BBC Content Boss on Tim Davie, Traitors and Strictly's Future

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Speaker 2 Hello, and welcome to this episode of the Resters Entertainment Questions and Answers Edition. I'm Marina Hyde.

Speaker 1 And I'm Richard Osman. Hello, Marina.

Speaker 2 Hello, Richard. Now, we've got a very special guest today.

Speaker 1 We have. It's not just the two of us in the studio, is it?

Speaker 2 No, it is not. We have with us the BBC's Chief Content Officer, Kate Phillips.
Hello, Kate. Hello.

Speaker 5 Hi, everyone. Really, really pleased to be here.

Speaker 2 Oh, my goodness, thank you so much for coming.

Speaker 1 Now, Kate is probably responsible for more of what people watch day to day than anybody else in Britain, I would say.

Speaker 2 With that, and listen to, and everything to all of the BBC services.

Speaker 1 And so when we asked for questions, we had, I'm going to say, a deluge of questions. Yes.
And some good ones as well.

Speaker 1 Kate, did you miss?

Speaker 1 Should we just kick off? And listen, I apologise for some of the swearing that our listeners do. No, everyone's been so lovely.

Speaker 1 We're going to start with something topical because you agreed to do this before.

Speaker 1 There's been some shenanigans at the BBC recently. I don't know if you know that.
I don't know if you know you're being sued for $1 billion.

Speaker 1 Shannon Hughes says, what is the atmosphere like at the BBC now with Tim Davey resigning? What's his time up after so much scrutiny and press coverage?

Speaker 5 It's definitely been a tough few days for the BBC. That's undeniable.

Speaker 1 I think we could literally have said that at any point in the last time.

Speaker 5 That's true, yes. But I think, particularly recently, we were all very shocked when Tim and Deborah Turnis, our head of news, resigned.
Because for me personally,

Speaker 5 I am huge admirers of them. They have been incredible colleagues, great friends.

Speaker 5 And I know no one who has worked harder or cared more about the BBC and making sure that it's of value to everyone in the UK. That is at their core.
And it was a real shock when they resigned.

Speaker 5 And in typical Tim Manner, he wrung me

Speaker 5 and told me personally, and it was a bolt from the blue. And I just think he is an amazing leader and he will be very hard to replace.

Speaker 5 And I think everyone at the BBC is feeling great sadness that they've gone because we're very proud of everything we do there. And two of our most talented and brilliant leaders are stepping down.

Speaker 2 You know, as we know, it is the most trusted news organization in the whole world. So, imagine how bad last week must have been for the second most trusted news organization in the whole world.

Speaker 2 Except, no, because we're the only country who tears our things apart like this, is what I would like to think.

Speaker 5 But and

Speaker 1 is it tricky working at the BBC? And we all know that the public service is wonderful, but there is this sense, and I felt that with Tim, that you're constantly under scrutiny.

Speaker 1 And it feels to me like maybe that was the thing that pushed him over the edge. He just thought that there's other jobs that I could be doing.

Speaker 1 And I have spoken to him about the BBC, and I genuinely believe how much he loved it and how much he did for it. Do you think maybe it was just one thing too many?

Speaker 5 I think we are under a lot of scrutiny at the BBC, I think more than any other broadcaster, but rightly so. We're funded by the public and I always say we are utterly accountable.

Speaker 5 And when we get something wrong editorially or something comes into question, it should be questioned and looked at. I think Lisa Nandy spoke about warning against sustained attacks on the BBC.

Speaker 5 So for me, yes, we should be scrutinised. Yes, we're accountable and we should be upheld when we don't get it right.
But in the spirit of making the best broadcaster in the world even better.

Speaker 5 It's as simple as that. And that's what we should strive for.

Speaker 2 I've just got a little thing before we go on to our next video question because it's made me think of that. Do you, I mean, you would drive yourself mad doing this.
Do you ever try and think,

Speaker 2 what culture will next blow across my door? So do you look at what you're about to put out and think, I wonder if it will be this that blows up?

Speaker 2 Or is it always just something you totally didn't predict? And then it just becomes the biggest dominant news story?

Speaker 5 Yeah, it's a really good question. I think it's a bit of both.
I mean, we are very proud of our content and I don't think we want to sanitize it for fear of people not liking it.

Speaker 5 There's this great line that indifference is the enemy, not contempt.

Speaker 5 And I think that is a good line because I think we stand by our content and the BBC mantra of inform, educate and entertain is in everything we do.

Speaker 5 But yes, sometimes you can be a bit blindsided by something and think, oh, right, okay. But you know, you just, you're prepared for anything at the BBC.

Speaker 5 And you're right, Marina, I can wake up in the morning and by the time I go home at night, it's a very different day to the one I thought I was going to have.

Speaker 1 Enough about politics. Let's talk about entertainment.
I felt for you when

Speaker 1 all the BBC stuff happened because you just had celebrity traitors, which you were one of the first big advocates of. Such a huge, massive success.

