Ever wish you could go behind the scenes of a television show and watch all the parts that were edited out?
Welcome to The Rush. Its hosts are bravely going where few hosts have ever dared go before live airing of all those tiny moments that no one else is supposed to see.
It works like this. For two hours every weekday, the cameras roll inside the Shaw television studios on West Cordova, picking up every word that is spoken by long-time television partners Michael Eckford and Fiona Forbes as they tape the reminted version of Urban Rush. Every second of those two hours is live-streamed on the web (http://new.livestream.com/therushtv).
That means every time they flub an intro and have to do it again, the web audience watches them go through the process. When one interview ends, the cameras stay on them as the goodbyes are said, the guests leave and Eckford and Forbes have 15 minutes to fill in before the next guests arrive. So when Eckford checks underneath the life-sized horse lamp in the studio to see whether its a stallion or a gelded version, the web audience hears him exclaim, Whoa, thats not an udder! Trip, fall, sneeze, bend over to pick up a pen? Nothing is hidden from the cameras. It can be like a live blooper reel watch that glass of water fly off the table when Eckford puts a book down beside it or a reality tv show about a tv show.
The web audience isnt just silently watching the antics, however. They feel very much a part of the goings on, even though they might be half a continent away. Theyre tweeting and Facebooking and emailing their comments during those two hours, which an intern responds to immediately. Its a melding of the interactive nature of social media with the more traditional television talk show.
Of those two hours, half an hour is edited to air across the country on Shaw stations every weekday night at 10pm. (And 10am the next day.) Another half hour is tacked onto the Vancouver portion of the show.
Weve always said, This should be on the show, Forbes says of the banter that takes place between taping. Some of their best moments were when no one else was watching.
It was Eckford who had the lightbulb moment when, in thinking of ways to revitalize the program, he thought of airing all of those off-camera moments.
The Rush is really two friends who have worked together for 16 years. Were like a family some of the funniest parts are when we forget the cameras are still on, he says.
The only problem, says Forbes with one of her dimpled smiles, is that everyone now realizes that she can swear like a trucker and shes often the one egging Eckford on and then letting him take the blame. Its been really fun but totally embarrassing, she says.
In this way, Eckford and Forbes are the perfect guinea pigs for such a new approach. As one of their first producers said, they like each other enough to get along but dislike each other just enough to make good chemistry. Its like a brother and sister you poke the bear, she says.
For all of his ease on camera, Eckford says that in real life hes a real homebody, preferring to being with his wife and three kids a 15-year-old daughter (who rolls her eyes at some of his antics) and boys aged five and three. Put him in a crowded social situation, he says, and I can make any conversation awkward.
Forbes on the other hand, never gets an invitation she doesnt enjoy. Shes constantly out about town, supporting her favourite causes and checking out everything and everyone thats new and interesting.
It was a bit daunting to take the made-in-Vancouver show national. Forbes is well known here shes repeatedly been the top television personality in WE Vancouvers Best of the City survey but no matter how long youve been doing this, you still worry whether people will like you, she says. And she wants the ROC (Rest Of Canada) to like Vancouver, too.
Its fun to go back and re-introduce yourself for the first time, Eckford says.Were confident well find our audience and our audience will find us.
