BBC2 to position original drama as ‘major event of the week’

Published Thursday 30 April 2009 at 12:35 by Matthew Hemley

New BBC2 controller Janice Hadlow has revealed she plans to make original drama “the major event of the week” on the channel and draw inspiration from its previous successes including literary adaptations and series such as Our Friends in the North.

Speaking exclusively to The Stage, Hadlow, who was previously controller of BBC4 and replaced Roly Keating as head of BBC2 at the end of last year, said she was looking for dramas that audiences know “no one else is going to do”. She cited recent Liam Neeson and James Nesbitt drama Five Minutes of Heaven as the kind of production the broadcaster should be screening and added: “That’s a really good touchstone of the sort of thing you think only BBC2 could do. It made a splash and our drama should do that. It should feel like the major event of the week.”

Hadlow explained she would be looking to parts of “BBC2’s drama heritage” when considering the future shape of the genre on the channel, adding that she wanted more series as well as the single dramas the channel is best known for.

“Singles will always be at the heart of what we do, but what could we be doing in terms of looking at BBC2’s heritage and to shows such as Our Friends in the North? We should have an aspiration to have that sort of thing in the mix,” she said.

Regarding literary adaptations, she said she was inspired by the success the channel had 15 to 20 years ago with dramas based on the works of authors such as John Le Carre. But she warned any adaptations would have to be chosen carefully, because of the success BBC1 has had with shows based on books.

“You have to think carefully about that because you don’t want shows to look like a pale BBC1 drama, but it does open up all sorts of territory,” she said.

Hadlow also said there would be space on the channel for new writing talent and added that BBC2 had a vital role to play in light of the fact commercial broadcasters have been affected by a poor advertising market.

She said the Corporation had an “enhanced responsibility to protect areas of creativity that find themselves pushed elsewhere”. She added: “There are many reasons why you want drama on BBC2 to be an important part of the channel. Most are to do with audience, but there is also the other reason, which is to do with nurturing a production community in difficult times.”