Speaker 1 And you had like about maybe two days to enjoy that before this all happened. So let's start talking about formats and shows like that.
Mike from Leeds has a question. Thank you, Mike.

Speaker 1 Hello, Richard, Marina, and Kate.

Speaker 5 So that's nice.

Speaker 5 Hello, Mike.

Speaker 1 Inclusivity.

Speaker 1 He says the BBC has had great success recently with big entertainment formats like The Traitors and Race Across the World and their celebrity versions.

Speaker 1 How are these large show scales developed or sought out by the BBC? What is the process for spotting or nurturing a potential hit format? Essentially, what is your job in some ways?

Speaker 5 So I think one of the great things about working for a public broadcaster funded by the public is that is literally our jobs as commissioners to give the audience the best shows.

Speaker 5 We're not a commercial organisation. We don't have to worry about advertising funding.
It is about what do the audience want to watch.

Speaker 5 If you want to know how The Traitors came about, it is quite interesting. So

Speaker 5 we've had the pandemic and I was very conscious of a really tough time that millions had been through.

Speaker 5 So we wanted programmes that brought audiences together, something that collectively would be popular. I've talked before about the three Gs and by that I mean three generations.

Speaker 5 What is a programme that kids, parents and grandparents would watch together? So The Traitors was developed by two very talented brains in Holland originally. It had been on in Holland.

Speaker 5 It hadn't knocked it out the park. I think it had done okay.
I mean, Richard, you know all this. I know that your knowledge is extraordinary on The Traitors.

Speaker 5 But someone on my team, Saida, she was talking to a friend at NBC, Ed, and they thought, is there a show we can do together? Because they're expensive, these shows.

Speaker 5 So is there a show we could co-fund with another broadcaster?

Speaker 1 And that's happening much more often now.

Speaker 5 That happens much much more often now, yeah. So then they would have it exclusively in America.

Speaker 5 We'd have it exclusively in the UK, but the creators would hold on to the format rights, which is important for us at the BBC, that people own their IP.

Speaker 5 And Ed talked to Saeeda about this show in Holland called The Traitors. So Saeeda came to me to talk to me about it.

Speaker 5 And I remember when it was first pitched, the instinct I had was, I'm sorry, we know who the traitors are. Wouldn't you want to play along?

Speaker 5 You know, you're in so you want the audience to play and gloss and they said no no no it's more fun when you know of course you're right because you see the duplicitous behavior so we thought uh we thought it was uh sounded exciting then

Speaker 5 they were looking at filming it in costa rica

Speaker 5 that is true

Speaker 5 um they were like they were looking at costa rica as a location and

Speaker 2 so

Speaker 5 much worse i think i don't think claudia would have liked wearing outfits at costa ricochet

Speaker 5 so i then went to the then chief content officer Charlotte Moore, who was a brilliant chief content officer, and I said to her, I literally said this, I said, I've got this show, Charlotte.

Speaker 5 It's a bit of a punt. I'm not quite, and everything is a punt.
You know that, Richard.

Speaker 5 You can do all the audience research you like, but ultimately you're holding hands with the indie and jumping in and hoping it works. It's a bit of a punt, but there's something different about it.

Speaker 5 And what I liked about it was its distinctiveness. I'd never seen it before as a television show.
Yes, there were sort of parlor games that were played like this.

Speaker 5 And Charlotte, God love her, literally literally took me on that. And then at the BBC, we

Speaker 5 like to

Speaker 5 spend money in the UK and we like to do portrayal across the UK.

Speaker 5 So Charlotte came back to me and said, Well, the good news is I think I found you the extra money because I was head of entertainment then and I'd sort of spent all my money.

Speaker 5 So I was going to Charlotte, you're always pitching up, asking for more money. And Charlotte said, Well, a good news, I think, with the entertainment, but we would like you to make it in the UK.

Speaker 5 So then I had to call

Speaker 5 Studio Lambert and NBC.

Speaker 1 So Studio Lambert are the production company. And how does that work? So if I was an ordinary, just normal person on the street and had seen that Dutch show,

Speaker 1 I'm not going to be the one that's making it. So did you talk to Studio Lambert? Did they come to you? You'd worked with them before on lots of things, presumably.

Speaker 5 Yeah, they make Race Across the World for us, of course, which they do brilliantly. But yes, so they had the rights to make it in America and the UK.
So they had

Speaker 5 a rebrand.

Speaker 5 They taken the rights to make it.

Speaker 5 And that is a really good point, actually, because often when you do television programmes, it's, is it a great format, but it is a lot about execution and having a team that know how to make that.

Speaker 5 And one of the reasons Traitors is so great is because it's got incredible people working on it. But yeah, so I then had to ring Studio Lambert and NBC and say, how do you fancy a Scottish castle?

Speaker 5 And they, of course, I think the Americans love a bit of that. And it's really interesting with the show because...
a lot of stars have to align. So that worked well.

Speaker 5 Then we were looking at hosts and Alan coming had been signed to do the American one. So I thought, well, Alan's known here and, you know, he's a popular Scottish actor.

