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Legal TV

An interview on Legal TV
  • Posted at 10:54am
  • 05 November 2007
  • by RhodriMarsden-RT
  • 1 comment

The Legal TV channel is nothing if not eclectic. You can see a Judge Judy-style character with the improbable name of Judge Extreme Akim wield a baseball bat with "Justice" written on the side – and no, I'm not speaking metaphorically, he really does – while solving disputes between hyperactive American families. And within a few minutes you can be settling down to several sober, sombre episodes of Crown Court, that festival of facial hair that screened in the mid-1970s during long afternoons on ITV.

Crown Court used to present fictitious cases in front of a real jury, and gave regular work to a host of British actors: Andrew Sachs, Peter Jeffrey and John Barron were all in the three-part show I lounged in front of yesterday.

When I was a boy it seemed deadly dull, but what a fantastic programme it was, in retrospect. Right from the grim, Janacek-penned theme music, through to the announcement of the verdict to a noticeable lack of hysteria. No sound, no movement. Just a room full of actors, staying very still. They probably don't teach you that at RADA any more.

But it's the bits between the shows on Legal TV that are particularly eyebrow-raising. Court Law with Neil Humphrey is a ten-minute show that's hilariously reminiscent of the segments that Tommy Vance unwittingly recorded for Chris Morris's Channel 4 show Brass Eye, in which he addressed persistent offenders via video-link. "You've bin and gone and dun it again, intcher?" was a typical line.

Anyway, Neil Humphrey, a former magistrate, dons a leather jacket and attempts to give offenders advice by using the kind of consonant-free, glottal-rich language they might understand. "Magistrates are clever," he drawls, leaning against a graffiti-covered wall, "so don't go trying to pull the wool over their eyes wiv excuses."

Quite why he imagines that his target audience will be waiting to watch an episode of Crown Court on Legal TV rather than letting off fireworks on a local industrial estate, I've no idea. You might ask a similar question of another of their ten-minute programmes, People's Court, which is just downright weird.

On the lowest budget imaginable – the edits frequently cut the beginnings and ends off conversations, and the word "sentence" is persistently spelt "sentance" on screen – recent offenders are interviewed about their experiences in court. Some of these are conducted by an old lag who's seen it all before, and who greets the offender like an old pal, incredulous that the bloke got a 12-month stretch for driving while disqualified and carrying an offensive weapon. "Gor, that's a bit much, innit," he commiserates.

Others are done by a ditzy teenage girl trying to break into TV. This leads to surreal, barely believable exchanges. Yesterday a chap called Lee who had recently been convicted of common assault showed us his electronic tag and stared at the girl's breasts while she attempted to ask searching questions.

"Um, were you scared when the police arrested you?" "No, er, I've been arrested quite a bit." "You're used to being naughty, then." "Mm." "And I hear you're having a baby soon?" "Yeah." "Boy or girl?" "Don't know yet." "Right, so, for those of you watching today, you see, you can turn your life around!"

Just think, I could be just a fistfight away from getting an electronic tag and becoming a dad. Come on, then, if you think you're hard enough.

The Legal TV channel is on Sky 186.

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  • Posted on 05 November 2007
  • at 1:43pm
  • by SarahDempster-RT

Crown Court? Hideous programme. My dad used to terrify my brother and I by pretending he was going to turn up on C. Court and tell everyone how bad we'd been (he's a lawyer). Our small, confused minds believed every word. Horrible memories. It was the beginning of the end, really.

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