On the Hour was a British radio programme that parodied current affairs broadcasting, broadcast on BBC Radio 4 between 1991 and 1992. Written by Chris Morris, Armando Iannucci, Steven Wells, Andrew Glover, Stewart Lee, Richard Herring and David Quantick, On the Hour starred Morris as the overzealous and self-important principal anchor (for which he used his own full name). He was accompanied by a regular cast assembled by Iannucci, comprising Steve Coogan, Rebecca Front, Doon Mackichan, Patrick Marber and David Schneider, who portrayed assorted news reporters, presenters and interviewees. On the Hour featured the first appearance of Coogan's character Alan Partridge as the "Sports Desk" reporter.
Overview
As in much of Morris's work, surrealism was an important part of the programme, the nonsense in the content ("De-frocked cleric eats car park", "Borrowed dog finds Scotland", etc.) delivered in the same straight-faced manner with which contemporary news stories are dealt, and it has often been quoted that Morris's initial intention was indeed to show how the public would believe anything if it were delivered with a straight face. It did fool many people, with some listeners ringing in to complain about how the anchor treated his guests. The programme also utilised editing of out-of-context sound-clips and prank phone calls, heightening its surreal quality.
The programme satirised broadcasting within news programmes by emphasising that it was reporting the news, repeating the show's title, and using such aspects as news speak, media manipulation, exploitation of tragedies, patronising mistreatment of the general public, a lack of fact checking (personified by Marber's Peter O'Hanraha-hanrahan), and the general assumption that the programme itself is infallible ("On the Hour – Towards a New Eden"). Also satirised were party political broadcasts, chummy yet vacuous radio DJs (in the form of Morris's Wayne Carr), religious broadcasting, glossy magazines, 'fun' local events, local radio, youth information shows, Radio 4 plays, Royal ceremonies, and even satirical comedies that do not hit the mark. Episodes often featured a main storyline (the World "Summit on the Future," coverage of the public execution of Prince Edward, etc.) interspersed between the news items.
Twelve episodes were made (including a Christmas special, of which two versions exist) and broadcast in 1991 and 1992. A regular feature in Series One (episodes 1-6) was the On the Hour "Audio Pullout," a mid-episode "colour supplement" that would usually parody human interest stories and local events (and, in one episode, was sponsored by a [fictional] American Christian Fundamentalist sect).
The final episode of On the Hour closed with Morris introducing a set of headlines with the line "And there is still just time to part the beef curtains on tomorrow's news." Running throughout the final episode was the announcement that On the Hour would be taking over all of Radio 4 to transmit 24-hour "Perma-News."
On the Hour was named "Best Radio Comedy" at the 1992 British Comedy Awards, and it also won the 1992 Writers' Guild of Great Britain Award for Comedy/Light Entertainment. The On the Hour team (minus Lee and Herring due to creative/legal disputes, who were replaced by Peter Baynham and writers Graham Linehan and Arthur Mathews) subsequently made a television series called The Day Today, which retained the same regular cast and several characters from On the Hour.
Recurring characters
Christopher Morris (Chris Morris): The anchor. Combative and over-zealous, he believes in the infallibility of the news, bombastically delivering slogans like "Man is only 90% water, but On the Hour is 100% news!", "Arise, Sir News!" and "These facts are ear-shaped, let's ram them home!" Morris frequently talks over his guests and does not realise or will not admit when he has the wrong person on the other end of the phone. He "interviews" real-life politicians, whose responses are edited from pre-recorded material to render them nonsensical, as well as the public, who give baffled or earnest responses to absurd questions such as, "Which is worse, a horizontal disease or a vertical disease?" Morris reprised his newsman persona for The Day Today and Brass Eye, retaining the character's self-importance while further emphasising his bullying demeanour.
Roger Blatt/Michael Blatt (Chris Morris): Roger Blatt is the "Disaster correspondent" for a train crash report; the identically-voiced Michael Blatt is the "Strategy correspondent" for the On the Hour "War Special."