Tonight's The Night

Saturday nights for six weeks from mid April to the end of May 2009 were a real treat for John Barrowman fans, when he presented his own show, co-produced by his own company, Barrowman Barker and the BBC.

Tonight’s the Night was a twenty-first century spin on Saturday night variety entertainment. It had all the sparkle of the old shows from the London Palladium with music and dance galore, and also the element of surprise that came from those old classics like Jim’ll Fix It and The Generation Game. There was also a spot of Opportunity Knocks in there.

The Palladium element was ably provided by John himself, who sang and danced a couple of bouncy numbers at the beginning and end, as well as a host of his friends from current West End productions.

Jim’ll Fix It became John’ll Fix It as our man went out on location around the UK, surprising people who were nominated by friends and relations as deserving of a dream come true. To do that, he went to such extremes as dressing as a gorilla in a gorilla pen at the zoo in order to surprise a little girl and pretending to be a hairdresser with a very bad Lancashire accent before revealing his true identity to one young woman. Stars including Mick Hucknall, Ronan Keating, Katherine Jenkins and Zac Efron to name but a few turned out to pay tribute to ordinary people who had overcome personal tragedies and hardships with courage and fortitude.

The Generation Game bit came with the challenges that John set himself on three of the six episodes, learning martial arts, football skills and fire juggling, alongside a fellow celebrity who was game for a laugh. The audience got to vote on their efforts and not surprisingly. John won three out of three. After all, they were his fans, and they were already in the palm of his hand by the time the opening number was over. But it was all just a bit of fun.

There were also the challenges set to members of the audience. These included a young woman learning to line dance and a very game for a laugh gentleman prepared to dress up in feathers and spangles and dance with the chorus from La Cage Aux Folles. Lucky for him it was a bank holiday weekend. It’s just possible his mates would have forgotten about it by Tuesday morning at work. But he didn’t seem to mind as he got well stuck in and won a holiday for his pains.

Then there was the Opportunity Knocks section. For four weeks, two groups of workers from various walks of life from plumbers to waitresses to firemen who liked to let off steam by getting together and performing gave it their best to be voted ‘Workplace Wonder’. It was a tight competition with some surprising talent from very ordinary people who didn’t expect any record contracts or big prizes, just the fun of being on stage and giving it their best shot. The final came down to the waitresses from the first episode and the plumbers from week three and the plumbers, who made a very fine rock and roll band, just had the edge on the girls.

Then there was the big finale surprise. Well, not so much of a surprise, really, since it had been hyped in the papers for weeks. Tying in with John’s other TV slice of fame, Doctor Who, there was a competition to find the best amateur alien in Britain. The entrants ranged from the sublime to the ridiculous, as expected. The eventual winner was a suave Frank Sinatra style alien with a blue face and a dangerous weapon instead of a hand. Sao Til, otherwise known as Tim Ingham from Stoke on Trent won the chance to star in a scene of his own on the TARDIS set in Cardiff. Captain Jack Harkness was his co-star and protagonist and they were joined halfway through by David Tennant, who reminded John that it was HIS TARDIS.

Tonight’s The Night was beaten in the ratings war by the over-hyped Britain’s Got Talent, but it got a healthy average of 4.5 million, which for its time slot and the fact that it wasn’t especially well advertised, wasn’t bad. No news of a second series, yet. But if it doesn’t, that would be a shame, because it was GOOD. It would have been good with anyone half decent presenting it. But John, with his infectious smile and real, genuine fondness for all the people whose dreams he made come true was the icing on the cake for this show.