BBC Four
Encyclopedia
BBC Four is a British
television network
operated by the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC)
and available to digital television viewers on Freeview, IPTV
, satellite
and cable
.
BBC Four launched on 2 March 2002, transmitting a schedule between 19:00 to 4:00. It shows "a wide variety of programmes including drama, documentaries, music, international film, comedy and current affairs ... an alternative to programmes on the mainstream TV channels." It has a schedule dominated by repeats but is required by its licence to broadcast at least 100 hours of new arts and music programmes, 110 hours of new factual programmes and premier 20 international films each year.
, an educational and cultural channel which had undergone many changes throughout its lifetime; the latter of which consisted of documentaries and art programming: essentially a test of the new BBC Four schedule. BBC Four would rebrand this channel, and bring it into line with the well recognised BBC One and Two brands at the same time. Planning for the new channel, along with the new BBC Three
, had been in progress since October 2000; however the incumbent government delayed approving the new BBC digital plans. The BBC Four plans were approved earlier, and as a result launched before BBC Three.
BBC Four was different from the old BBC Knowledge: the channel would be more heavily promoted with more new and original programming and the channel wouldn't be broadcast 24 hours a day. This is due to the fact that on the Freeview digital terrestrial
platform, BBC Four is broadcast in a statistically multiplexed
stream in Multiplex B that timeshares with the CBeebies
channel. As a result, BBC Four broadcasts from 7 pm to about 4 am every day, with an hours down-time and promotions for CBeebies, before CBeebies channel runs from 6 am until 7 pm.
On 12 May 2011, BBC Four was added to the Sky EPG in Ireland on channel 230.
group, and as a result, the channel controller is answerable to the head of this executive department: George Entwistle, as of 2011. The channel direction is determined by the channels remit, set by royal charter and the corporation's governing body the BBC Trust
, and by the channel controller. These are:
BBC Four has an annual budget of £54.3 million.
The first evening's BBC Four programmes were simulcast
on BBC Two
. BBC Four is notable for first showing Larry David
's Seinfeld
follow-up, Curb Your Enthusiasm
, Armando Iannucci
's cutting political satire
, The Thick of It
, The Chaser's War on Everything
, Flight of the Conchords
, Mad Men
and Danish
thriller, The Killing.
The channel broadcasts a mixture of art
and science
documentaries
, vintage drama
(including many rare black-and-white
programmes), and non-English language
productions such as film
s from the Artificial Eye
catalogue, the French thriller Spiral
and the Swedish detective series Wallander
. BBC Four further supports foreign language films with its annual World Cinema Award
which has been running since 2004.
On weekdays at 19.00, the channel shows a 30-minute global news programme called World News Today
, simulcast with and produced by BBC World News. It screens a number of documentaries such as The Century of the Self
and The Trials of Henry Kissinger
. The channel is also home to many political travel shows such as Holidays in the Axis of Evil
which features investigative journalism.
Drama
has given the channel some of its most popular programmes, with The Alan Clark Diaries
(2003) and Kenneth Williams: Fantabulosa!
(2006) being among the highest rated, with over 800,000 viewers. The 18 March 2008, broadcast of The Curse of Steptoe
brought the channel its highest audience figures, estimated as 1.41 million viewers, a 7% share of multichannel audiences between 9pm and 10.05pm, based on overnight returns. The official audience figures for the broadcast, including time-shifting, were later published as 1,625,000. Another notable production was a live re-make of the 1953 science-fiction serial The Quatermass Experiment
, adapted from the original scripts into a single, two-hour version (though on the night it in fact underran considerably, lasting less than 1 hour 40 minutes), broadcast on the evening of Saturday 2 April 2005. Discounting BBC Four's previous live relays of theatrical Shakespeare productions, this was the first live made-for-television drama to be broadcast by the BBC for twenty years.
Another notable programme broadcast on BBC Four is Charlie Brooker's Screenwipe
which contains reviews of current shows, as well as stories and commentary on how television is produced. The show is presented by broadcaster Charlie Brooker
.
Some output from BBC Four (documentaries rather than foreign films) was for a time repeated on BBC Two in a 'BBC Four on Two' branded area, although this was often in a late night broadcast slot after Newsnight
and has since been discontinued.
