Interview: Jeremy Vine, BBC Radio 2/BBC1 (Evening Standard)
By David Rowan
JEREMY Vine thinks interviewers are far too hostile towards politicians. It is a curious admission, given that the Radio 2 presenter also fronts BBC1's Politics Show, and one certain to prompt the customary Jeremy Paxman scowl. But the Paxman-Humphrys school of questioning, Vine believes, has only produced "gridlock" in political debate, and brought the media into disrepute. What's needed now is "a different tempo, a different style of interviewing".
He does not name names - Vine is too smooth an operator for that.
But two years after he left Newsnight - where Paxman witheringly dismissed him as "mini-me" - it is not hard to jump to conclusions.
"We've thrown them all around the room, slapped them in the face, yet we've realised it doesn't get them to say things that are truer than they were saying before," Vine says, eyebrows raised. "It's turned out to be counterproductive, because we've ended up treating them as if we hold them in contempt. The result is that the viewers and listeners have decided that they hold us in contempt, too."
What began as an interview to promote Vine's latest project, a new BBC1 books series, is starting to look like a pitch to replace David Frost as the corporation's soft-touch political question-master.
"I have quite a high opinion of politicians," he says, easing into his chair in a hotel by Broadcasting House. "Maybe that's a grotesque human failing.
But these guys have gone into something that's fairly thankless. They probably could earn better money elsewhere, they have their lives opened to scrutiny, then in the studio they're treated like something the cat brought in.
We need to start from the basis that they come into the studio in good faith, to try to explain what they're doing. There's no point in us trying to throttle them."
So what about the rumours that he will succeed David Frost when he retires?
"Frost would be a fantastic show, but I can promise you nobody has rung me about that," he says. "I find the speculation rather perplexing." He laughs.
"Do I sound really shifty now?"
Still, he firmly challenges the view, famously attributed to Paxman, that an interviewer's correct response is to keep asking himself, "Why is this lying bastard lying to me?". "No, I don't share that view," Vine says firmly. "If we honestly believe that all they ever do is lie, then what is the point?"
Vine's argument conveniently echoes the view of Michael Grade, the BBC chairman, who recently warned its journalists against "the knee-jerk cynicism that dismisses every statement from every politician as, by definition, a lie".
BUT then Vine, 39, has always managed to play the loyal corporation man.
Whereas Paxman used a recent interview to question why "the boss class" saw it necessary to propose 15 per cent budget cuts, all Vine will say is: "I understand the rationale ... There needs to be some money shaved off so it can be used for other purposes. If that's the case, that's the case."
His loyalty has been rewarded with near ubiquity. As well as Radio 2, the Politics Show and an upcoming BBC1 series interviewing actors, he is about to take on Richard and Judy's book club with Page Turners. "It's an oldfashioned, low-tech programme about content, not whizzy gimmickry," he says. The fact that Channel 4 got there first is irrelevant. Where Richard and Judy succeeded - "and good luck to them for being there first" - is by creating a communal reading experience in an atomised culture.
Vine, a committed Christian, has published two novels on religious themes.
Yet growing up in Surrey, he was also an unlikely punk rocker, in bands such as the Flared Generation. His pop career stumbled after their debut vinyl single emerged from the presses as oval rather than round.
He went on to read English literature at Durham University where, displaying the relentless ambition later to prompt ribbing from Newsnight colleagues, he persuaded Metro Radio in Newcastle to give him a graveyard slot. A traineeship with the Coventry Evening Telegraph led to a BBC traineeship.
He soon earned a reputation as a work-obsessed, focused reporter who would never turn down a job as he rose through Today, BBC Westminster, Five Live and a post in Johannesburg.
The pressure of work and travel, he has admitted, contributed to the end of his seven-year marriage to an American banker. He wooed his second wife, Rachel Schofield, a Radio 4 reporter, while covering the last general election for Newsnight in a VW camper van. They have an 11-month-old daughter, Martha.
Despite the reported tensions with Paxman, he looks back fondly on his Newsnight years. "I joined very young, presenting fulltime at 34," he reflects. "At that stage it was never going to be my show, and it took me a while to realise.
