My attention has been drawn to the trailer for the new Alan Partridge movie “Papa Alpha”. The film opens in August in Norwich – where else? With a showing in London later.

I’ve loved the Alan Partridge character from the early days when he appeared on Radio 4’s On The Hour as a sports journalist with a worrying obsession for athletes who’d suffered “a rather nasty groin strain”.  Following that of course was the “Knowing Me Knowing You – Ah Ha” chat show series on radio and then TV and then of course the TV series following his career after the chat show.

While I think Partridge is a great comic creation I’ve been thinking for a while that it’s an idea that’s possibly running out of steam. Though some of the on-line only “Mid Morning Matters” shows were quite good – I’m not sure the that trailer promises a movie that fans of Alan Partridge will really welcome.

Still as far as the movie goes we’ll have to wait and see when it opens – my reason for this post is not really to do with the movie as such but – as a radio professional – it’s to do with headphones.

Actually before we get to the headphones – let me say that there’s another great detail I loved when I viewed the trailer for the second time. Have a look:

Check out, 28 secs in, when Alan is in the on-air studio talking to another character clearing his desk. On the wall in the studio are three cards bearing the legends – “Repeat the name, and the strapline, shape the way you want it to be”.

It took me back to all those years as a radio presenter – “Book-ending” the link with the radio station name and frequency plus filling the link with all those great “sense of the day” and “music passion” pieces of content.  Happy days huh?….hmmm.

Anyway – my real beef is about headphones.  Throughout the trailer Alan Partridge is shown to be on-air introducing songs and also back anno-ing songs. There are other times when he’s shown talking mid-link. In all these situations he’s got the radio standard headphones (Beyer DT100s)….. but they are round his neck!  No one ever talks through a link on-air on the radio with their head phones round their neck!  Does Steve Coogan think that radio presenters use headphones like music DJs: just for cueing up the music?  Or was he worried that putting on the “cans” would mess up Partridge’s hair?

It’s just wrong – and given that Steve Coogan invented Alan Partridge in a radio environment he must know that too.
I realise I’m at risk of severe radio anorak-itis here but for me it just gets in the way of me enjoying the movie.
Although….erm…. now I’ve watched the trailer again without my radio anorak on, I wonder if it’s possible that the film just won’t be any good at all.

Still – let’s hope it’s great – Roll on the premier in Norwich’s Anglia Square!    …. “and on that bombshell!”