Skating Losing Its Edge? Not for Kurt who is going for a spin on W tomorrow
| Source: |
The Toronto Sun |
| Date: |
November 29, 2002 |
| Author: |
Bill Brioux |
Copyright 2002 Sun Media Corporation
Are figure skating specials suddenly on thin ice? For a dozen
years, an ice special was money in the bank for CBC and CTV. Even if
you thought the sport was, well, lame, everybody knew and cheered for
Brian Orser, Kurt Browning and Elvis Stojko, our string of North
American men's champions.
Not only were these guys world class, they were great ambassadors
for their sport and always friendly and available to the fans and to
the media.
Several charismatic women and pairs' champs also proved to be an
irresistible draw on TV.
That was then. The titles aren't coming as easily, and when they do
-- as they did last winter when Jamie Sale and David Pelletier
eventually captured the gold medal, the sport seems tainted and
diminished.
Browning admits it has all had an impact. Instead of the usual
packed houses for every ice show, he's skated in front of as few as
three thousand fans in recent years.
That being said, he was pretty pumped when I spoke with him a few
weeks ago about Kurt Browning's Gotta Skate, which airs tomorrow night
at 7 p.m. on W. Browning, who taped the ice show Nov. 1 at Hamilton's
Copps Coliseum, has aced TV in the past, especially a decade ago in an
arty and memorable black-and-white CBC special that paid homage to
Casablanca.
This new, two-hour offering is a more straight-forward ice show,
featuring old friends Orser, Isabelle Brasseur & Lloyd Eisler,
back-flipping U.S. Olympic gold medalist Scott Hamilton and three-time
Canadian national champion Josee Chouinard, plus several others.
As much of a coup as this is for W, which is enjoying a ratings
upsurge this season (who knew dropping two letters could make such a
difference?), it's also an indication that figure skating has dropped
a notch as a hot TV property. That being said, CBC has HSBC Stars On
Ice set for Monday at 8 p.m. Canadian Olympians Shae-Lynn Bourne and
Victor Kraatz, Brasseur and Eisler and Orser and Browning are all
featured on the hour-long special along with U.S. past champions Todd
Eldredge and Kristi Yamaguchi.
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