The upside was that it gave me a unique training experience in the political interview."
But he was never one of those "back of the envelope BBC people", as he sees them, who precisely plot their careers. "They're the ones who are usually not flexible enough to see the big opportunity when it arises. For me, that was Radio 2. It's the best job."
He was apprehensive, he admits, taking over from Jimmy Young, aware that Young's hard-line loyalists - "the militia", as he calls them - were initially hostile.
"I honestly thought we'd drop a million listeners in an afternoon," he says.
"I went in with what I now think was a defensive and negative mindset, not appreciating that the audience was ready for change. As it happens, the audience has stayed and even grown." Has he heard from Young? "No, I haven't," he says with a smile. "I think I probably won't go there, actually."
THE Politics Show has also gained viewers over On the Record, which it replaced, although it has failed in the BBC's professed mission to increase the proportion of younger viewers. "I was never told to go and get a young audience," he explains. "We've laboured under this misunderstanding that we were somehow part of delivering this young people's remit and we didn't make it. In fact, it was never the case. We can't repackage politics in a zingy way to make it more interesting to young people if they're not interested."
Does that mean the BBC has given up on bringing a younger audience to politics? "I honestly don't know," he reflects. "It may be that that goal isn't being professed quite as loudly."
But, he adds, the programme does have "the distinction of having been attacked by Jonathan Dimbleby". Dimbleby, his ITV rival, complained that Vine's shorter interviews were evidence of dumbing-down. "It's a preposterous proposition that the only way to do a serious interview is long," Vine responds. "Having seen my programme three or four weeks ago get double his audience, I'm happy with the 10-minute interview."
Meanwhile, "there's a real job of work to be done" on Radio 2. "The last guy had 29 years," he says. "I've had two." Besides, he is rather enjoying nesting. "Being in harm's way as a foreign correspondent is one thing. Being in the way of dirty nappies is far more life-changing."
Although should the next opportunity arise, you can bet that Vine will be only too willing to make himself available.
(Evening Standard, February 9 2005)
JEREMY Vine thinks interviewers are far too hostile towards politicians. It is a curious admission, given that the Radio 2 presenter also fronts BBC1's Politics Show, and one certain to prompt the customary Jeremy Paxman scowl. But the Paxman-Humphrys school of questioning, Vine believes, has only produced "gridlock" in political debate, and brought the media into disrepute. What's needed now is "a different tempo, a different style of interviewing".
He does not name names - Vine is too smooth an operator for that.
But two years after he left Newsnight - where Paxman witheringly dismissed him as "mini-me" - it is not hard to jump to conclusions.
"We've thrown them all around the room, slapped them in the face, yet we've realised it doesn't get them to say things that are truer than they were saying before," Vine says, eyebrows raised. "It's turned out to be counterproductive, because we've ended up treating them as if we hold them in contempt. The result is that the viewers and listeners have decided that they hold us in contempt, too."
What began as an interview to promote Vine's latest project, a new BBC1 books series, is starting to look like a pitch to replace David Frost as the corporation's soft-touch political question-master.
"I have quite a high opinion of politicians," he says, easing into his chair in a hotel by Broadcasting House. "Maybe that's a grotesque human failing.
But these guys have gone into something that's fairly thankless. They probably could earn better money elsewhere, they have their lives opened to scrutiny, then in the studio they're treated like something the cat brought in.
We need to start from the basis that they come into the studio in good faith, to try to explain what they're doing. There's no point in us trying to throttle them."
So what about the rumours that he will succeed David Frost when he retires?
"Frost would be a fantastic show, but I can promise you nobody has rung me about that," he says. "I find the speculation rather perplexing." He laughs.
"Do I sound really shifty now?"
Still, he firmly challenges the view, famously attributed to Paxman, that an interviewer's correct response is to keep asking himself, "Why is this lying bastard lying to me?". "No, I don't share that view," Vine says firmly. "If we honestly believe that all they ever do is lie, then what is the point?"
