Life has changed beyond all recognition over the last 67 years. The way we live, the way we communicate, the things we eat; if you were to grab someone from 1958 and bring them forward in time to 2025, the sheer scale of change would blow their minds. Except, perhaps, for one thing. Everything else might be unrecognisable, but Blue Peter has always been broadcast live. Until now.
It has been reported that the last live episode of Blue Peter has aired, ending a tradition that has endured for nearly seven decades. It isn’t the end of Blue Peter, which will continue, albeit in a prerecorded format, but it is the end of an era. The show may be an institution, but even the longest-running children’s programme in the world isn’t immune to change.
The BBC has cited changing viewing habits as the reason for the switch, but that feels like code for something sadder. Blue Peter used to be watched by millions of children, all excited and eager to learn. But there are so many other choices today – not just on streaming platforms, but the monolith that is YouTube – and the staid, earnest, eat-your-vegetables approach taken by Blue Peter no longer holds the same appeal. In other words, it isn’t financially sustainable to put on a weekly live show for a declining audience that is more likely to watch it on iPlayer anyway.
The BBC says that viewers are unlikely to notice much difference, because the show has been mixing live and prerecorded segments for decades, but plenty of people have pointed out that the show might lose some of the magic you only get with live TV. What they mean, I suspect, is that elephants won’t poop all over the floor any more.
This, to some, is the quintessential Blue Peter moment; the episode in 1969 when a baby elephant called Lulu started acting up in the studio. After dragging John Noakes and Peter Purves around the floor, Lulu narrowly missed Valerie Singleton’s shoes with a stream of urine, crapped everywhere, then caused her keeper to slip on it and fall over.
There have been other live catastrophes. In 1971, someone had the smart idea of having a campfire singalong, despite the show being filmed indoors. Dozens of Guides and Brownies looked increasingly worried as the flames grew higher and the studio filled with thick black smoke before someone rushed in with a fire extinguisher. A year later, Roy Castle’s attempt to play the spoons was frustrated and derailed by Shep the dog leaping up at him and trying to join in on the drums. Also, let’s not forget the show’s 1966 attempt at a Dalek cake, the result resembling a sort of floppy sponge dildo. All these moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain.
Except they won’t. One pile of elephant poo every 67 years hardly justifies keeping Blue Peter live and, besides, most of its indelible moments were prerecorded anyway. When John Noakes climbed Nelson’s Column in 1977 – without a harness, on some rickety tied-together ladders, on a windy day while wearing flares – it had been recorded. It’s also worth pointing out that prerecorded segments don’t have to be sanitised. In a filmed piece in 2008, presenter Andy Akinwolere was tasked with putting the star on top of the Trafalgar Square Christmas tree. He dropped the star, which fell 70ft to the ground. Blue Peter still kept it in the final broadcast.
That is extremely heartening. Blue Peter may not be live any more, but it is entirely in keeping with the spirit of the show to leave all the accidents in anyway. If a presenter is recording an episode and there’s a power cut or a fire, or a zookeeper starts skidding around in piles of animal excrement, Blue Peter is smart enough to keep all that stuff in. After all, nothing gets more eyeballs than a cock-up gone viral. This might be the end of an era, but Blue Peter is going nowhere just yet.