Speaker 5 So we did actually, full disclosure, ask Alan if he would do it.

Speaker 5 But he couldn't do it with our dates because America were filming first and then we were going and he had another job. So he couldn't do it.
So then we were thinking who else?

Speaker 5 And Studio Lambert had got a good list of names. And I just thought Claudia, because I'd worked with her on Strictly.

Speaker 5 And the thing about Claudia on Strictly is she's brilliant on that show, but she's brilliant because she's interested in people more than the dancing she's about the people and the contestants and what's happening so I run Claudia and I run her up and I said and um she she's she's a good friend and you know and she's always open to sort of new challenges so I said Claudia I've got the show Before you say anything, it's the two things you hate.

Speaker 5 You've got to leave your home and it's in the countryside. And she was like, oh, no, no, no, no.
You know how I feel about that.

Speaker 5 I said, look, I'm going to ask the production team to send you a copy of the Dutch version. See what you think.
She watched that and she was in straight away.

Speaker 5 But did I know that her clothes were going to become such a big thing or it would get so sort of...

Speaker 5 camp and gothic or that it was scheduled so well as well. I think scheduling, you know, big credit to them, to

Speaker 5 Lindsay Curry and his team, because they, when we put the first step out, they then said we'd like to drop the second one straight away. And that was like, what?

Speaker 5 Because I'm of the old school sort of apprentice once a week, but they said, no, no, we're just tuning on this. Yes, we need to parcel

Speaker 5 people in, and then we're going to strip it and do these three apps a week. And that made me really nervous, but it was absolutely the right call.

Speaker 5 And I think so, everything marketing did a great campaign press. So everything comes together.

Speaker 1 You watch it. You've got all the tape.
So you know what the show is. You've known it from start to finish.

Speaker 1 So you must have had, firstly, what was your confidence about the show that you've been delivered? And secondly, at what point did you think all the audience has started to work this out as well?

Speaker 5 So, that again, good question, because often you watch a show, and we've all been involved in shows that actually have been really good, but they haven't found an audience.

Speaker 5 So, I watch when you watch a show, you watch it on your laptop in the office. And of course, that's a very different experience to watching it at home with a friend.

Speaker 5 So, I watched the first two eps and thought, oh no, this is good.

Speaker 5 You know, you literally, when you watch the first episode of something, your heart is in your mouth going, please be good, please be good. It's good.
So, I'm like, wow, this is something special.

Speaker 5 I do remember another story for you: Stephen Lambert ringing me up after I watched.

Speaker 1 Oh, he's the guy who runs Three Pepsi.

Speaker 5 He's well Stuff

Speaker 5 after I watched three Eps and said,

Speaker 5 the castle that we filmed at, if you want it for series two, we need to put a deposit down now because it's a wedding venue. What a play.
Now, where's that play? What's that play?

Speaker 5 But he did say you need to put a significant amount of money down now to secure it. And NBC, I've spoken to them and they will.
And

Speaker 5 so, of course, I wrung NBC and NBC said, no, no, they said you were putting the money down. That's fine, but that's absolutely.

Speaker 2 I thought you were American.

Speaker 2 It's incumbent upon you.

Speaker 5 Yes, and I would do the same if I was Stephen. But I remember normally you wait for a show to transmit or you at least do some audience testing on it before you commission a second series.

Speaker 5 And I remember sitting there thinking, what do I do? It's good, but I've had other good shows out for an audience. And then I just rung them back and said, yeah, put the money down.

Speaker 5 And I didn't tell any of my wife.

Speaker 2 Just

Speaker 2 a little bit.

Speaker 5 Is there a point now at which you just buy the castle? They always say that about, I think, the apprentice back in the day. They should have bought a luxury house back in the day, 20 years ago.

Speaker 1 That's like with Avalon, just buy the Taskmaster house.

Speaker 5 It's really small. I know, but it's not even as expensive.
But yeah, but

Speaker 5 I knew it was good. But I think when it first transmitted the very first series, it didn't get huge numbers overnight.

Speaker 5 It built. It really built.

Speaker 2 With anything new like that, it's really,

Speaker 2 it just built. And then by the end, you had to watch it on the night.

Speaker 5 And word of mouth is key, I think. I think often, particularly, well, actually, all audiences, sometimes they don't want to be told that they're going to trust a friend more than they are us.

Speaker 5 So, that word of mouth build is really key.

Speaker 2 But it's easier to catch up on as well when there aren't millions of episodes a week. When there were three, people felt like, okay, I can join the bad one again.

Speaker 5 Yeah. And then

Speaker 1 celebrity traitors. So, you know, lots of people go, oh, my God, they're doing a celebrity version of this thing.

Speaker 1 How did that come about? Were you certain about doing that? And at what point did you, you must have seen that and you must have gone, oh, okay, I think this was the right thing to do.

Speaker 5 Yeah, well, I mean, it's interesting that Claudia wasn't keen, so she didn't, she didn't want to do a celebrity. She wanted to arrest the format civilian, yes, but she's very protective of it.