According to BARB
the comedy panel game QI
has the highest ratings of any show on BBC Four.
At the Edinburgh International Television Festival
, BBC Four won the Non-Terrestrial Channel of the Year award in 2004 and 2006.
were generated dynamically reflecting the frequencies of the continuity announcers' voice or of backing music and were designed by Lambie-Nairn
. As a result, no two idents were ever the same. The first continuity announcer was Zeb Soanes.
When the channel first started airing, it used the slogan "Everyone Needs A Place To Think", but the BBC stopped using this several months after the launch. However the BBC Four logo and above slogan can be found, engraved on benches along the South Bank
in London, between the London Eye and Waterloo Bridge
.
In September 2005, the channel began showing new idents comprising a central BBC Four logo surrounded by four quadrants which show different stages of the same footage thus making for a sort of optical illusion; for example, a swimming pool where a person on an inflatable ring appears in the bottom-left corner, though ripples don't enter the remaining quarters. Although the image appears as one at the start of the ident by the end it is clearly four separate images.
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
television network
Television network
A television network is a telecommunications network for distribution of television program content, whereby a central operation provides programming to many television stations or pay TV providers. Until the mid-1980s, television programming in most countries of the world was dominated by a small...
operated by the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC)
BBC
The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...
and available to digital television viewers on Freeview, IPTV
IPTV
Internet Protocol television is a system through which television services are delivered using the Internet protocol suite over a packet-switched network such as the Internet, instead of being delivered through traditional terrestrial, satellite signal, and cable television formats.IPTV services...
, satellite
Satellite television
Satellite television is television programming delivered by the means of communications satellite and received by an outdoor antenna, usually a parabolic mirror generally referred to as a satellite dish, and as far as household usage is concerned, a satellite receiver either in the form of an...
and cable
Cable television
Cable television is a system of providing television programs to consumers via radio frequency signals transmitted to televisions through coaxial cables or digital light pulses through fixed optical fibers located on the subscriber's property, much like the over-the-air method used in traditional...
.
BBC Four launched on 2 March 2002, transmitting a schedule between 19:00 to 4:00. It shows "a wide variety of programmes including drama, documentaries, music, international film, comedy and current affairs ... an alternative to programmes on the mainstream TV channels." It has a schedule dominated by repeats but is required by its licence to broadcast at least 100 hours of new arts and music programmes, 110 hours of new factual programmes and premier 20 international films each year.
History
BBC Four launched on 2 March 2002 at 19.00 GMT, having been delayed from the original planned 2001 launch. The channel replaced BBC KnowledgeBBC Knowledge
BBC Knowledge was an early BBC digital television channel, available by cable, satellite, or terrestrial digital broadcasting, providing a programme of documentary, cultural and educational television.-Launch:...
, an educational and cultural channel which had undergone many changes throughout its lifetime; the latter of which consisted of documentaries and art programming: essentially a test of the new BBC Four schedule. BBC Four would rebrand this channel, and bring it into line with the well recognised BBC One and Two brands at the same time. Planning for the new channel, along with the new BBC Three
BBC Three
BBC Three is a television network from the BBC broadcasting via digital cable, terrestrial, IPTV and satellite platforms. The channel's target audience includes those in the 16-34 year old age group, and has the purpose of providing "innovative" content to younger audiences, focusing on new talent...
, had been in progress since October 2000; however the incumbent government delayed approving the new BBC digital plans. The BBC Four plans were approved earlier, and as a result launched before BBC Three.
BBC Four was different from the old BBC Knowledge: the channel would be more heavily promoted with more new and original programming and the channel wouldn't be broadcast 24 hours a day. This is due to the fact that on the Freeview digital terrestrial
Digital terrestrial television
Digital terrestrial television is the technological evolution of broadcast television and advance from analog television, which broadcasts land-based signals...
platform, BBC Four is broadcast in a statistically multiplexed
Statistical multiplexing
Statistical multiplexing is a type of communication link sharing, very similar to dynamic bandwidth allocation . In statistical multiplexing, a communication channel is divided into an arbitrary number of variable bit-rate digital channels or data streams. The link sharing is adapted to the...
stream in Multiplex B that timeshares with the CBeebies
CBeebies
CBeebies is the brand used by the BBC for programming aimed at children 6 years and under. It is used as a themed strand in the UK on terrestrial television, as a separate free-to-air domestic British channel and used for international varients supported by advertising, subscription or both...
channel. As a result, BBC Four broadcasts from 7 pm to about 4 am every day, with an hours down-time and promotions for CBeebies, before CBeebies channel runs from 6 am until 7 pm.
