The Voyage of Charles Darwin Crew Enjoys 40Th Reunion Page 7
Total Page：16
File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb
The newspaper for retired BBC Pension Scheme members • June 2018 • Issue 3 PROSPERO THE VOYAGE OF CHARLES DARWIN CREW ENJOYS 40TH REUNION PAGE 7 PENSION SCHEME | BACK AT THE BBC BBC Studios lands first GOLFING GREATS Channel 4 commission BBC Studios’ Science Unit was commissioned by Producer Jonathan Bramley was part of the talented Channel 4 to produce a programme, broadcast in April, that provided an in-depth look at a growing urban team that brought the action from the 82nd Masters phenomenon: masses of congealed fat and waste Championship to British screens. He shares an clogging up our sewers, otherwise known as fatbergs. The one-hour programme was Channel 4’s first insight into what’s involved on the ground… commission from BBC Studios, the BBC’s commercial production business and the first third party commission his year was one of the most eagerly-anticipated for BBC Studios from a UK broadcaster. Masters ever, and it lived up to the hype. BBC Studios’ Science Unit, in conjunction with Thames TTiger Woods and Rory Mcllroy didn’t quite deliver Water, performed the first ever fatberg autopsy on a but Saturday and Sunday saw an incredible weekend of giant London fatberg, believed to be one of the largest golf with American Patrick Reed winning his first major. ever found in the capital. Alongside our highly-experienced commentary team of Fatbergs are becoming a growing problem across the Peter Alliss, Ken Brown, Andrew Cotter and Paul Azinger UK as our sewage infrastructure struggles to cope with – plus reporter Rishi Persad – we added some high-profile Britain’s changing habits. The battle to remove them is guests to our live build-up to the weekend. Eight-time costing an estimated £80 million a year across the UK, Major winner Gary Player, UK Masters Champions Sandy a bill that ultimately falls to utility customers in their Lyle and Ian Woosnam and current European Ryder Cup water bills. Captain, Thomas Bjorn all featured in our studio The programme saw presenter Rick Edwards and overlooking the practice range. pathology technician Carla Valentine oversee the This year also marked the debut of presenter, Eilidh process as the fatberg emerged from the sewers Barbour. Eilidh has presented numerous football and and made its way to Abbey Mills Pumping Station in rugby programmes before, but this was her first live Eilidh Barbour. East London, dubbed ‘the cathedral of sewage’, Masters broadcast. for a thorough examination of its contents. before that, however we needed to carefully plan our We were very keen to make the most of Eilidh’s build-up while trying to reflect what was happening on enthusiasm, so this year our ambition was to record the course and practice range before that. more of our links and preview chats out and about World Service expansion around the course, so that the viewer got to see Once we hit the live golf slot, our job was to supplement As part of the World Service expansion, three new daily our team in situ in the glorious surroundings of the CBS feed and fill their commercial breaks by adding radio services have been launched in Amharic, Afaan Oromo Augusta National. additional coverage of European golfers plus our own and Tigrinya. The new language services have been interviews and features, especially ‘Ken on the Course’ available online since September 2017 – when they launched For the final day we were on air at 18:30, but the broadcast which always goes down well with audiences. websites and Facebook pages in all three languages. rights only allowed us to show four minutes of golf on BBC2 before the world feed started at 19:00. We could It’s a tricky juggling act, but we have had a hugely The new radio services will provide impartial news, show digital feeds (Feature Groups, Amen Corner, 15/16 experienced team on site which makes my job that current affairs, features and analysis for Ethiopia and and On the Range) on the website and Red Button much easier! Eritrea, as well as regional and international news. There will be a strong focus on culture, health and original journalism from the region. The programme will be broadcast on shortwave, satellite A love letter to Liverpool – and streamed directly onto each service’s Facebook page. To mark its 50 years of broadcasting, BBC Radio Merseyside In addition, English Language Teaching (ELT) will feature has been awarded the Freedom of the City of Liverpool prominently across the schedules for all three languages. – the highest civic honour the city can bestow. Pauline McAdam, Over 800 people have recently joined the World Service Assistant Editor was thrilled