Speaker 5 And Claudia is all in. If you, yeah, if you go

Speaker 5 in the dressing room that Claudia has in the Traitor's Castle, she has feed, she has screens, she's watching it all the time. She is in Claudia.
I've never seen that presenter so invested in the show.

Speaker 5 So she was very protective. She was reluctant.

Speaker 5 I think the good thing we did was because we had civilian versions first, I think when we started booking the celebrity one, they just wanted to play the game.

Speaker 5 If you'd had a celebrity version first, you wouldn't have got the names you did. So the, I mean, yes, the names were fantastic.
And it was the mix of names as well.

Speaker 5 And who knew that Joe Marla was going to be such a star and actually cleverer than any of them at seeing who the traitors were. But I suppose the thing I always remember is Alan Carr.

Speaker 5 So Alan Carr said no

Speaker 5 because he doesn't really do reality shows. When he was offered it first.
When he was offered it, so no. Yeah, so they came back to me and said, Alan's a no.

Speaker 5 So I thought, okay,

Speaker 5 what do I do to change this? Because I knew Alan would be good. So he was filming in

Speaker 5 Bromley and I live in southeast London. This is true.
It's about this time last year. So, and I know his agent, Danny, very well, who did think he should do it.

Speaker 5 So I said to Danny, let's take Alan out for lunch. Let's do a pincer movement and get him to sign up.

Speaker 5 So I remember walking into the restaurant and just went, I know why you've asked me for lunch, Kate, and I'm not doing it. And I sort of said to Alan, okay, this is why you should do it, Alan.

Speaker 5 And I just talked to him about what a great show it was, how he'd be looked after. Stephen Fry was actually the first person to sign up for it.

Speaker 2 I was going to say, is it a bit like casting a movie? If you can say, Scott Hanson's doing it,

Speaker 5 Stephen was great. Stephen signed up for it because he wanted to play the game and he did say, look, use me to get others.
So that helped.

Speaker 5 But I said, and then what Alan said to me said, then we sort of talked him around and he was coming around to the idea i said you'll have fun it's amazing you know it's a proper game it's i think you'd be really good and and um i think you'll really like the other we couldn't really say who else was signed up at that point because there were some names anyway because i knew he was disclosing access yes so yes alan was a yes and we had to be quiet before he became tony montana

Speaker 2 was quite loquacious but he obviously developed his ability

Speaker 5 but the thing he said to me he said all right kate I think maybe I will do it on one condition. I said, what's that, Alan? He said, you've got to promise me I won't won't be a traitor.

Speaker 5 And I was like, well, first of all, I can't promise that because it's the format and I've got no control. And

Speaker 5 then I said, and honestly, Alan, I think if you, and he said, I can't, I'm sweating thinking about it. I can't lie, Kate.
I can't lie. And who knew he was going to be less traitorable?

Speaker 5 And you know, Claudia's very much part of picking those traitors as well. It's the other thing I'd say, those interviews that Claudia does are very key in the civilian version.

Speaker 5 I'm a celebrity version. And they normally have one, possibly two people in mind for the traitors.

Speaker 5 But I think on one series, it was only about an hour before that round table that the team with Claudia had said, okay, these are the three we're going to go for.

Speaker 5 I think because those interviews with Claudia do actually, and actually, if someone really doesn't want to be a traitor, we wouldn't make them. We do look after people on it.

Speaker 5 We don't want them to have an awful experience. But I think by the time Alan got to Castle, he changed his mind.

Speaker 1 Yes, of course he did. Because, again, we talked about what a great booking is.
He understood what the show is. He understands the role of the role that he can play.

Speaker 2 I saw an amazing graph at the weekend. I thought was so fascinating.
The graph of Google searches about neuroblastoma was completely flat, and then suddenly there's this insane spike.

Speaker 5 I think it was like half a million more searches after Traces, which is brilliant. And I just recognize that I told Alan that because we got that from audience research, and I said,

Speaker 5 But it's just been a real joy to see it take and see it become. I think it's still

Speaker 5 you.

Speaker 5 You've talked before about linear television and the challenges of that but you can still get big numbers I mean strictly this Saturday and Sunday you know was was the biggest show watched over both nights and it's still getting really good numbers so that is brilliant to see and and uh but when I commission for linear now or my teams do I should say because you've got amazing commissioning teams who are experts in all of this but we very much commission for linear television as a shot window for iPlayer so iPlayer is where we're really seeing the growth so it's very much Commissioner Chauvin.

Speaker 5 It used to be Commissioner Chauvelinia, iPlayer's the catch-up. It's now Commissioner Chauvelinia and shine a spotlight on iPlayer.
So, episode one of Traitor Celebrity is now up to 15 million.

Speaker 5 Six million of that was from the overnight, nine million was from iPlayer.

Speaker 1 That's I think one thing that people haven't quite caught up on, that that's the fact with all channels now. It's just one of those things that has just happened.