On 12 May 2011, BBC Four was added to the Sky EPG in Ireland on channel 230.
Organisation
BBC Four forms part of the BBC VisionBBC Vision
BBC Vision is a department of the BBC which incorporates the programme production, commissioning and broadcast operations including BBC Television...
group, and as a result, the channel controller is answerable to the head of this executive department: George Entwistle, as of 2011. The channel direction is determined by the channels remit, set by royal charter and the corporation's governing body the BBC Trust
BBC Trust
The BBC Trust is the governing body of the British Broadcasting Corporation. It is operationally independent of BBC management and external bodies, and aims to act in the best interests of licence fee payers....
, and by the channel controller. These are:
- 2002–2004: Roly KeatingRoly KeatingRoland "Roly" Keating is the current Director of Archive Content for the BBC.-Education:Keating was educated at Westminster School, an independent school for boys in London, followed by Balliol College at the University of Oxford, where he read Classics.-Life and career:Keating joined the BBC in...
- 2004–2008: Janice HadlowJanice HadlowJanice Hadlow is a British television executive. She is the current controller of the BBC television channel BBC Two, taking over this position in November 2008 having previously been controller of BBC Four....
- 2008–present: Richard KleinRichard Klein (TV)Richard Henry Klein is the controller of BBC Four. He became controller in 2008, taking over from Janice Hadlow, who went on to be Controller of BBC Two.-Early life:...
BBC Four has an annual budget of £54.3 million.
Programming
Simulcast
Simulcast, shorthand for "simultaneous broadcast", refers to programs or events broadcast across more than one medium, or more than one service on the same medium, at the same time. For example, Absolute Radio is simulcast on both AM and on satellite radio, and the BBC's Prom concerts are often...
on BBC Two
BBC Two
BBC Two is the second television channel operated by the British Broadcasting Corporation in the United Kingdom. It covers a wide range of subject matter, but tending towards more 'highbrow' programmes than the more mainstream and popular BBC One. Like the BBC's other domestic TV and radio...
. BBC Four is notable for first showing Larry David
Larry David
Lawrence Gene "Larry" David is an American actor, writer, comedian and producer. He is best known as the co-creator , head writer, and executive producer of the television series Seinfeld from 1989 to 1996, and for creating the 1999 HBO series Curb Your Enthusiasm, a partially improvised sitcom in...
's Seinfeld
Seinfeld
Seinfeld is an American television sitcom that originally aired on NBC from July 5, 1989, to May 14, 1998, lasting nine seasons, and is now in syndication. It was created by Larry David and Jerry Seinfeld, the latter starring as a fictionalized version of himself...
follow-up, Curb Your Enthusiasm
Curb Your Enthusiasm
Curb Your Enthusiasm is an American comedy television series produced and broadcast by HBO, which premiered on October 15, 2000. As of 2011, it has completed 80 episodes over eight seasons. The series was created by Seinfeld co-creator Larry David, who stars as a fictionalized version of himself...
, Armando Iannucci
Armando Iannucci
Armando Giovanni Iannucci is a Scottish comedian, satirist, writer, director, performer and radio producer. Born in Glasgow, he studied at Oxford University and left graduate work on a PhD about John Milton to pursue a career in comedy....
's cutting political satire
Political satire
Political satire is a significant part of satire that specializes in gaining entertainment from politics; it has also been used with subversive intent where political speech and dissent are forbidden by a regime, as a method of advancing political arguments where such arguments are expressly...
, The Thick of It
The Thick of It
The Thick of It is a British comedy television series that satirises the inner workings of modern British government. It was first broadcast on BBC Four in 2005, and has so far completed fourteen half-hour episodes and two special hour-long episodes to coincide with Christmas and Gordon Brown's...
