Italian TV

[rjshook]

I have been wanting to get an entry in my log about Italian TV for a while now. In another thread far_gone wrote "After the novelty of bikini-clad girls assisting in *every* program wears off, there's not much to watch."

It sums up Italian TV perfectly.

Comments

[far_gone]

Thanks for the quote! I'm out of time tonight but maybe we could put up some of our favorite moments:

* the 1970s game show that was a close up of (shock) a woman's tits in a boob-tube style halter top while she swung from trapeze to trapeze (hand to hand, like a monkey) -- til the top fell down. The winner was the woman who could make it furthest before exposing her breasts on national TV.

or

* the political/economic commentary show of four men (of course) around a round table and about every other comment, one of the chicks would come along right beside the man's face and strategically refill his coffee cup so that you had a close-up of his face and a cleavage. Sometimes the face was even off to the side!

or more recently

* for the game show similar to Who Wants to be a Millionaire (L'eridita`) the questions are queued and prizes awarded by the male MC and his lovely assistants dressed only in a chain-mail style mesh of Euro coins in the general shape of a tap-pants bikini!!

As Tobias Jones pointed out in his article on the media (which was printed in the Financial Times, extracted from his book The Dark Heart of Italy, which I highly recommend) : Italy is "the land that feminism forgot" -- at least when it comes to (Berlusconi-controlled) TV.

[rjshook]

I think I remember seeing the euro coin bikini. I don't have too many to add though. What I am trying to figure it how much the older women who's bodies don't quite meet current fashion standards, are paid to be measured and filmed for an infomercial.
I read Dark Heart of Italy back in the winter. It was a really interesting book. However I would tend to say that feminism forgot this land long before Berlusconi took full control of TV. I should point out that the F1 racing coverage does use women as somewhat more than accessories.

I keep seeing adds for the Miss Italy contest in 10 days. I wonder how many nights they can drag that out for.