TV-am
TV-am was an ITV breakfast television franchise that broadcast from February 1983 to December 1992.
It was intially headed by Peter Jay, a prominent neoliberal ideologue who was close to the future BBC Director-General John Birt. Together Jay and Birt had developed a critique of television which came to be known as the ‘mission to explain’ which became the philosophy of the new company.
However, in 1983 Jay was forced to resign amid criticisms of his management style [1] The future BBC Director-General Greg Dyke was subsequently brought in as Editor-in-Chief. Dyke is often reported to have saved the station by bringing it 'downmarket', [2] but according to TV-am's former head of PR Dyke restored a popular following but not suffient advertising revenue:
After the sacking of the founder "famous five" presenters (Anna Ford, David Frost, Robert Kee, Michael Parkinson and Angela Rippon), in 1983 Greg Dyke, now director-general of the BBC, but then a little-known and relatively inexperienced programme -maker, had been brought in as Editor-in-Chief to attempt to drive up ratings. He took the station resolutely downmarket, but failed to win the confidence of advertisers sufficiently and early in 1984, a year after the launch, bankruptcy was imminent.
It was at this point that the shareholders, led by the cousins Timothy and Jonathan Aitken persuaded Kerry Packer to invest £1m in TV-am for around 25 per cent of the company. Part of the deal was that he insisted that [the Australian media executive, Bruce] Gyngell should become managing director. [3]
Notes
- ↑ Moving Image Communications Ltd, TV-am Timeline [Accessed 22 October 2009]
- ↑ e.g. Peter Jay, ‘Jay talking’, Observer, 18 June 2000
- ↑ David Keighley, 'OBITUARY: BRUCE GYNGELL', Independent, 9 September 2000
