News & Events

BBC 'needs to rival HBO'

Date posted:

26th August 2008

Subscription service could answer marketing headache at BBC, says Iannucci

The BBC needs to create a new channel, paid for by subscription, in order to rival America's HBO, award winning producer Armando Iannucci has said.

Iannucci, the producer of The Thick Of It and I'm Alan Partridge has said that in order to provide the public with quality drama and comedy programs the BBC should create a subscription channel to rival the US networks, which invest heavily in new and original ideas.

"What I feel is missing from our screens is a channel that encourages adventurism and experimentation, backed by money," he said in a speech at the Media Guardian Edinburgh International TV festival.

"A channel that becomes home of the best programme-makers, the best writers, the best directors and most visionary producers and format creators, a channel that becomes a brand for what is new and surprising but not compromised by the pressures of advertising or too tightly targeted an audience."

Such a channel could take pressure off a BBC that is already in desperate need of a marketing solution to its license fee problem, after Channel 4 recently attempted to stake a claim over the public cash.

In a recent survey the public also gave a distinct message to the BBC in its suggestion that the license fee was not good value for money.

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