the rant are as follows:
1. Reading autocue you could see her eyes scanning the lines, she didn’t look relaxed or natural.
2. The way she read serious news story was ABC, 1,2,3 of news reading WRONG. She read awful headlines as if she were sitting in a cafe scanning the front page of Hello magazine. The reporting of news is just that – report it as it was. But she was putting in sensationalism and inappropriate emphasis at the worst points. If I were Penny Smith I’d be standing by my phone if someone at GMTV doesn’t phone her, apologise and beg her to come back then I will.
