Good Evening Britain, ITV, review: Danny Dyer steals the show with Brexit rant
A man of the people did some straight talking on Brexit, railed against a Tory PM and won the hearts of the nation. Yet this wasn’t Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn – it was his fellow panellist Danny Dyer, who thoroughly stole the show on the shambolic Good Evening Britain (ITV).
This was a live, late-night spin-off from Good Morning Britain, where presenting duo Piers Morgan and Susanna Reid’s combative relationship and controversial interviews attract copious column inches, even if they’re soundly trounced in the ratings by their BBC rivals. Not content with serving up Morgan for breakfast, ITV are now force-feeding him to us for supper too.
Airing immediately after ITV’s coverage of England’s final World Cup group game against Belgium, this hour-long special was intended to capture the mood and reflect the public conversation. Sadly, the only voice Morgan was interested in hearing was his own.
Anyone familiar with his pot-stirring Twitter presence will know he’s over-opinionated and under-informed about football. So it proved here. Morgan mispronounced players’ names, mistook Sweden for Spain and repeatedly insisted that Colombia were far superior to Japan - even though Japan beat Colombia 2-1 just nine days ago.
It was like watching Alan Partridge with a plummy accent. The way in which Morgan blithely equated Britain with England throughout won’t have endeared him to viewers from Scotland, Wales or Northern Ireland either.
Reid sighed and eye-rolled with the demeanour of a long-suffering spouse but failed to take Morgan to task like she does in the mornings. She could barely get a word in edgeways, admittedly, but it was disappointing to see the more experienced broadcaster being steamrollered by her co-host’s foghorn-voiced pomposity.
Danny Dyer's best films
Dropping by the studio to offer their opinion on the football and other topical stories were a bafflingly eclectic selection of famous faces. As well as Corbyn and Dyer, we had Pamela Anderson, David Ginola, Ed Balls, Daliso Chaponda, Harry Redknapp, James Cleverly and Amir Khan. Less of a balanced panel, more of a pin stuck randomly into the celebrity phonebook. Even Dyer noted that it was “nutty group of people”.
Corbyn sported a new casual shirt for the occasion. “No expense spared,” he remarked wryly. “I went to Marks & Spencer on Holloway Road this afternoon.” For all his failings, the Leader of the Opposition came across well.
It was hard to imagine Theresa May going on live TV directly after an England game and performing with such calm assurance. Corbyn discussed his love of grassroots football, his memories of 1966 and attempted to clarify Labour’s position on Brexit. It was at this point that Dyer took over.
“What’s happened to that t**t David Cameron?” demanded the EastEnders star. “He called the referendum, then scuttled off. Where is the geezer? He’s in Europe. He’s in Nice with his trotters up. He should be held accountable. T**t.” Morgan looked momentarily panicked. Corbyn sat back and enjoyed the spectacle. It was like Dyer’s glorious turn on Who Do You Think You Are? all over again.
Dyer had threatened to knock out Morgan live on-air for branding Love Island contestants - which include Dyer’s daughter - "braindead zombies". Sadly, this didn't come to pass after Morgan’s grovelling apology. Instead Dyer issued a verbal beating, telling him “Eat it, Piers” and speaking for us all with: “Just stop talking.” A textbook loose cannon for a live show, Dyer also refused to toe the ITV party line by claiming that its talent franchises, The X Factor and Britain’s Got Talent, were “hanging on for dear life”.
Far less entertaining was the chat with Anderson. Ever the tabloid hack, Morgan diminished and patronised her, first by calling her “a WAG”, then by hectoring her about a possible affair with Vladimir Putin. When Morgan asked about sex for the umpteenth time, Anderson retorted: “Why do you reduce me to that? I have more to offer than just sex.”
Piers Morgan versus the world: a guide to his celebrity feuds
She looked quietly furious for the remainder of the programme and seemed confused about what she was even doing there, pointing out: “Because Jeremy Corbyn was on, I thought this was a serious political programme.” The atmosphere grew awkward and palpably tense.
The remaining half-dozen guests - Ginola, Balls, Chaponda, Redknapp, Cleverly and Khan - were redundant, reduced to a sentence or two apiece, most of which were interrupted by Morgan anyway. They would have been better off scrapping these six to give Corbyn and Dyer more airtime - or asking Anderson some proper, non-creepy questions.
At least Morgan can console himself that he isn’t Andi Peters. The roving reporter was stationed in Emmerdale’s Woolpack pub, where he presided over some stilted links. Peters mistakenly referred to the Yorkshire soap as “Coronation Street”, at which point the temperature dropped several degrees. The fact that producers cut from the Corbyn interview to this amateurish fluff said it all about Good Evening Britain’s editorial values.
From its cheap graphics to its clunky segues, this primetime incarnation still had a flimsy daytime feel. Robbie Lyle’s report from Russia was inaudible, with pictures pixellating like a patchy Skype call. The programme played out with terrace anthem Three Lions, which was presumably planned before England lost. Even the ads during the commercial breaks were for incontinence pads and diarrhoea relief.
ITV had hyped this show as live and post-watershed, teasing that anything could happen. Unfortunately, most of what happened was horrendous. If this one-off was a pilot for a permanent primetime slot, it’s back to the drawing board. ITV might want to consider giving Danny Dyer his own vehicle instead.