Radio Review: Unless you actually saw on TV Michael McDowell's face, going through an entire colour chart from soft baby pink to toddler tantrum red, then you probably didn't get the full impact of the Minister for Justice's Bruton-bashing performance.
Radio did try its best, though, and even claimed the limelight when McDowell came on Morning Ireland (RTÉ1, Tuesday) to apologise - in his own "God, amn't I great" kind of way - to Richard Bruton for comparing him to a Nazi. It shows quite how much muscle that programme has.
In her radio column, Olivia O'Leary (Five Seven Live, RTÉ1, Tuesday) got out her sharpest filleting knife and went to work. Not one to mince words, she said the Minister had made "a total fool of himself" and she talked about his arrogance, his macho language and suggested that this hissy fit would damage him politically. And that's where the commentators on the airwaves - and there were lots of them - just couldn't agree. For every one who thought the outburst was damaging in the long run, there was someone who said it would be forgotten in a week.
Richard Bruton played a smart media game by staying schtum - and is the sure, long-term winner in all this. Those of us who would, prior to this week, have had trouble recognising the Dublin TD if we tripped over him (not that he's knee-high as McDowell suggested, or anything) have by now heard many times how downright fair, gentlemanly and smart the Fine Gael man is. Pity for us listeners tired of pomposity and arrogance that Pat Rabbitte couldn't have taken a leaf out of Bruton's book.
Smarting from a cancelled appearance on Prime Time, the Labour leader hopped on one of the high horses that McDowell seems so fond of and joined the name-calling merry-go-round.
"Since Michael McDowell was seven he has never taken any criticism," said Rabbitte, sounding as puffed up as his adversary (The Last Word with Matt Cooper, Today fm, Wednesday), "he believes he has a divine right to rule".
On Monday (Breakfast with Eamon Dunphy, Newstalk 106) we heard of a disturbing childcare report about a number of creches where the preferred method of chastising toddlers included a good wallop, letting them out to play with the traffic and tying their hands behind their backs and putting them in a corner. I'm for bussing these (presumably by now) ex-creche workers into Leinster House to sort out all that childish behaviour.
This week Matt Cooper got an extra half hour for his drivetime programme. For talk radio fans it's a welcome move. He joins George Hook's programme The Right Hook (Newstalk 106) by coming on air at 4.30pm - though as Newstalk isn't a national station, for many listeners it's really a head-to-head between RTÉ's Five Seven Live and The Last Word with Matt Cooper. The station has said that the change is to cater for the increasing number of car-bound commuters at the earlier time but it's surely intended as a way of grabbing listeners first, in the hope that they'll be so absorbed they'll forget to switch to RTÉ at 5pm.
This week Cooper had no trouble filling the extra time, giving more space to some contributors including its always interesting American correspondent Marion McKeown, and adding new magazine-type items including one on travel. They'll have to be more careful, though, in using callers to generate items. On Tuesday, Cooper took a tediously long call from a listener about a Garda delay in investigating a road accident. The trouble was she had already aired her grievance in the same detail a couple of hours earlier on Liveline (RTÉ1).
It'll be interesting to see if RTÉ adjusts its drivetime show's time (and presumably its name, though that's a tricky proposition as it's such an established one) to compete directly with the commercial station.
This column got a sharp rap on the knuckles from Aodán Ó Dubhghaill, head of Lyric fm, for suggesting some weeks back that there is no film programme on RTÉ radio. He reminded me of Aedín Gormley's Green Room Cinema (Lyric Fm, Wednesday) - which I listen to often - but, despite what Ó Dubhghaill thinks, it isn't really a film show in the generally accepted sense. Gormley (one of the most pleasing radio voices on air, incidentally) presents a show where she plays, as she says herself, "songs from the movies and musicals" which isn't the same thing at all. Hers is a niche music programme that fits well into the Lyric mix.
There is, however, a good general movie programme, We Love Movies (Spin 103, Sunday). Good interviews (the one with man-of-the-moment Brendan Gleeson about Studs and stardom was particularly strong), lively reviews and film news and gossip make the hour-long programme worth a listen.
