Television industries in the mid 60’s

Part 1 - 1960’s television

Television industries in the mid 60’s

Background of tv
-Tv was scarce
-Only 3 channels - BBC 1,2 & ITV
-BBC2 not available on older tv sets
-Tv’s - Expensive ,small,unrealiable, black and white
-No broadcasting for large parts of the day- all channels closed down at night
-Changing channels- Difficult, done manually (audiences were more loyal to one programme)
-No home computing or technology to watch any other sort of programmes on
-Itv started - 1955, allow advertisements online BBC, introduced game shows
-By 1965- competition in the television market
-Itv- was financially secure, television could be highly regulated

Ownership,funding and regulation
-ITV & BBC not part of internationtional media congolomorate (company that owns a lot of companies)
-BBC- governed by Royal Charter and funded by licence-fee payers.
-ITV- network of regional tv comoanies who competed with each other to provide programmes for the channel and provided regional content for transmission area.
-Production company of The Avengers - ABC- Companies not allowed to merge(until after 1990)- British ownership was controlled by their regulator (ITA)
-ITA: Independant Television Authority
-ITV- Highly profitable and could afford larger budgets then BBC
-Profitability of ITV let ITA insist on PSB requirements
-Schedules includes PSB fare: single dramas, educationional programmes, children programmes, art, news and current affair documentaries etc.
-BBC- self regulating - function carried out by a board of governors appointed from ‘the great and the good’  group defined by those in power.

'Global TV'

- World television was controlled by the US

- British television production was protected by the rules pf PSB.

- E.g ABC's programming for November 1965, included an American series at 7.25pm.

- the schedule reached its climax with The Avengers at 9.05pm.

- British television did compete on the world market, with productions being sold to countries overseas. (90 countries in 1969)

- A deal with the ABC required the fourth series of The Avengers to be shot on film & allowed high production values for television.

- Previous series were studio bound.

- Editing was difficult and expensive so mistakes and fluffed lines were left uncorrected.

- (1966) The fifth series of The Avengers was filmed in colour, even though on ITV programs could only be shown in b&w.

- Production of international markets raised the prettied of television productions. 

- Productions that had been looked down on as inferior to film as an art form.

- Seen as the process that led some television dramas gaining higher critical and artistic status then some feature films.

- Budget of series 4 of The Avengers was £56,000 per show.

- A major British spy film,The Ipcress File, had a budget of £309,000

Reaching different audiences 

- Channel loyalty tended to split on class lines (ITV seen as working class).

- The rise of youth culture was suddenly 'cool' to be working class.

- The BBC was seen more as middle class.

- In mid 1960's BBC's program, The Forsyte Saga, was a set of novels. Whereas on ITV, The Avengers was seen as mush more daring, youthful, irreverent and sexy.

- BBC remind London-centric.

- ITV had production centres in the North and midlands.

- ABC studios used for the Avengers were in Borehamwood, Hertfordshire and London.

- ATV and ABC retain large production faculties in London.

- Grander television developed a distinctively northern identity in opposition to the southern establishment.