Textural analysis of Casualty and Holbly

City
Casualty and Holby City are two British medical dramas that air weekly on BBC
One. They are both set in the fictional Holby City Hospital and focus on its staff
and patients. Casualty is the longest-running emergency medical drama
television series in the world. Holby City is a spin-off from Casualty and they both
feature occasional crossovers of characters and plots (broadcasted as
Casualty@Holby City). Holbly City also has its own spin-off with HolbyBlue, a
crime drama set in the same fictional city.
Both shows revolve around the lives of the staff and patients in the hospital and
borrow a lot from the conventions of soap operas. Although they share narrative
similarities with the soap opera genre, they are seen as being more educational
due to the technical terminology more often used. Medical dramas also tend to
play on the human fascination of witnessing horrifying events. I think the target
audience of medical drama can vary greatly but it tends to be women in social
grades C2-E. This is because they low working class people who tend to have
more time to watch TV. However I think that some men and women in A/B may
like some medical dramas if they feel they are represented.
Holby City and Casualty are both sub-genres of TV drama Medical Drama, along
with programmes like ER, A&E and Scrubs. They are standard serial dramas that
follow a multi stranded, open ended narrative based on typical soap opera
convention. They also have their own conventions that they follow such as
dramatic opening titles to develop tension, lot of claustrophobic shooting and
many shots of hospital equipment. Sometimes narrative themes are developed,
often involving the need to make moral judgements on life or death situations.
The characters sometimes witness horrific events and occasionally, bigger
narrative themes are touched on which relate to the program, for example the
ethics of euthanasia. These moments can be very emotional and even lifechanging to the doctors and patients. These themes are there to more create
interest and make a greater impact, in comparison to the usual soap opera, but
rarely challenge the viewers beyond entertainment values or a sympathetic
display of emotion.
Medical drama conventions include individual characters, each with their own
well-known storyline, narrative themes of good against bad and familiar settings.
This ensures audience recognition, ensuring the characters and situations are
recognised. For example Holby City and Casualty are both set in a hospital, an
identifiable setting which is the point of interaction where everything happens,
where there is diverse set of characters that set each other apart. There are
hard-hearted Doctors who are power hungry while others are seen to be more
caring and compassionate.
An important aspect to medical dramas is making sure they are convincing to the
audience while remaining entertaining and driven by the characters which is a
tricky balance. Scrubs is a drama that moves completely away from this,
touching on the comedy side with the medical drama as a back story while
dramas such as Casualty try to keep two strands that link together, the day to

day running of a hospital and the personal relationships of the staff. Medical
Dramas often include short term and dramatic storylines.
Recently, both Casualty and Holby City have attempted to create a more
cinematic feel, in order to attract a younger audience. They are now shot in HD
making it appear clearer and reflecting the clean, sterile look of a hospital.
During the day time, the inside hospital sets tend to be bright, white and blue
not only confirming this expected look of a hospital but also reflecting a sense of
purity and in some cases emergency. In the dramatic opening titles (which are
both very similar) we see this colour palette of silver, blue and white, perhaps
signifying the high end technology used in a hospital. However there are also
splashes of orange possibly there to convey the impurity of some of the personal
lifes of staff within the shows. The use of orange could also be there to show the
ambulance lights. This keeps the audience excited as they expect to see some
sort of emergency within the hospital, again playing on the idea that people like
to see horrific events. The camera movement is very fast and pans across the
screen, emphasizing the constant movement within the hospital. The main
characters are framed in medium close up with panels of light that swipe to the
next character. The BBC logo is fore-grounded ensuring brand identity, as with
every BBC TV drama.
Dramatic sound is also very important. After the titles, non-diegetic sound is
used sparingly and most sound is diegetic to ensure a sense of realism.
The episodes tend to moves very fast with each 50 minute episode consisting of
around 50 scenes, with at least three major plots alongside a few sub-plots and
plots which develop between episodes to encourage viewers to watch regularly.
There are a significant use of close-ups used of staff and patients faces,
especially during procedures and operations. This helps to maintain tension and
allows the audiences to experience the fear of an often life or death situation.
Reaction shots are also common within this genre. The camera will often cut
away to the face of someone else in the scene to ensure the audience
understand the full range of emotions. Close-ups also include a lot of shots of
surgical tools highlighting the nature of the drama and creating even more
tension.
The camera is often at eye level to help the audience feel more engaged and
give them the opportunity to make more of a connection with the characters. An
extremely common shot is the hospital bed shot where the patient is isolated
on the bed and made to look vulnerable by using a high angle shot. These
camera shots help to encode fear and ensures the audience remain worried but
from the safety of their own home.
Holby City is shot on videotape using the single-camera setup and fewer cuts are
used, meaning the shots have to be prolonged into a longer take, another
technique used to build tension. These long shots also ensure significant parts of
the narrative that show the personal relationships of the staff are emphasised.
Fast paced editing is usually only used during emergency situations and also to
create tension in the operating theatre with frequent cuts between the surgeons
and other hospital staff. Conversations between Doctors and Nurses are common
with the Doctor being framed in a more respectful way to reflect his authority
taking up most of the frame, positioned in the centre, while Nurses are often to
the side of the frame. Another way to establish authority is through body

