The Perils of Trading on Former Glories
(Or, why Clive Myrie won’t bring me back to Mastermind).
I recently read the following statement on the BBC website, celebrating the appointment of Clive Myrie as host of Mastermind.
To clarify:
I’m not debating the length of its success, although let’s not forget it had a 6 year break from BBC screens;
I’m glad Myrie has been given the job — he is a capable presenter, and another old white man wasn’t needed. He maintains the genial but firm nature of John Humphreys without the grumpy boomer edge. I do think Samira Ahmed would have been a better choice though;
If you want to argue that it’s the most ‘intellectual’ in terms of self-regarding pomposity, you may have a point, although I reckon Brain of Britain goes further if we’re including radio.
No, I think Mastermind has long been usurped in terms of ‘rigour and intelligence’, and in claiming that while dumbing down, it’s losing both its existing audience, and its reason for existing.
Last year, as we entered lockdown, the BBC released viewing figures for their popular Monday night quizzing block. Mastermind and University Challenge have a lengthy history, and Only Connect (despite being a relative newcomer only in its 17th series) has built its audience steadily since moving from BBC4. While all three shows were doing well in the early days of the pandemic, Mastermind was clearly in last place, being the only one not to break the 3m barrier.
I declare my bias here, as a huge Only Connect fan. I love the humour, the combination of what one might call high- and low-culture subjects, the running jokes, and the willingness to mock the show, the teams, the presenter and staff, Michael Portillo, the viewers…just about anyone. More than that, I love that the show is unashamedly nerdy. They know the show isn’t for everyone, and that’s fine. They’re very happy doing their own thing and that’s that. It’s working — 3.1m viewers earlier this month, beating Eastenders.
Interestingly, I haven’t seen the show make any attempt to update itself, to make itself easier to bring in new viewers with the move to BBC2. If anything, they’re leaning into the weirdness. Watch an early episode from Series 3 — the questions are just as hard, but the intro at least tries to make some sense to the uninitiated, unlike the cold open weirdness you get now. I cannot stress enough, this is a good thing. The show was breaking the 1 million mark on BBC 4 ten years ago, so I’d consider that a steady, but worthwhile rise.
In the same way, the Mastermind potted history I link to above notes that:
“The series was initially thought too ‘high-brow’ and was aired in a late-night slot. When it was brought to peak hours it clocked up such a huge audience that it remained there”.
IT’S ALMOST LIKE THE PUBLIC ARE SMARTER THAN YOU THINK AND WILLING TO BE CHALLENGED BY THINGS ISN’T IT.
On the other hand, let’s compare a 1993 Magnusson episode with a recent one. The changes are notable.
The presentation is immediately different. Magnus starts his introduction 25 seconds in — a quick introduction to the historical building they’re in, a run through the contestants and their subjects, and at 1m51s we’re into the first set of questions. Clive Myrie starts the questions after 1m54, but ends up filling more time with descriptions of things that frankly don’t matter. He doesn’t just give the subject, he gives an explanation of what it is.
I don’t think Mastermind viewers need that. I don’t think Clive needs to explain that Paul Thomas Anderson is a director, or that contestants are “fearless quizzers…braving the cauldron of Mastermind”. I don’t think you need to fill time with an explanation of the rounds or a cutesy VT with them making dinner for their families. Just get on with it.
The specialist subjects are:
1993:
The History of the Rose,
The German Statesman Bismarck,
Early British Feminists and
The History of the Swiss Federation
2021:
The Giza Necropolis
Martin Luther
The Films of Paul Thomas Anderson
Yes, Minister and Yes, Prime Minister
This is perhaps something that annoys people, but I’m less fussed about the choices of specialist subject. You can make difficult questions from anything. What I would say is that I reckon each year has a couple of subjects where I’d be able to guess a few questions, and a couple of subjects where I’d have no chance. Unless they ask me what shape the pyramids are.
What gets me is the state of the ‘General Knowledge’ round. I’ve no problem with ‘low-brow’ questions — Only Connect are happy to ask about Strictly Judges or One Direction members. What gets me is the replacement of ‘difficult’ questions, with ones which are just long.
Here are the first three General Knowledge questions in 1993.
Pulex Irritans, a creature parasitic to man, is known by what common name?
On which Mediterranean Island was Napoleon Bonaparte born in 1769?
In mythology, which Latin name is given to the Horn of Plenty, the symbol of abundance?
From 2021?
In Imperial measurements, a foot is equal to how many inches?
What’s the surname of the Scottish Television presenter who began hosting her own daytime talk-show entitled ‘Lorraine’ in 2010?
Keflavik airport is the main international airport in which island country?
There’s a definite drop in difficulty there, isn’t there? So, without watching the shows, how many of those questions do you think the contestants got right?
