'Panorama...stunts,' The Guardian (News)

Monday, August 21, 2006

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Panorama urged not to depend on stunts and secret filming

· BBC1 controller criticised for rock and roll approach
· Return to peaktime show's last chance, says reporter

By James Silver

Panorama's best-known reporter, John Ware, today warns against the programme becoming over-dependent on stunts and undercover reporting when it returns to a high-profile slot on BBC1 in January.

In an interview with MediaGuardian, Ware, 58, describes the return of the venerable BBC current affairs show to the peaktime schedules as "a tremendous achievement", but says he fears BBC1 controller Peter Fincham's entertainment-driven channel may prioritise "stunty presentation" and secret filming over more conventional storytelling. "[Peter Fincham] is interested principally, though not exclusively, in what I call rock and roll narrative," he says.

"I, too, like rock and roll narrative, but I also think it's possible to explore ideas and ideologies. For example, political Islam needs to be explored robustly on BBC1, it shouldn't be tucked away late at night on BBC2. I wouldn't be confident that Peter Fincham would agree with that. I think he has a view that BBC1 should be an uplifting experience and shouldn't come out of dark corners."

Ware also says: "The overwhelming impression we've had [from Peter Fincham] is that BBC1 is about entertainment and that the benchmark for current affairs would be undercover stuff. It's not very challenging to strap on a camera and go and work in a hospital and tell people how dirty it is. That's an important issue, of course, but infinitely more important and memorable journalism than that has been done by reporters with a new take on things."

He also urges his BBC bosses to resist the temptation to "pander to a caricature of young viewers with 20-second attention spans". He says: "Whenever we do go a bit stunty, when we use too much music or do too many fast cuts or try desperately, almost pathetically, to be too funky, rather like Tony Blair dropping his h's eating fish and chips in Durham, it just doesn't work, people can smell it."

The long-running programme has gone through many incarnations in its 53-year history. It had an inauspicious start as a magazine show, with a mixture of serious and lighthearted items. But it went on to become the BBC's leading current affairs programme, carrying hard-hitting interviews and reports. It was fronted at one time by Richard Dimbleby, and later by his son David. Reporters such as Tom Mangold and Jeremy Paxman cut their teeth on the show. Robin Day developed the genre of combative political interview on the programme. Probably the most famous edition was in 1995, when Martin Bashir interviewed Diana, Princess of Wales. It drew the programme's highest audience, 22.8 million people.

Panorama was moved to Sundays in 2000, a result of the BBC's decision to shift the weekday main evening news bulletin to 10pm. But audiences declined and there was much press criticism. It will move back to Mondays at 8.30pm from January.

Ware considers the transfer to Mondays to be the programme's last chance. "I don't want to imply by that it's on its uppers, because it isn't," says Ware, who has worked on the programme since 1986. "By last chance I mean it's had a lot of reconfigurations both in terms of its duration, its slot and the sort of stories it's going to cover and if that's transmitted one thing to people it's a sense of insecurity. Now, we have a fantastic piece of real estate. It's just a question of what we do with it."

(The Guardian, August 21st 2006)

Posted by James Silver - On Monday, August 21, 2006

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