, The Chaser's War on Everything
The Chaser's War on Everything
The Chaser's War on Everything is an Australian television satirical comedy series broadcast on the Australian Broadcasting Corporation television station ABC1. It has won an AFI Award. The cast perform sketches mocking social and political issues, and often feature comedic publicity stunts...
, Flight of the Conchords
Flight of the Conchords (TV series)
Flight of the Conchords is an American television comedy series that debuted on HBO on June 17, 2007. The show follows the adventures of Flight of the Conchords, a two-man band from New Zealand, as its members seek fame and success in New York City. The show stars the real-life duo, Jemaine Clement...
, Mad Men
Mad Men
Mad Men is an American dramatic television series created and produced by Matthew Weiner. The series premiered on Sunday evenings on the American cable network AMC and are produced by Lionsgate Television. It premiered on July 19, 2007, and completed its fourth season on October 17, 2010. Each...
and Danish
Denmark
Denmark is a Scandinavian country in Northern Europe. The countries of Denmark and Greenland, as well as the Faroe Islands, constitute the Kingdom of Denmark . It is the southernmost of the Nordic countries, southwest of Sweden and south of Norway, and bordered to the south by Germany. Denmark...
thriller, The Killing.
The channel broadcasts a mixture of art
Art
Art is the product or process of deliberately arranging items in a way that influences and affects one or more of the senses, emotions, and intellect....
and science
Science
Science is a systematic enterprise that builds and organizes knowledge in the form of testable explanations and predictions about the universe...
documentaries
Documentary film
Documentary films constitute a broad category of nonfictional motion pictures intended to document some aspect of reality, primarily for the purposes of instruction or maintaining a historical record...
, vintage drama
Drama
Drama is the specific mode of fiction represented in performance. The term comes from a Greek word meaning "action" , which is derived from "to do","to act" . The enactment of drama in theatre, performed by actors on a stage before an audience, presupposes collaborative modes of production and a...
(including many rare black-and-white
Black-and-white
Black-and-white, often abbreviated B/W or B&W, is a term referring to a number of monochrome forms in visual arts.Black-and-white as a description is also something of a misnomer, for in addition to black and white, most of these media included varying shades of gray...
programmes), and non-English language
English language
English is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and spread into what was to become south-east Scotland under the influence of the Anglian medieval kingdom of Northumbria...
productions such as film
Film
A film, also called a movie or motion picture, is a series of still or moving images. It is produced by recording photographic images with cameras, or by creating images using animation techniques or visual effects...
s from the Artificial Eye
Artificial eye
Artificial eye may refer to:* Visual prosthesis, functioning implant designed to restore sight* Ocular prosthesis, non-functioning cosmetic replacement for a lost eye...
catalogue, the French thriller Spiral
Spiral (TV series)
Engrenages is a French television police drama series created by the TV production company Son et Lumière. It is marketed in the English speaking world as Spiral. The first eight episodes series started on Canal+ in France on 13 December 2005...
and the Swedish detective series Wallander
Wallander (Swedish TV series)
Wallander is a Swedish television series adapted from Henning Mankell's Kurt Wallander novels and starring Krister Henriksson in the title role. The 1st series of 13 films were produced in 2005 and 2006, with one taken directly from a novel and the remainder with new storylines suggested by Mankell...
. BBC Four further supports foreign language films with its annual World Cinema Award
BBC Four World Cinema Awards
The BBC Four World Cinema Award is an annual prize given out to celebrate the best in world cinema. A shortlist of up to six films is made by the UK's leading critics, film-school heads and festival directors from the foreign language films released in that year in the UK...
which has been running since 2004.
On weekdays at 19.00, the channel shows a 30-minute global news programme called World News Today
World News Today
World News Today is a current affairs news programme produced by BBC News and presented by Zeinab Badawi. It was originally conceived as a morning television show aimed at American audiences, hosted by George Alagiah, but later expanded to six editions a day aimed at different markets...