Vine's argument conveniently echoes the view of Michael Grade, the BBC chairman, who recently warned its journalists against "the knee-jerk cynicism that dismisses every statement from every politician as, by definition, a lie".
BUT then Vine, 39, has always managed to play the loyal corporation man.
Whereas Paxman used a recent interview to question why "the boss class" saw it necessary to propose 15 per cent budget cuts, all Vine will say is: "I understand the rationale ... There needs to be some money shaved off so it can be used for other purposes. If that's the case, that's the case."
His loyalty has been rewarded with near ubiquity. As well as Radio 2, the Politics Show and an upcoming BBC1 series interviewing actors, he is about to take on Richard and Judy's book club with Page Turners. "It's an oldfashioned, low-tech programme about content, not whizzy gimmickry," he says. The fact that Channel 4 got there first is irrelevant. Where Richard and Judy succeeded - "and good luck to them for being there first" - is by creating a communal reading experience in an atomised culture.
Vine, a committed Christian, has published two novels on religious themes.
Yet growing up in Surrey, he was also an unlikely punk rocker, in bands such as the Flared Generation. His pop career stumbled after their debut vinyl single emerged from the presses as oval rather than round.
He went on to read English literature at Durham University where, displaying the relentless ambition later to prompt ribbing from Newsnight colleagues, he persuaded Metro Radio in Newcastle to give him a graveyard slot. A traineeship with the Coventry Evening Telegraph led to a BBC traineeship.
He soon earned a reputation as a work-obsessed, focused reporter who would never turn down a job as he rose through Today, BBC Westminster, Five Live and a post in Johannesburg.
The pressure of work and travel, he has admitted, contributed to the end of his seven-year marriage to an American banker. He wooed his second wife, Rachel Schofield, a Radio 4 reporter, while covering the last general election for Newsnight in a VW camper van. They have an 11-month-old daughter, Martha.
Despite the reported tensions with Paxman, he looks back fondly on his Newsnight years. "I joined very young, presenting fulltime at 34," he reflects. "At that stage it was never going to be my show, and it took me a while to realise.
The upside was that it gave me a unique training experience in the political interview."
But he was never one of those "back of the envelope BBC people", as he sees them, who precisely plot their careers. "They're the ones who are usually not flexible enough to see the big opportunity when it arises. For me, that was Radio 2. It's the best job."
He was apprehensive, he admits, taking over from Jimmy Young, aware that Young's hard-line loyalists - "the militia", as he calls them - were initially hostile.
"I honestly thought we'd drop a million listeners in an afternoon," he says.
"I went in with what I now think was a defensive and negative mindset, not appreciating that the audience was ready for change. As it happens, the audience has stayed and even grown." Has he heard from Young? "No, I haven't," he says with a smile. "I think I probably won't go there, actually."
THE Politics Show has also gained viewers over On the Record, which it replaced, although it has failed in the BBC's professed mission to increase the proportion of younger viewers. "I was never told to go and get a young audience," he explains. "We've laboured under this misunderstanding that we were somehow part of delivering this young people's remit and we didn't make it. In fact, it was never the case. We can't repackage politics in a zingy way to make it more interesting to young people if they're not interested."
Does that mean the BBC has given up on bringing a younger audience to politics? "I honestly don't know," he reflects. "It may be that that goal isn't being professed quite as loudly."
But, he adds, the programme does have "the distinction of having been attacked by Jonathan Dimbleby". Dimbleby, his ITV rival, complained that Vine's shorter interviews were evidence of dumbing-down. "It's a preposterous proposition that the only way to do a serious interview is long," Vine responds. "Having seen my programme three or four weeks ago get double his audience, I'm happy with the 10-minute interview."
Meanwhile, "there's a real job of work to be done" on Radio 2. "The last guy had 29 years," he says. "I've had two." Besides, he is rather enjoying nesting. "Being in harm's way as a foreign correspondent is one thing. Being in the way of dirty nappies is far more life-changing."
Although should the next opportunity arise, you can bet that Vine will be only too willing to make himself available.
(Evening Standard, February 9 2005)
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