movement and posture. Nurses are often seen dashing around, while the
Doctors remain calm and in control reflecting their status.
Realism is a point that is constantly coming up, as it one of the most important
aspects to making a show enjoyable. The biggest way realism is established is
through mice-en-scene. Objects and props must be accurate and reflect the real
day to day working of a hospital. Drips, tubes and monitors are common and can
be seen in all of the wards, while offices are filled with computers and filing
cabinets. The setting has to accurately reflect an NHS hospital. NHS posters can
be seen throughout the entire hospital allowing audiences to keep making
connections with the location. However, Holby City has often been criticized for
its lack of realism. It has been said that Holby City is simply a clone of Casualty
and The Times news referred to it as Casualtys cute little sister. Holby City has
also been unfavorably compared several other medical dramas and some are
saying that it has become more of a soap opera, rather than a drama. This is
mostly due to false representations, use of stereotypes and medical inaccuracies.
The costumes and dress code are extremely important as they help to show
status and authority. This is shown senior Doctors and Consultants in suits or
smart clothes and white coats, contrasting with the working blue uniforms of the
nurses.
Lighting can be used to give a realistic look and it can bring out the drama in a
scene. Different types of lighting can be seen in different genres. In this case,
there isnt much natural lighting but more high key, artificial lighting. This
reflects the clinical nature of the environment. However scenes at night are shot
using much softer lighting to try and create a more relaxed environment for the
patients to sleep in.
Soaps also commonly have low production values and are scheduled prime time
which is the case for Holby City. Casualty however, has higher production value
along with other TV Dramas belonging to other sub genres like period drama and
crime; tend to be aired at 9pm or later.
New viewers can easily pick up on storylines and soon understand
representations of character from the previously feature which follows the titles.
Like a soap opera the narrative is not difficult to follow and is often open ended
with stories that run through the whole series.
Both Holby City and Casualty have been praised for their positive representation
of multiculturalism and Holby City has won two Ethnic Multicultural Media
Awards. Most characters are purposefully young and good looking and to attract
a younger audience and keep the show fresh. In Holby City, Chantelle Lane is a
good looking, typically blonde character who is very much there for the male
gaze. Chantelle is a very stereotypically blonde and Daddys girl. She is set in
binary opposition to the more functional Eddie who has more masculine traits.
There are also some male characters who are framed for female audiences.
Caleb Knight in Casualty is an unconventional, witty and roguish kind of
character with an eye for women and is the complete opposite to his studious
brother, Ethan. Although they have their differences and usually dont get along,
when Ethan nearly dies and Caleb is forced to perform a life-saving exercise,
they put their differences aside and Caleb tells his brother how much he means
to him, which is very out of character for Caleb.

Gender stereotypes are common in both shows. Most Doctors and are seen as
the dominant figure that are well respected. Even in the opening credits men
have more time on the screen than the female characters and have a more
obvious on screen presence. Female characters tend to be seen as weaker as
and less powerful, with a few exceptions. Men more frequently make crucial
decisions and are often seen telling off the female characters. There are however
a few challenging representation, for example Connie Beauchamp. Her character
first made an appearance in Holby City and then continued on in Casualty.
Connie is a very feisty, strong character with a lot of authority and power due to
her position as clinical lead. She throws herself into her work and is driven by
success. Throughout the series we see her character develop and peoples
opinion of her changes. Connie is a working mother, whose loyalties are
constantly put to the test and she ends up choosing work over her daughter.
Many women in her position can emphasize greatly with her. Representations of
sexuality are also referenced with Dixie, a gay paramedic. She ends up marrying
her best friend Jeff, despite her sexuality, in order to keep it a secret from her
father.
I feel that the biggest underlying message and social issue in both of these
programs is the current strain the NHS in under at the moment. While on a dayto-day basis most areas of the service are running ok, there are already signs of
the strain the system is under in areas such as hospital care, A&E and GP
services. This is especially reflected in Casualty as it is set in the hospitals A&E
Department. In each episode, we get to see the struggles the department goes
through on a daily basis.