, simulcast with and produced by BBC World News. It screens a number of documentaries such as The Century of the Self
The Century of the Self
The Century of the Self is an award winning British television documentary film. It focuses on how Sigmund Freud, Anna Freud, and Edward Bernays influenced the way corporations and governments have thought about, dealt with, and controlled people....
and The Trials of Henry Kissinger
The Trials of Henry Kissinger
The Trials of Henry Kissinger , is a documentary film inspired by Christopher Hitchens' 2001 book The Trial of Henry Kissinger, examining the alleged war crimes of Henry Kissinger, the National Security Advisor and later Secretary of State under Presidents Nixon and Ford.The film was directed by...
. The channel is also home to many political travel shows such as Holidays in the Axis of Evil
Holidays in the Axis of Evil
Holidays in the Axis of Evil is a television documentary series shown on BBC Four in the United Kingdom, first broadcast in January 2003. In the series, reporter Ben Anderson travelled to all of the countries in U.S. President George W. Bush's "Axis of evil": Cuba, Iran, Iraq, North Korea, Libya...
which features investigative journalism.
Drama
BBC television drama
BBC television dramas have been produced and broadcast since even before the public service company had an officially established television broadcasting network in the United Kingdom...
has given the channel some of its most popular programmes, with The Alan Clark Diaries
Alan Clark
Alan Kenneth Mackenzie Clark was a British Conservative MP and diarist. He served as a junior minister in Margaret Thatcher's governments at the Departments of Employment, Trade, and Defence, and became a privy counsellor in 1991...
(2003) and Kenneth Williams: Fantabulosa!
Kenneth Williams: Fantabulosa!
Kenneth Williams: Fantabulosa! is a 2006 BBC Four television play starring Michael Sheen as the English comic actor Kenneth Williams, based on Williams' own diaries...
(2006) being among the highest rated, with over 800,000 viewers. The 18 March 2008, broadcast of The Curse of Steptoe
The Curse of Steptoe
The Curse of Steptoe is a television play which was first broadcast on 19 March 2008 on BBC Four as part of a season of dramas about television personalities. It stars Jason Isaacs as Harry H. Corbett and Phil Davis as Wilfrid Brambell...
brought the channel its highest audience figures, estimated as 1.41 million viewers, a 7% share of multichannel audiences between 9pm and 10.05pm, based on overnight returns. The official audience figures for the broadcast, including time-shifting, were later published as 1,625,000. Another notable production was a live re-make of the 1953 science-fiction serial The Quatermass Experiment
The Quatermass Experiment
The Quatermass Experiment is a British science-fiction serial broadcast by BBC Television in the summer of 1953 and re-staged by BBC Four in 2005. Set in the near future against the background of a British space programme, it tells the story of the first manned flight into space, overseen by...
, adapted from the original scripts into a single, two-hour version (though on the night it in fact underran considerably, lasting less than 1 hour 40 minutes), broadcast on the evening of Saturday 2 April 2005. Discounting BBC Four's previous live relays of theatrical Shakespeare productions, this was the first live made-for-television drama to be broadcast by the BBC for twenty years.
Another notable programme broadcast on BBC Four is Charlie Brooker's Screenwipe
Charlie Brooker's Screenwipe
Charlie Brooker's Screenwipe is a British television review programme broadcast on BBC Four by Charlie Brooker. The programme contains reviews of current shows, as well as stories and commentary on how television is produced.-Format:...
which contains reviews of current shows, as well as stories and commentary on how television is produced. The show is presented by broadcaster Charlie Brooker
Charlie Brooker
Charlton "Charlie" Brooker is a British journalist, comic writer and broadcaster. His style of humour is savage and profane, with surreal elements and a consistent satirical pessimism...
.
Some output from BBC Four (documentaries rather than foreign films) was for a time repeated on BBC Two in a 'BBC Four on Two' branded area, although this was often in a late night broadcast slot after Newsnight
Newsnight
Newsnight is a BBC Television current affairs programme noted for its in-depth analysis and often robust cross-examination of senior politicians. Jeremy Paxman has been its main presenter for over two decades....
and has since been discontinued.
