British TV has eye on HBO as model
Iannucci addresses TV needs at Edinburgh
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Armando Iannucci, who was feted for award-winning political satire “The Thick of It,” said the BBC needs to set up a subscription channel modeled on HBO.
“What I feel is missing from our screens is a channel that encourages adventurism and experimentation, backed by money,” said Iannucci, delivering the Alternative MacTaggart lecture on Sunday. “A channel that becomes the home of the best program 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 lightly targeted an audience.
“We can see these channels in America, whose output is much more frequently cited as the best television in the world.”
Feevees like HBO and Showtime or basic cablers such as AMC have created “The Sopranos,” “The Tudors” and “Mad Men.” Although the shows at these nets are sometimes ratings failures, Iannucci said, the upside is that these kind of channels experiment on a big scale backing “popular yet challenging entertainment” and constantly raising the benchmarks for network shows.
“What the U.K. lacks is its own HBO,” said Iannucci, who in the past has collaborated with British comedian Steve Coogan and is now helming his first movie, a BBC Films production.
He said that in the same way people were prepared to spend $5 at coffee shops, Brits would subscribe to such a BBC channel.
“I’m not even going to begin to pretend to understand how the economics of this would work,” Iannucci admitted.
“I know we’d have to give a guarantee that the content on the channel would make its way eventually onto the BBC’s free-to-air channels and that some would need help in paying the subscription.”
Some U.K. TV toppers like ex-Sparrowhawk Media David Elstein have argued in the past for the BBC to be funded entirely by subscription.
But Iannucci made it clear that the continuance of the license fee was essential to pay for existing BBC services.
His proposed web would be an additional service with a unique funding model for a U.K. pubcaster.