Speaker 1 The audience just watches things in very, very different ways.

Speaker 2 And you see the misreporting of it all the time, which is like it's down, it's down, and you think, no, no, no, on catch up, if anything, it's yeah, and it's because people still are quite hung up on overnights.

Speaker 5 But for us, we wouldn't recommission a show until we looked at the 28-day picture.

Speaker 5 And iPlayer Dan McGulp and his teams who run that, I think, do a brilliant job of sort of keeping pushing things on iPlayer and pushing people to them.

Speaker 5 And

Speaker 5 with a young audience as well, I think 80% of all comedy and drama viewing is now an iPlayer for that age group. So you're seeing those trends definitely.

Speaker 1 Can I ask you a question about Traitors from Rainer, which I thought was an interesting one because I think people sometimes don't get this.

Speaker 1 Firstly, Raina says, congratulations, what a triumph Celebrity Traitors was.

Speaker 1 Big fan of Traitors and the celebrity version was a tweet. She says, how does the BBC make money from productions like this without commercial advertising?

Speaker 1 I wonder how you make that much deserved return on investment in these situations.

Speaker 5 Well, for the BBC,

Speaker 5 we don't, really.

Speaker 5 Our return on investment is seeing the audience are getting value from their licence fee and they're loving the show.

Speaker 5 The independent production company and the format holders are the ones that make the money from it, but not the BBC actually. Unless it's the BBC-owned format.

Speaker 5 If it's a show from BBC Studios like Strip Be Come Dancing, which

Speaker 5 has sold all over the world in like 60 different countries, yes, the BBC gets money from that. The same with shows like Top Gear.

Speaker 1 And that money goes straight back into...

Speaker 5 other programmes. Yeah, so it absolutely comes back into the BBC to support the BBC and means we can spend money on more programmes.
Absolutely. So speaking of Top Gear, will you bring it back?

Speaker 2 That's what Giles asked.

Speaker 5 Okay, that's it. We are, I mean, Top Gear, we still see it does huge numbers and iPlayer with the shows and everything.
So, yeah, never say never.

Speaker 5 It's not due back in the immediate future, but it is a really important show for us.

Speaker 1 So many people have asked a question, which I'm not going to ask you, which is who's going to be the next host of Strictly.

Speaker 1 But so, what I will ask you instead, in the spirit of that, when a job like that comes up,

Speaker 1 when an opportunity comes up,

Speaker 1 what happens? What's the process? Who is emailing you? What's happening inside the BBC? When you've got a slot to fill or two slots to fill there, what's the process by which those slots are filled?

Speaker 2 I want to believe there's a situation room like the one where they all went in when they killed Osama bin Laden and they're all watching like that.

Speaker 2 Is there a BBC situation room where you would handle this?

Speaker 5 Well, you'd handle that when it came? Not really. I mean, we that was, I mean, that was very much Tess and Claudia's decision.
And they did ring me to sort of tell me what they were thinking.

Speaker 5 But I think they were worried it was going to leak so which we often have so they wanted to very much announce it on their own terms but

Speaker 5 you know they are brilliant brilliant hosts of that show and they have sparkly high heels that are going to be hard to fill definitely but in terms of the process next well the production team BBC Studios and Sarah James and her team and Susie Lamb and all these great people who make it they are now concentrating on getting two shows out a week.

Speaker 5 So we haven't got time at the moment to start doing any screen test or chemistry testing. So we've got time.

Speaker 5 So we I don't think we'll really be looking at it until the new year because we want to make sure that we deliver a great Strictly series.

Speaker 5 Having said that, yes, my inbox has been inundated.

Speaker 5 So, I mean, I can't say names, obviously, yes, but

Speaker 5 it is one of the best gigs in television. So we have had

Speaker 5 two of the best gigs. Two best gigs, exactly.
We've had so many people who are keen to be considered, which is great and we'll think carefully about next steps on it. But yes, there's

Speaker 5 no sort of room where we all go.

Speaker 2 They literally told me and then it's probably a panic room at the BBC. It's after the room in the circumstances

Speaker 5 of any organization that should have a panic room.

Speaker 5 But then it's about the press teams linking up with studios press team, with Claude and Tester's teams and making sure that we're all sort of aligned on how it's being announced and everything.

Speaker 1 But it's interesting. So with something like Strictly,

Speaker 1 the names who are going to do it will be big names. So the people, you know what it is that they can do Will you do what is that something where you would do chemistry tests with people?

Speaker 1 Is it something where you would do pilots or is it something where if everyone agrees everyone just goes we know that person X would be able to do this show We've lots of us have worked with her or him We know exactly what they can do or is it something that's such a big thing for the BBC you would have to sort of put people through their pace Yeah, is anyone Is anyone offer only on that?

Speaker 2 You know how they say in acting roles where it's just like no I'm not I'm not doing a test.

Speaker 5 I'm not doing a read with anyone either offer to me or don't offer to me I think because it's two roles and because Claudia and Tess have had such a strong relationship, I think it would be hard just to sort of hire someone cold without seeing how they are with the other person.

