Mr Keith Fortner (5/7) By The Silver Fox

(1/7), (2/7), (3/7), (4/7), (5/7), (6/7), (7/7).

Beginning as an Assistant Director on EastBeat - a regional BBC current affairs show, he went on to direct and produce a string of hit programmes: never confining himself to one genre, he worked in light entertainment (Debra's Daily Dozen and Friday Fever), drama (Never Crossed Paths), and was one of the first to spot the TV potential of fusing "alternative" comedy stars with more traditional formulae (Jackie Mekon Has A Stab At… and Bollollocks).

That many of these shows are still being shown in the digital afterlife that is cable TV and that some of them are to be re-launched for a new generation of viewers by the big hitters of the industry are adequate testament to their - and their creator's - unrivalled genius. It was only with the late 90s explosion of reality programming that Keith's fortunes began to fail. The buzz around these shows was, of course, huge: finally, production companies had found what was surely the dream formula for the perfect format. Reality shows were cheap, compelling, oft-times cruel, and - almost without exception - utterly moronic.

What could be better? Not since the "nuts and sluts" shows (The Time…The Place, Donahue, Ricki Lake, et al) had there been such huge numbers of strange, deluded, telegenic-for-all-the-wrong-reasons, and desperate people prepared to hurl themselves into the maw of the TV mincing-machine on the off-chance of attaining some fleeting moment of nanocelebrity: also, the shows pretty much financed themselves; their would-be stars generating astronomical revenue through frantically dialling (and re-dialling) premium-rate telephone numbers before the producers had to do so much as turn on a camera.

And while the nabobs of the industry congratulated themselves on their own acumen, all of them still found time to speculate: What will Fortner bring to the party? Previous experience showed them that whatever format Keith applied himself to - however tapped out the well may appear - the Golden Boy of the Cathode Ray Tube would find something new in it; a fresh well-spring that always managed to combine undoubted creative originality with massive popular appeal.

Continued...Next Page (6/7)

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