BBC Four 'Dropping Comedy & Drama'
It will happen to the other channels soon enough the way things are going.
Quite right. Makes total sense. They get lost on there, people don't even know BBC Four does them, so it makes sense to put all new shows on BBC Three, Two or One. I don't see this meaning the BBC will be making fewer sitcoms and dramas, just moving them to more suitable channels. This should help give BBC Foura stronger identity too.
As long as the kind of shows BBC Four was broadcasting do still have a place with Auntie, I don't see any problem. As Alfred says, many people barely know the channel exists, let alone produces entertainment programming. I hope to see Four return more to the old: BBC Knowledge, with lots of wonderful documentaries - and hopefully, not just on the arts, but embracing more historical documentaries and other high-brow subjects too.
Like BBC Three, it is a feeder channel for comedy and drama and its low audience figures do give it more scope for experimentation. I'm sure most populists would say the BBC should make more popular programmes like Gavin & Stacey and QI on BBC One but dislike there being a space for them to emerge in the first place.
As someone said about The Mighty Boosh: "No TV executive comedy committee sat down and said what British comedy is missing is a pink octopus who talks like the Small Faces."
I remember listening to comedy on Radio 2 also. I listened to their comedy hour every Saturday morning for about ten years - then all of a sudden they just dumped it and stuck Sound of the friggin 60s in its place.
Gutted!
Bitches.
Look at BBC Four's comedy track record. This is a BAD thing.
Lead Balloon, Thick of It and Getting On are the only real succesful BBC Four sitcoms I can think of. The first two I can imagine coming into existence elsewhere. Getting On I worry would never have got made without the channel.
Quote: chipolata @ June 6 2011, 7:05 PM BSTLead Balloon, Thick of It and Getting On are the only real succesful BBC Four sitcoms I can think of.
Those are enough. It may not have made a vast amount of it, but its hit rate is pretty darn strong.
Cowards was pretty good, and of course, not sitcom, but Charlie Brooker's output on the channel. Would shows like that still be made?
It has to be a bad thing if there's one less place for sitcoms/comedy to be made. Will those slots be spread out over the remaining channels, or will there just be less comedy made? You suspect the latter.
Quote: Matthew Stott @ June 6 2011, 7:20 PM BSTThose are enough. It may not have made a vast amount of it, but its hit rate is pretty darn strong. Cowards was pretty good, and of course, not sitcom, but Charlie Brooker's output on the channel. Would shows like that still be made? It has to be a bad thing if there's one less place for sitcoms/comedy to be made. Will those slots be spread out over the remaining channels, or will there just be less comedy made? You suspect the latter.
But there's only a finite amount of money and arguably the BBC have been spreading themselves too thinly.
And drama-wise, BBC Four buys in a lot of great foreign dramas that you can't see really being shifted onto any other channel (The Killing, Wallander etc); does that mean goodbye to all that too?
Bad.
Quote: Matthew Stott @ June 6 2011, 7:20 PM BSTThose are enough. It may not have made a vast amount of it, but its hit rate is pretty darn strong.
Cowards was pretty good, and of course, not sitcom, but Charlie Brooker's output on the channel. Would shows like that still be made?
It has to be a bad thing if there's one less place for sitcoms/comedy to be made. Will those slots be spread out over the remaining channels, or will there just be less comedy made? You suspect the latter.
I can't quite believe I'm saying this, but frankly, given the quality of much recent output (as a whole), a few less comedy slots wouldn't be amiss.
First things first. Drop The One Show.
Or at least get Adrian and Christine back.