Lily Allen & (No) Friends

posted: 13 February 2008 by Sonja Stephen

Lily Allen's been touted as the saviour of BBC Three - brought in to attract the young to the flop digi channel. But having watched the risible Lily Allen & Friends, Sonja Stephen says she's anything but a saviour...

Desperate to make BBC Three appear funky and down with the kids, the beeb big wigs thought it would be a good idea to make loud mouth pop singer Lily the face of their channel and handed her a late-night chat show.

In theory, the idea behind Lily Allen & Friends is good enough. It's about attempting to create a user-generated Web 2.0 style TV show, inviting viewers to become Lily's virtual friends and getting them involved with the programme by contributing to discussions and putting questions to guests.

We've all gone pretty mad for that user-generated networking stuff, and combine that with the fact that the idea of music and chat still sounds like a good formula for a show (Charlotte Church's car-wreck of a show notwithstanding), it kind of felt obligatory to tune in and check out the first show.

And that despite all the scare stories regarding over a third of the audience allegedly walking out during the filming of the first show, because it was boring, horrible and limp.

Unfortunately, within minutes it was clear why those people had got the hell outta there. It's never good to kick a girl when she's down and Lily has suffered that horrible miscarriage and relationship breakup business, but it has to be said, that if the BBC Three troops have put all of their eggs in Lily's basket, they have made a big mistake. Huge.

Not even top name guests like comedian David Mitchell and Hollywood actor Cuba Gooding Jr could make the 45 minute show worth watching. Lily giggled her way through the interviews, tried to be cool by saying f*** a few times (in the same way they throw in the profanities in those late night Hollyoaks shows, because they can) teased Cuba Gooding Jr about him being a rubbish actor and then got upset and called him a t*** when he retaliated and said she wasn't very good at music. Had Cuba said she wasn't very good at presenting, he would have had an equally valid point.

Er, Lily Allen & Friends? It's not even on my Sky Plus radar.

Sonja Stephen - Sonja Stephen got mixed up with Big Brother from an early age and spent many a summer locked away in a dark and dingy portacabin writing stories about the socially inept housemates. She had brief love affairs with MTV and then Emap, where she worked as the Mobile Producer on heat Daily, but something in that BB portacabin kept luring her back- maybe it was those long unsociable hours. After being snogged by a winning housemate, and progressing to the role of Sub-Editor, she decided it was time to call time on her BB romance. A brief stint at the BBC made her realise that life's too short, and it was then she found herself in the warm welcoming arms of Que Pasa where she's now Content Editor on Virgin BITES.