Speaker 5 So I think that is a really important part of it. I don't think it's necessary about having a really big name.

Speaker 5 I think with shows like Strictly, format is king, and it's no one is bigger than that show.

Speaker 5 And we, you know, when Bruce went, when Len went, we've had amazing people come through it, but it survives because it's such a good format.

Speaker 5 But yes, I think it's very important about the relationship between the future hosts. But

Speaker 5 I mean, we were talking strictly before we started today.

Speaker 5 And it's just, if anyone wants to, there's a quick plug, but on the results show, 17 minutes in, there was a collaboration between diversity.

Speaker 1 Oh my God, it was so sweet.

Speaker 5 It was one of the best things I have ever seen. We sat at the show, watching it.

Speaker 1 Not me and Marina.

Speaker 2 I mean, that show is such a thing of itself. Yeah.

Speaker 2 Where you think actually, in some ways, it's got what that's such a lesson in how to make amazing television out of essentially a one-fact thing, who's going to go and stay.

Speaker 2 And then it's just an amazing hour.

Speaker 5 It is. And it's, I mean, people talk about the teens and you see it backstage, but they're amazing, the costume, the hair and makeup.
Jason oversees the choreography.

Speaker 5 You know, we've got the BBC, sort of Counter and Joe that look after it. And Sarah and Susie, Nikki, this, Jack, there's so many amazing people who care so much about that show.

Speaker 5 And make, and every year it's like, how are we going to raise the bar? How are we going? And that's one of the challenges with shows.

Speaker 5 You know, this, it's not just about making sure new shows land and grow, but how do you keep the big brands at the top of their game? How do you keep those big shows fresh?

Speaker 5 You know, something like House of Games, I'm sure you must think about that. And how do you

Speaker 5 keep it fresh?

Speaker 1 Yeah, exactly that. And I absolutely won't put words in your mouth.
But I do think that Claudia and Tess understand that actually

Speaker 1 it's probably a good thing to have somebody new doing. They've done such an incredible job on that show, but actually, you want it to still be on

Speaker 5 15 years time.

Speaker 1 And, you know, it is sometimes it's useful and it's lovely when it comes from the people themselves when they've gone, do you know what? That's

Speaker 1 we've done our time. Well, I'm very excited to see who it's going to be.

Speaker 5 And again, so you and Marina aren't throwing your hat in the red. Oh my God, can you imagine?

Speaker 2 Can you imagine? That is an anxiety dream. Would you like to anchor that much?

Speaker 1 I must get more messages about who's going to be the next Strictly host than anything else. I do have an opinion.

Speaker 2 That's for sure.

Speaker 5 I fear that it could just be the traitors. This is not public service.

Speaker 2 I'm afraid we are now going to have to go. This is not the BBC.
We are now going to have to go for a break, Kate, if that's all right.

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Speaker 1 Welcome back everybody to this Q ⁇ A episode special one with Kate Phillips, Chief Content Officer of the BBC.

Speaker 1 Marina, we have lots of questions from our listeners. The next one.

Speaker 2 We've got so many about young audiences. Anyway, Tom Davis, this is is a good one how does the bbc plan to engage younger audiences who are increasingly turning away from traditional broadcast media

Speaker 5 very good question tom and it is something we look at a lot i think Again, when we have a big show like Traitors, we see the young come in.

Speaker 5 And I think what we learned, we did a social media strategy that very much targeted young and it triggered thousands of memes and it gave the audience a chance to be creative.

Speaker 5 So actually, you've got your main show as kind of your live sports event, if you like.

Speaker 5 But actually, we could see a whole separate show going on at the same time online. It's so funny.

Speaker 2 The memes were finally funny again because lots of that has sort of gone from social media and bled away now. Social media has become so awful, but they were so funny, the memes of about Traitors.

Speaker 5 Yeah, they're really good. And, you know, and a gift to the show, gift to uncloak.
So, actually,

Speaker 5 we love that, that they were all engaging so much. And I think

Speaker 5 Celebrity Traitors is now the biggest show of the year. And for young, it's the biggest show after adolescence, which is really great for us to see.
So I think it is about that.

Speaker 5 And we had a partnership with TikTok on it as well when TikTok was sort of pushing back to iPlayer.

Speaker 5 YouTube is a really important platform for us. We've been on YouTube for about 20 years, but I think we can see the growth of YouTube.

Speaker 5 And I think going forward, we will be putting more content on YouTube. And we'll announce more plans about that soon.

Speaker 5 But we see when I started, when I was running entertainment, traditionally it was the battle of the broadcasters, you know, the Saturday nights with ITV, Channel 4.

Speaker 5 Then the streamers came in, then you saw the competition from the streamers. I'd say now for young audiences, the biggest competition is YouTube.
But YouTube is a platform, they're not commissioners.

Speaker 5 So instead of looking at it as competition or rivals, we need to look at it as another platform where we can reach young audiences.