According to BARB
Barb
Barb may refer to:* A backward-facing point on a fish hook or similar implement, rendering extraction from the victim's flesh more difficult* Wind barbs for each station on a map of reported weather conditions...
the comedy panel game QI
QI
QI is a British comedy panel game television quiz show created and co-produced by John Lloyd, hosted by Stephen Fry, and featuring permanent panellist Alan Davies. Most of the questions are extremely obscure, making it unlikely that the correct answer will be given...
has the highest ratings of any show on BBC Four.
At the Edinburgh International Television Festival
Edinburgh International Television Festival
The Edinburgh International Television Festival, founded in 1976, is held annually over the British August bank holiday weekend at the Edinburgh International Conference Centre....
, BBC Four won the Non-Terrestrial Channel of the Year award in 2004 and 2006.
Original programming
- BBC Four Sessions
- Singer-Songwriters at the BBC
- If Walls Could TalkIf Walls Could Talk"If Walls Could Talk" is a song by Céline Dion, which was intended as the final single from her greatest hits album All the Way... A Decade of Song....
- Britain's Best DrivesBritain's Best DrivesBritain's Best Drives is a six-part 2009 British television series in which Richard Wilson travels across the UK in reviewing the best driving roads from a motoring guide of the 1950s. In each episode he drives a different car of the period. There was also a seventh episode where Wilson learns how...
- Only ConnectOnly ConnectOnly Connect is a quiz show programme first shown on BBC Four on 15 September 2008, presented by Victoria Coren. In the series, teams compete in a tournament of finding connections between seemingly unrelated clues. Radio Timess listings usually describe it as "a game of patience and lateral...
- Birds Britania
- Britain by Bike
- Churches: How To Read Them
- Shock and Awe: The Life of Electricity
- Elegance and Decadancy: The Age of the Regency
- The Story of the National Grid
- Walter's WarWalter TullWalter Daniel John Tull was an English professional footballer who played as an inside forward for Tottenham Hotspur and Northampton Town...
- To Kill a Mockingbird at 50
- HG Wells: War with the World
- The Sky At NightThe Sky at NightThe Sky at Night is a monthly documentary television programme on astronomy produced by the BBC. The show has had the same permanent presenter, Sir Patrick Moore, from its first airing on 24 April 1957, making it the longest-running programme with the same presenter in television history.The...
(originally on BBC One) - World News TodayWorld News TodayWorld News Today is a current affairs news programme produced by BBC News and presented by Zeinab Badawi. It was originally conceived as a morning television show aimed at American audiences, hosted by George Alagiah, but later expanded to six editions a day aimed at different markets...
(simulcast on BBC Four and BBC World News) - The Secret Life of Ice
- Hattie (television film)Hattie (television film)Hattie is a television film on the life of the British comic actress Hattie Jacques, played by Ruth Jones, her marriage to John Le Mesurier and her affair with their lodger John Schofield...
- The Curse of SteptoeThe Curse of SteptoeThe Curse of Steptoe is a television play which was first broadcast on 19 March 2008 on BBC Four as part of a season of dramas about television personalities. It stars Jason Isaacs as Harry H. Corbett and Phil Davis as Wilfrid Brambell...
- How to Build a Dinosaur
- Frankenstein: Birth of a Monster
- The Great War
- SandhurstSandhurstSandhurst is a small town and civil parish in England of 7,966 homes and 20,803 inhabitants , primarily domiciliary in nature with a few light industries...
Imports
- Wallander
- SpiralSpiralIn mathematics, a spiral is a curve which emanates from a central point, getting progressively farther away as it revolves around the point.-Spiral or helix:...
- Mad MenMad MenMad Men is an American dramatic television series created and produced by Matthew Weiner. The series premiered on Sunday evenings on the American cable network AMC and are produced by Lionsgate Television. It premiered on July 19, 2007, and completed its fourth season on October 17, 2010. Each...
- The SlapThe SlapThe Slap is a novel by Australian author Christos Tsiolkas. The eight-part television series, The Slap, is an adaptation of the book. Its filming commenced in January 2011 and first screened on Australian television channel ABC1 from October 2011....
- The KillingThe KillingThe Killing is a 1956 film noir produced by James B. Harris and directed by Stanley Kubrick. It was written by Kubrick and Jim Thompson and based on the novel Clean Break by Lionel White...
