The main focus of Jamie Oliver’s shows is not how we eat but, more to the point, how we think and perceive food. He teaches not just about how to cook but how to appreciate healthier food. Most people need to be informed and to understand what it is that they could eat and lost touch with, to actually eat it. His shows offer practical solutions for everyday living (for) ordinary people.
This ``tagliatelle show`` has been chosen randomly but it is just as important as any other because it offers an insight in the field of performing food. In examining the show I have considered several elements that comprise the performance and have been on a constant look out for the evident, or not so evident, system that made a difference in choosing some performance ingredients or omitting (what could have been) obvious ones.
Main elements: story, space, costume, props, sound and light
First there is a story line just like in any thing we try to say or perform. Here the story is simple: `` (I will show you today) how quick and how relevant it is to make fresh pasta!``. The moments of the story are well defined; we have an intro, content and a concluding part. In the beginning we are informed about today’s lesson of fun: pasta, than, with a firm ``First of all…`` we start learning about the sauce. Throughout the program there are repetitions to clearly mark certain actions or aspects: ``Going in there first (…) Going in!`` or where we are in making the dish. Besides recap and leitmotifs there are different techniques to make the viewer comfortable such as reminding of bits and pieces that maybe the audience was were unaware of to begin with: ``And than OBVIOUSLY, to season it … salt``.
Just in case anyone might of lost interest here comes the exciting bit: ``From this point, this is the EXCITNG BIT, this is where you can control you pasta`` and we proceed to cutting the pasta from the sheet of dough, so that later we have the option to stop or go the extra mile and add broccoli ``sprouting from the garden. So prepare, taste it, plate it and you are done in 6 minutes. It certainly is quick!
And relevant? You bet: who cannot remember simple mathematics ``4 persons : 4 eggs : 400 grams of flour``?! And not just that but if you can, as Jamie so nicely puts it: ``rattle, rattle, rattle, rattle; uh, uh, uh, uh; mihih, ihih, ihih, hi… if you can do that in a couple of minutes and you do that in front of your mates they will think you are supercool``. So, remember: fast, easy to remember and it could change/improve your social status!!! How great is food!!!:
The costume in one word: uncomplicated. Jeans, a colored squares shirt, yellow T shirt. No chef uniform and no head cover to hold. + a wedding ring. All informal, all relaxed. The message is simple: ``You can just get up and do it! you don`t need anything extra, anyone can``.
The space setting is a kitchen in an English country style home. The kitchen, a bit like a garage full of shelves and objects, is a wooden dominated space, all a natural complementary colors environment. The preparation is a semi-semicircle with easy work flow: in the middle we have the main prepping area, a big wooden working table; next to an iron grater four burner stove (serious cooking can be done here!) and right next to it a big deep sink. The garbage bin is behind the chef to the left. In the whole kitchen the only one element maybe off key is the green macreus shine vase in the background. The space is enlarged trough a window showing outside toward a three in a pot (maybe a bit artificial) and part of another country house/structure.
For the props the general tone of soft, woody colors and the color coordination is visible also with the dishes. At a closer look there are at least two dishes that are pairs: brown crème fresh dish that goes with the white-blue-dark brown dish covering the pan on the stove; pink - white dish and blue - white dish for mixing the eggs with the marjoram. The food is obviously the most important prop and it all looks and sounds fresh.
The cleanliness of the utensils and the place can counterbalance any sanitation concerns (rarely does one get to see such a clean kitchen mixer!). No whimsical utensils, just maybe some new uses for usual ones such as plate on top of a pan to heat the base of the sauce.
From sounds and the acoustics of the place we are made aware of a home kitchen not too big. Evidently the sounds support the home/country/natural approach of the whole show. There are different sounds, in equal measure deriving from the kitchen appliances and utensils (knife, table, porcelain bowl, tin, a mixer mixing but not too loud) as from the actual sounds of the aliments (eggs, eggshell, boiling water, greens, noodle sheet).
With all this enthusiasm there is also a redundancy where at some point there is talk of ``different eggs`` and the next frame we have a didactic slide of two plates of all sorts of different color chicken eggs and a few quail eggs.
From the intro we know we might get a little bit too much: sound of chickens and forest birds. Witch one is it: are we in a house hold, case in which we go with the chicken sound cliché, or are we in the great outdoors, case in which the little birds twittering are perfect? Answer is simple: both - an undiluted substance of nature.
Light also suggests something undemanding and effortless. Light studios are not evident so light comes from in front, a little to the right of the performer, supposedly from a window. In the background have also sunny windows.
Timing and tension
There is no comedy without some moments of boredom because we cannot always be on the maximum of excitement. But keeping the maximum of excitement is the secret of today’s television. And when the television directors, hosts or producers fail to immerse or capture the audience than the audience takes charge and zaps through different channels in search of that continuous state of flux. This is something that both Jamie Oliver and the producers of the show understand very well and they do not want anyone to even get the idea of changing the channel in case they started watching the program. So there is progression and alternation in catching the viewers’ interest alternating tension with, inevitably, a reduced number of unexciting scenes. A graphic of the action, besides the impossibility of the constant state of excitement (from the part of a viewer, cause Jamie seems to be able to keep it up for a lot longer than six minutes), reveals also this internal dosage of the tension.
(click to enlarge)
This remains a subjective representation as catchy varies from person to person. Obviously true is the fact that half way through the show effort is made into getting (again) things of the ground just in case there is something stagnant or just to catch attention. No wonder that the rolling pin was not involved. This is a new instrument and actually requires new skills as you have to have to have some exercise to notch down the dough every time you roll
Quick conclusion
How does Jamie Oliver manage to get pleasure, sympathy, empathy and identification out of the audience? First of all: self confidence. We would not relate and identify with a timid, nervous chef. Jamie is not afraid of making a fool of himself if he plays a little or, even more so, not afraid of expressing his delight trough interjections (eg. in the end when we have the ``Aaaahh…new season’s oil… new season oil!``). Also he has a quick pace this being a signifier not just for this technical perfection (again something ranking high with the audience) but also for the little time that the viewer has. In just 6 minutes you get to be entertained and also learn something cool and useful! And with this fast pace he does remember to recap from time to time and, most important to poke the audience from time to time: ``what I want to show you here``, ``from this point on``, ``this is the exciting bit`` etc. Not just his attitude and tone of voice are comforting but the language he is using is also a trip to the candy factory: ``absolutely delicious``, ``interesting light herbs``, ``rich in the color``, ``will cook in a nice way``, ``super cool``, ``funny little sound`` etc. I personally like how the eggs will cook in a ``nice, silky way`` as opposed to`` scrambled``. Makes me wonder what kind of glorious treatment the scrambled eggs got later, for a comeback.
Jamie is not just a likable character, a missionary of accessible food but he is also an ambitious individual. I believe there has never been any one individual using so many approaches and such a varied arsenal of expression means in the attempt to get through to a mass audience adrift and in a constant process of change in regard to alimentation, self image, laziness, health etc. He is a very good example of a performer engaged in a performing food show. Watching his shows gets me worried about the audience he is addressing and, I think, tells a story about how things are possibly out of our control.
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