to be able to write and produce to undertake its biggest expansion since the 1940s. a special stage show celebrating the award, which was These plans have been made possible by the £289 million accepted on behalf of listeners and staff. given by the government over the next four years. It’s customary, when you’ve been honoured with the Liverpool is a port and it is apart. As Scouse poet of Freedom of the City, to give an acceptance speech. Jamaican heritage, Levi Tafari said, ‘We aren’t English: But where would we begin? Back in 1967 the BBC gave we are Scouse’. It’s that fiercely proud sense of identity Lagos bureau is Merseyside a radio station but it is our listeners who that makes us who we are. It marks our difference, gave her a voice. So we decided to say thank you with as many port cities find, from the mother country. officially open a special programme celebrating this glorious city. Our new bureau in Lagos is now open, making it That sense of belonging to our community is wonderful the headquarters for our BBC News operation With the help of some famous friends like musician but brings its own problems. The city has suffered across West Africa. Pete Wylie, actors Ricky Tomlinson and Pauline Daniels, from economic decline and reputational damage over and writer Frank Cottrell Boyce, we performed a Love the years, although oddly not from our myriad of The bureau has a new state-of-the-art TV studio, Letter to Liverpool and her ‘accent exceedingly rare’, foreign tourists. Again and again the sense of defiant two radio studios and can house up to 200 staff. as the local song goes. optimism surfaced in poems, songs and speeches. It is home to 100 new staff who joined the BBC as For me, to be asked to write this love letter to my It was a spectacular evening: occasionally mournful, part of the expansion of the World Service and to home town was an enormous and paralysing privilege. frequently joyful as our stories and voices floated launch three new language services – BBC News Presenter Tony Snell and I, two kids from working around our heads and the Grade One listed civic palace. Igbo, BBC News Pidgin and BBC News Yoruba. class Anfield, sat on the stage that night pinching With Hausa and English, BBC News is now available We laughed, we cried and we sang. We celebrated our ourselves. How did we get here with responsibility for in these five shared history and, importantly, our future. delivering this beautiful tribute? I think this may be languages across the most important programme I have ever written in But, as Frank Cottrell Boyce put it: ‘Radio Merseyside Nigeria and has a my almost 30 years at the station. I am thrilled as a is where our voices have been listened to and heard reach of 36 born and bred Liver Bird to have been given the and cherished. It’s a long and winding road. And as million, the largest chance by editor, Sue Owen to create this homage long as Radio Merseyside is with us we will not of any country in to my home. walk alone’. the world. 2 PROSPERO Peaking into the world of costume design Prospero is provided free of charge to retired Scheme members, or to their spouses and dependants. Costumes play a huge role in any production, but especially historical Prospero provides a source of news on former dramas like Peaky Blinders. Ariel Networker Joanna Izowska spoke to colleagues, developments at the BBC and pension costume designer, Stephanie Collie, who worked on the first series, to find issues, plus classified adverts. It is available online at bbc.co.uk/mypension out more about what’s involved. Here Joanna shares what she learned... To advertise in Prospero, please see page 12. s you’d expect, preparation for the project Please send your editorial contributions, or started with a huge amount of research - comments/feedback, to: reading books, going to exhibitions and A Prospero, BBC Pension and Benefits Centre, browsing photographs from the 1920s to really get Broadcasting House, Cardiff CF5 2YQ immersed into the era. Email: [email protected] After the First World War, fashions changed. There was a shortage of fabrics and those that were available Please make sure that any digital pictures you send were expensive, so clothes were shorter and tighter. are scanned at 300dpi. Please also note that the People also didn’t have money to buy new clothes. maximum word count for obituaries is 350 words. And with filthy streets, trousers in particular got shorter – above the ankle – to stop them from getting dirty. The process of creating costumes involved having Contents conversations with the production team; talking to the director and developing ideas; talking to the director of photography about colours and to the production Letters 4-5 designer.