- Il DivoIl DivoIl Divo is a multinational operatic pop vocal group created by music manager, executive, and reality TV star Simon Cowell. Formed in the United Kingdom, they are also signed to Cowell's record label, Syco Music...
- Inspector MontalbanoInspector MontalbanoInspector Salvo Montalbano is a fictional character created by Italian writer Andrea Camilleri in a series of novels and short stories.Set in the picturesque Sicilian town of Vigàta , the fractious detective's character and manner encapsulate much of Sicilian mythology and astute detective work...
Domestic repeats
- Life
- Planet EarthPlanet Earth (TV series)Planet Earth is a 2006 television series produced by the BBC Natural History Unit. Five years in the making, it was the most expensive nature documentary series ever commissioned by the BBC, and also the first to be filmed in high definition...
- The Blue PlanetThe Blue PlanetThe Blue Planet is a BBC nature documentary series narrated by David Attenborough, first transmitted in the UK from 12 September 2001.Described as "the first ever comprehensive series on the natural history of the world's oceans", each of the eight 50-minute episodes examines a different aspect of...
- Yes MinisterYes MinisterYes Minister is a satirical British sitcom written by Antony Jay and Jonathan Lynn that was first transmitted by BBC Television between 1980–1982 and 1984, split over three seven-episode series. The sequel, Yes, Prime Minister, ran from 1986 to 1988. In total there were 38 episodes—of which all but...
- All Creatures Great and Small
- Juliet BravoJuliet BravoJuliet Bravo is a British television series, which ran on BBC1 between 1980 and 1985. The theme of the series concerned a female police inspector who took over control of a police station in the fictional town of Hartley in Lancashire.-Programme name:...
- Last Of The Summer WineLast of the Summer WineLast of the Summer Wine is a British sitcom written by Roy Clarke that was broadcast on BBC One. Last of the Summer Wine premiered as an episode of Comedy Playhouse on 4 January 1973 and the first series of episodes followed on 12 November 1973. From 1983 to 2010, Alan J. W. Bell produced and...
- SykesSykesSykes is a British sitcom that aired on BBC1 from 1972 to 1979. Starring Eric Sykes and Hattie Jacques, it was written by Eric Sykes, who had previously starred with Jacques in Sykes and A... and Sykes and a Big, Big Show ....
- ButterfliesButterflies (TV series)Butterflies is a British sitcom written by Carla Lane broadcast on BBC2 from 1978–83.The situation is the day-to-day life of the Parkinson family in a bittersweet style. There are both traditional comedy sources and more unusual sources such as Ria's unconsummated relationship with the...
- Top of the PopsTop of the PopsTop of the Pops, also known as TOTP, is a British music chart television programme, made by the BBC and originally broadcast weekly from 1 January 1964 to 30 July 2006. After 25 December 2006 it became a radio program, now hosted by Tony Blackburn...
- Monty Python's Flying CircusMonty Python's Flying CircusMonty Python’s Flying Circus is a BBC TV sketch comedy series. The shows were composed of surreality, risqué or innuendo-laden humour, sight gags and observational sketches without punchlines...
- The Magic RoundaboutThe Magic RoundaboutThe Magic Roundabout was a children's television programme created in France in 1963 by Serge Danot...
- BatmanBatmanBatman is a fictional character created by the artist Bob Kane and writer Bill Finger. A comic book superhero, Batman first appeared in Detective Comics #27 , and since then has appeared primarily in publications by DC Comics...
- Fawlty TowersFawlty TowersFawlty Towers is a British sitcom produced by BBC Television and first broadcast on BBC2 in 1975. Twelve television program episodes were produced . The show was written by John Cleese and his then wife Connie Booth, both of whom played major characters...
- The Bear Family and Me
- The Life of MammalsThe Life of MammalsThe Life of Mammals is a nature documentary series written and presented by David Attenborough, first transmitted in the UK from 20 November 2002....
- The Onedin LineThe Onedin LineThe Onedin Line is a BBC television drama series which ran from 1971 to 1980. The series was created by Cyril Abraham.The series is set in Liverpool from 1860 to 1886 and deals with the rise of a shipping line, the Onedin Line, named after its owner James Onedin...
