Where Are They Now: UTV Ireland
LAUNCHED to much fanfare in 2015, the Irish television station suddenly vanished from the airwaves and people’s consciousness overnight, sparking a debate on just where exactly UTV Ireland disappeared to.
“We all left after the initial ratings came in, what was initially a steady exodus became an all out flood,” explained one time UTV Ireland cameraman Darren Kilkenny, “we knew the game was up when the 6 staff on the studio floor outnumbered those watching the broadcast at home”.
While we’ve been assured by people who managed to watch UTV Ireland while it was still on the air, the TV station did indeed make programmes and had a channel number on UPC and Sky, probably 560, or maybe 113. However, the mystery still remains over what the programming was.
“I worked on a newsy one, and then I’m pretty sure someone else worked on a not newsy one, and then it was Coronation Street for the other 23 hours,” explained one time researcher Carol Toland.
As staff left to find other work elsewhere in the media, those left behind were overburdened by the extra work.
“It was an odd thing whereby I started out as a runner, but after the first week I was the station’s manager,” 19-year-old Glen Casey explained to WWN.
“Another day would pass, I’d have to take on another task as the cameraman, director, floor manager, editor, lad who got the coffee and eventually I had to pretend to be Alison Comyn presenting the news. I did one make up tutorial on Youtube and got away with it, I actually found my true talent with make-up or maybe people just landed on UTV by accident and didn’t stay long enough to notice. But it’s all going brilliantly now, though, the ratings are through the roof,” Glen added, from his parent’s shed.
Glen was so traumatised by the experience, his parents explained, that he sits in the shed all day in the belief he is still filming the entirety of the now defunct station’s output.
“He tried to kidnap Daniel O’Donnell and make him do another episode of that God awful B&B driving show, it was at point we knew running UTV Ireland by himself had taken quite the toll on our Glen,” Glen’s mother Patricia explained.
“Mind you,” Glen’s father Michael countered, “Glen can still knock it out of the park with his weather reports, better than that King prick any day of the week”.