The breakfast TV market has been dominated by two entrenched players for decades but Sunrise and Today should watch out as there is a new diner at the brekkie table and in Breakfast, Ten could have a winner on its hands.
The decision to piggyback off the resignation of Kevin Rudd and launch the heavily trailed breakfast show today instead of Monday afforded the main presenting troika of Paul Henry, Andrew Rochford and Kathryn Robinson a slightly earlier opportunity to show what Breakfast has staked its pre-publicity reputation on delivering: intelligent conversation, spontaneity, unpredictability and laughs. It managed to hit some but not all of those marks this morning.
Breakfast has been built around Henry who is reportedly being paid $1m a year by Ten to anchor the three-hour show, which was today extended until 10.20am to fit in Rudd and Gillard’s press conferences. The controversial and polarizing Kiwi was flanked by the Rochford and Robinson on the red sofa and while pre-launch press surrounding him centered on his reputation as a big mouth shock jock, Henry showed he is a proficient and analytical interviewer – more skilled than those on both Seven and Nine – and he is funny.
While the chemistry with Rochford, whose role in the trio isn’t yet clearly defined and Hamilton will take time to develop, Henry is the class clown and is unafraid to say what he thinks even if that means drawing attention to faults with the show.
Henry’s Hotline where viewers phone on and leave messages on the news of the day or about the show itself both good and bad is gold and provides fodder for Henry to work off. The Buzz in which two politicians get a maximum of 30 seconds before being buzzed off by Henry didn’t work, but Henry’s package of his visit to Mt Isa to meet Rob Katter the son of politician Bob Katter was entertaining.
The ‘Twends’ feature which used graphs to highlight the number of Tweets about Rudd overnight was amusingly derided by Henry and surprisingly there was a general lack of showbiz news. Whether this was down to it being a heavy news day where pollies took centre stage remains to be seen. It will be interesting to see if entertainment and celebrity gossip and top five lists of things online appear during quieter news days.
The set needs some work. What looks like a Vespa motorcycle, a windmill, what appear to be empty boxes and a giant treasure chest as a coffee table adorn the Breakfast Sydney studio. The design is confused, but the graphics are clean and functional.
Ten has taken a gamble with Breakfast. Live TV is not cheap to produce, but chief executive James Warbuton will hope it can steal needed advertising dollars away from Sunrise and Today and significantly bolster the $3m a year it made from showing cartoons in the time slot.
Viewers of breakfast TV are notoriously loyal to their favourite programmes so clawing new viewers and delivering meaningful ratings will not happen overnight, but on its first outing at least and first day teething problems aside, Ten looks like it’s equipped for the fight. If the overall positive sentiment from Twitter is to be believed it may have struck lucky with Breakfast. The brekkie table once owned by Seven and Nine has become a bit more crowded.