- Tales of Beatrix Potter
- Walking with DinosaursWalking with DinosaursWalking with Dinosaurs is a six-part documentary television miniseries that was produced by BBC, narrated by Kenneth Branagh, and first aired in the United Kingdom, in 1999. The series was subsequently aired in North America on the Discovery Channel in 2000, with Branagh's voice replaced with that...
- Walking with BeastsWalking with BeastsWalking with Beasts is a 2001 six-part television documentary miniseries, produced by the BBC in the United Kingdom, narrated by Kenneth Branagh. In North America it has been retitled Walking with Prehistoric Beasts, and the original Discovery Channel broadcast was narrated by Stockard Channing...
- Casualty 1906
- Casualty 1907
- CranfordCranfordCranford may refer to:*Cranford - a novel by Elizabeth Gaskell*Cranford - a BBC television adaptation of Cranford and other works by Elizabeth GaskellCranford may also refer to the following places:...
Films
- South PacificSouth Pacific (film)South Pacific is a 1958 musical romance film adaptation of the Rodgers and Hammerstein musical South Pacific, and based on James A. Michener's Tales of the South Pacific...
- When Dinosaurs Ruled the EarthWhen Dinosaurs Ruled the EarthWhen Dinosaurs Ruled the Earth is a 1970 movie starring Victoria Vetri, set in the time of cavemen. The film was made by Britain's Hammer Films....
- To Kill a MockingbirdTo Kill a MockingbirdTo Kill a Mockingbird is a novel by Harper Lee published in 1960. It was instantly successful, winning the Pulitzer Prize, and has become a classic of modern American literature...
- Monty Python's Life of BrianMonty Python's Life of BrianMonty Python's Life of Brian, also known as Life of Brian, is a 1979 British comedy film written, directed and largely performed by the Monty Python comedy team...
- The Thirty-Nine StepsThe Thirty-nine StepsThe Thirty-Nine Steps is an adventure novel by the Scottish author John Buchan. It first appeared as a serial in Blackwood's Magazine in August and September 1915 before being published in book form in October that year by William Blackwood and Sons, Edinburgh...
- The Lady VanishesThe Lady VanishesThe Lady Vanishes is:*The Lady Vanishes , 1938 film*The Lady Vanishes , a 1979 remake of the original...
Presentation
The channel's initial series of identsStation identification
Station identification is the practice of radio or television stations or networks identifying themselves on air, typically by means of a call sign or brand name...
were generated dynamically reflecting the frequencies of the continuity announcers' voice or of backing music and were designed by Lambie-Nairn
Lambie-Nairn
Lambie-Nairn is an international branding agency within the WPP Group, headquartered in London with offices in Munich, Madrid, Abu Dhabi and Prague...
. As a result, no two idents were ever the same. The first continuity announcer was Zeb Soanes.
When the channel first started airing, it used the slogan "Everyone Needs A Place To Think", but the BBC stopped using this several months after the launch. However the BBC Four logo and above slogan can be found, engraved on benches along the South Bank
South Bank
South Bank is an area of London, England located immediately adjacent to the south side of the River Thames. It forms a long and narrow section of riverside development that is within the London Borough of Lambeth to the border with the London Borough of Southwark and was formerly simply known as...
in London, between the London Eye and Waterloo Bridge
Waterloo Bridge
Waterloo Bridge is a road and foot traffic bridge crossing the River Thames in London, England between Blackfriars Bridge and Hungerford Bridge. The name of the bridge is in memory of the British victory at the Battle of Waterloo in 1815...
.
In September 2005, the channel began showing new idents comprising a central BBC Four logo surrounded by four quadrants which show different stages of the same footage thus making for a sort of optical illusion; for example, a swimming pool where a person on an inflatable ring appears in the bottom-left corner, though ripples don't enter the remaining quarters. Although the image appears as one at the start of the ident by the end it is clearly four separate images.
See also
- List of documentary channels
- BBC Four World Cinema AwardBBC Four World Cinema AwardsThe BBC Four World Cinema Award is an annual prize given out to celebrate the best in world cinema. A shortlist of up to six films is made by the UK's leading critics, film-school heads and festival directors from the foreign language films released in that year in the UK...