1993–2 out of 3 (Bonaparte was born on Corsica, and the Cornucopia is the Latin name for the Horn of Plenty. He also gave a reasonable guess of ‘Mosquito’ for the first question — correct answer was ‘Flea’)
2021 — Also 2 out of 3 (very uncertain with her answers, she gets ‘12’ and ‘Kelly’ correct, but passes on Keflavik, which is the airport of Iceland. That pass shocks me a little — how many island countries are there? Could you not at least pick one for a guess?)
I remember watching Mastermind in the early 90’s as a child. While University Challenge questions were still mostly impenetrable, Mastermind felt like something almost within reach. The questions they ask above are an insight into whole realms of knowledge — who was Napoleon? What is the Horn of Plenty? It’s not just asking for a fact, it’s expecting you to have a wide range of understanding. You could potentially be asked follow-up questions to any of those. Not just ‘Who is Napoleon?’ — ‘WHY is Napoleon?’
In the 2021 version, it’s not enough to just ask you the question — you have to be given extra hints as well. Who is that famous TV presenter? She’s from Scotland? Has her own daytime show? First name is Lorraine? Is the next step to start spelling it out letter-by-letter?
The next question after the first three is a perfect example:
“What Spanish word is used in English for a Papier-mache party decoration, filled with sweets, that is hung up and smashed open by hitting it with a stick to release its contents?”
That question is answerable just from the words in the first line. Every word after that is just filling space, preventing the contestant from answering, and giving more clues. The end result is that most dedicated quizzers switch off halfway through. Yeah, it’s a piñata. Move on.
Mastermind in the 1980s was huge. The final in 1989 reached 13 million viewers. And yes, that was back in the days of 4 channels, and yes, it was on a Sunday night in a regular slot, but that’s nearly a quarter of the nation watching a proudly esoteric quiz show. By 1996, after having been bumped around the schedules repeatedly, and having its schedule pushed back and forth, it was down to 4 million. It was briefly cancelled and never saw those heights again.
These days, there are plenty of quiz shows — but most of them, even the ones I enjoy, seem to aim low. Mastermind was always supposed to be the high-brow one, the one you were proud to get a good score on. These days I’m more likely to struggle on The Chase than on Mastermind, and that’s multiple choice. At least it has a cash prize attached.
Of the three Monday quizzes on the BBC, Mastermind is by far the simplest. The standard of competition has dropped hugely. University Challenge is still deliberately obscure, although the difficulty sometimes comes from parsing a ridiculously convoluted sentence structure rather than any difficulty in the question per se, and Only Connect…well, I’ve made my feelings clear on that.
So considering that Mastermind is aiming for… if not the lowest common denominator, certainly a lower one…then TV logic would suggest it should get higher ratings, right?
Taken from Broadcast ratings for BBC2, C4 and C5:
OK, Mastermind is up against Coronation St, but Only Connect is up against Eastenders AND IS BEATING IT. An extra million viewers, almost double the audience share. Has it always been like that? Here’s a set of ratings from 2017:
So, University Challenge has stayed at roughly the same level, actually gaining 100k viewers. Mastermind has moved from a 10% share on a Friday to a slot alongside similar shows on a Monday — and has dropped nearly 500k viewers. Notice how the audience share for Mastermind and University Challenge are much closer, despite being in different slots. Would it be wrong to suggest that 10–12% of the population really like being quizzed hard?
If I had to guess, I’d suggest that the move to Monday has shown up the standard of the show for what it is — an increasingly dull, unchallenging show that’s only of real interest when someone has a specialist subject you’re interested in. If you’re wanting to entertain a wide range of people look at House of Games — it makes no attempt to imply that it’s a really challenging quiz show, it’s just some celebrities having a giggle, and that’s fine. You don’t need to be hard to be entertaining, but if you’re going to claim that you’re a challenge, you’d better hold up to it.
I can’t escape the feeling that someone, somewhere, decided that the problem with Mastermind was that it was too challenging. The Black chair and the music are iconic, but maybe we could bring the standard of questions down so that mum and dad sat at home can get a few. People like The Chase, they like Pointless, so why not add a few more questions about Marvel movies?
The problem is, Mastermind is never going to be as ‘fun’ as those shows. People watched it because it was a challenge, because they felt good when they got a good score — not because of the banter between the presenters. Nothing put me off more than John Humphreys trying to act like he understood the specialist subject of some final year student. If you’re going to build up the tension caused by the infamous black chair setting, shouldn’t it feel like a mental challenge, rather than a friendly chat with a slightly doddery uncle?
Currently, Mastermind is a 5k fun run acting as if it’s an ultramarathon. People who just want a fun quiz have plenty of options that are genuinely fun. People who want a challenge wait till 8pm, when they get questions that are the equivalent of running through electrified barbed wire.
So, in the current climate — who, and what, is Mastermind actually FOR?