Speaker 2 That's what I was partly going to ask. You know, we talked about inform, educate, and entertain.

Speaker 2 Is there a a world in which you're looking beyond that sort of notion that public service broadcasting has to come in 30-minute or 60-minute chunks?

Speaker 2 And is there other ways that it can be delivered completely different, you know, maybe via not via other people making short-form content about your content, but actually directly doing that, different types of

Speaker 2 broadcasts, as it were, or

Speaker 5 absolutely. So we still have a linear schedule to fill, so we still have those kind of time slots.
But absolutely, that's what YouTube gives us more freedom to do that.

Speaker 5 And we did a very good vertical drama, these senders did. They did vertical drama Spiked, which did very well.
And

Speaker 5 we've seen the rise in these comedy.

Speaker 2 I really think comedy is really good for comedy. Definitely.

Speaker 5 So

Speaker 5 that will all be looked at going forward and how we do more content,

Speaker 5 different lengths, different forms.

Speaker 5 It's just about reaching the audience and however we can do it.

Speaker 1 And are the people who are pitching to you, have they picked up on that as well?

Speaker 1 Because you must have had many years, it's the same group of people pitching and pitching half-hour shows, hour-long shows.

Speaker 1 Are you now getting different companies coming in to see you, pitching different ideas in different forms?

Speaker 5 Yeah, absolutely. I mean, we commission from a lot, but the BBC commissions from more indies than anyone else in the UK.
We worked with over 300 indies last year.

Speaker 5 But actually, what we're seeing is a rise of, well, visual podcasts

Speaker 5 has been a big thing. And there's more companies sort of specializing in that and more digital companies and just content creators.

Speaker 5 We're doing a lot of schemes, working with content creators, giving them the opportunity to use our resources to sort of make their content. And I think that's really exciting.

Speaker 5 That we're, of course, there are brilliant indies that we work with and will continue to work with.

Speaker 5 But actually, the rise of new content creators and new companies, I think, is a real opportunity for us.

Speaker 2 I've always spoken before for the immediacy of that, where you can just get something going and do it quite quickly.

Speaker 2 And a lot of things that are on the BBC are beautiful and incredibly high production values and as you've always said the the long gap between I've had this idea and it is now on TV when any in ways in which you can contract that as people do on the short form video sites it must be quite interesting I think that's interesting because when I look at documentaries on YouTube and things and sometimes they're a bit rawr they're a bit scrappier but actually they're great content and maybe uh we get a bit too hung up on the dub and the grade and all this and And, you know, we don't want to drop our standards.

Speaker 5 But

Speaker 5 you're totally right, Marino. How can we get content out there faster and reach more people

Speaker 2 on the same place that they're watching you? And they don't have that same sort of like, oh, it must be these kind of early clip production venues.

Speaker 1 Formats, I think, still are slightly handcuffed to TV studios and shiny floors.

Speaker 5 They don't need to be. Yeah, it's interesting, isn't it?

Speaker 5 It's hard to get rid of that. Saturday night.
Because what's your feeling on? I'm always interested in what people feel about Saturday nights because I still see the big numbers.

Speaker 5 But, you know, I think a a few years ago, people would have thought, oh, well, is Saturday night still a big thing? But it feels to me that people still want those sort of big shows.

Speaker 1 Yeah, as soon as you, you know, 1% Club, The Wheel, things like this, you know, stuff is working there that on the night we'll get three and a half million and we'll kind of consolidate to higher than that.

Speaker 1 Obviously, other countries don't have Saturday night TV. It's meaningless to them.
But I think it's a shop window for that 3G.

Speaker 1 idea which is shows that you know the wheel and the one percent club which is itv are shows you can watch with your kids

Speaker 1 and your parents. And I just think it's a great lead-in, but as you say, it's a shop window these days for

Speaker 5 iPlayer.

Speaker 5 When I was running entertainment, we commissioned Gladiators.

Speaker 5 Yes, I will tell you. So something I used,

Speaker 5 I should still,

Speaker 5 and I do want to actually do this again. I was thinking of doing it actually.
Anyway, I used to go down to my local shopping centre with a clipboard at the weekends.

Speaker 5 And I'd just stop and and talk to people and ask them about what they were watching on television and I just say and it's

Speaker 5 really how many people talk because we have amazing audience research teams of course we do and they give us invaluable information but I just wanted to talk to people direct and I remember being in the shopping center and speaking to this woman this lovely woman and and I said what what isn't on television at the moment that you would like to see on TV and she said I just want something I can watch with my kids and she had little kids they were under the age of 10 and they're already on different devices.

Speaker 5 And she said, I remember when I was young sitting down watching stuff my parents and now it's really hard to get them to watch anything with me. And then a week later, the gladiators pitch came in.

Speaker 5 And I'm not saying I commissioned it because of that one woman, but it was very much in my mind. Actually, the generation that watched it as kids are now have kids of their own.

Speaker 5 So you've got that nostalgia, but it's that shared. that shared feeling.

Speaker 5 And I think, you know, it's so liberating when you're commissioning just to put the audience first and think, yeah, why don't we bring back gladiators and don't mess with it too much.

Speaker 5 You know, that's what you don't want to do. You don't want to, you know, you want the sort of the music and the sort of the,

Speaker 5 we have new names, but you know, things like fire and nitro and all this, you know, great. And also, there'd been the rise of the Marvel superheroes since the last gladiators.

Speaker 5 So I could see that kids love that and they love sort of giant and legend and the sort of

Speaker 1 giant is shorter than me. I just like that.
He's like,

Speaker 2 anyone in entertainment apart from you. They are shorter in real life.

Speaker 1 I call him giant brackets not so much.

Speaker 1 That's what I call him. It's also been amazing for booking for other shows because suddenly you've got like 12 new celebrities.

Speaker 5 I love the way your mind thinks. No, but it's true.

Speaker 5 And you've had Nitro on strictly Harry, I should say, is his real name, lovely Harry. But yeah, no, it is.
But that was always, yes, why don't we bring back gladiators? Because it will just be a joy.

Speaker 5 But even I was caught, you know, caught back by just how popular it was. And I thought, yeah, audiences still want this shared viewing.

Speaker 5 so yes I will be I will go with my clipboard again and talk to people that's what people sort of say isn't it why can't we just have 10 versions of things this year why can't we just have like have 10 celebrity traitors it's much harder to get those 3g features than you think it is you you how many do you turn down a year that you think oh god well it's diff i mean again it's it was it's more the commissioning because commissioning teams now who look and and a lot of things do go into development and we sort of try them and we we pilot as much as we can i mean what when you see something on screen, a lot of work has gone on for quite a while to sort of get there.

Speaker 5 Even if you're taking an international format, like the traitors, it's still how's it going to work for our audiences and how does it feel distinctive? And BBC is really important.

Speaker 5 It's never just a lift and shift of these things.

Speaker 1 But there must be thousands of things pitched to your team

Speaker 5 every year. Yes, lots of

Speaker 1 thousands. When people pitch TV shows to me, sometimes

Speaker 1 you do think

Speaker 1 it's a really, really, really,

Speaker 2 I mean, even back in the day when there was lots more telly yeah it was a crowded market but now it's it's uh yeah speaking of which kate stephanie moore says is there a show that kate was pitched that she passed on that she regrets missing out on is there one that got away that's probably about 20 gosh i mean there's they always look at shows i think um

Speaker 5 i was

Speaker 5 i was a big fan of the masked singer when it first came up because it felt distinctive and different but um often in these things you're in a kind of a bidding war with another broadcaster and ITV got that one.

Speaker 5 But I did love Mars Singer because, again, it just felt different and ridiculous and joyous. And actually, it came at a good time.
I think they filmed it. It was in the pandemic.

Speaker 5 It was the perfect show for the pandemic when you've got masks.

Speaker 5 Whereas we had the challenge of keeping strictly on during the pandemic, which I'm glad that we did. But so.

Speaker 1 And there comes a point, presumably, where you cannot outbid. an ITV or some of the commercial broadcasters unless you team up with an NBC.

Speaker 5 Yes, and I think, you know, and I think Bandicoot have done a brilliant job making it it for ITV. But yes, I did always love that show.

Speaker 5 The one I always look at with envy, of course, it was never bid to us, pitched to us, is Gogglebox. I was going to say that.
I am a massive Gogglebox fan because it's all those, and

Speaker 5 it's people across the UK. It's different ages, different backgrounds.
It's funny. It's so British.

Speaker 5 And

Speaker 5 when I was directly commissioning shows, when I was running Ent and then looking after Unscripted, I would always say when a pitch came in,

Speaker 5 are there gogglebox box moments? When you're looking at a show, what are the goggle box moments that will make people react strongly? They'll laugh, they'll gasp, they'll cry.

Speaker 5 Because if you haven't got those, we shouldn't be doing it. So, that's always a sign,

Speaker 5 where are my goggle box moments?

Speaker 1 Yeah, that's interesting that it's changed commissioning in a way. Because, yeah, you have to imagine any of those groups of people.
What are Jars and Mary going to say about this?

Speaker 5 Yes.

Speaker 1 If they knew the power they had, those powers, yeah, that's extraordinary, isn't it?

Speaker 5 I know, and it's it, it's just, it's just utterly joyful. And I, uh, when I, a previous job I had when I used to sell formats, so I would sell shows around the world.
And I remember Dr.

Speaker 5 Foster, do you remember Dr. Foster back in the day? So I went to Mumbai to sell that to an Indian broadcaster as a scripted format so that they would do their own version.

Speaker 5 And instead of playing a sizzle tape of all the best bits, I had taken the goggle box clip where everyone's watching the dinner party scene and they're all reacting.

Speaker 5 And then she whacks Jodi Combe around the head. And I just played that and I said, look, this is from another broadcaster.
This isn't a BBC show, but look at the public reaction to it.

Speaker 5 And I sold it in the room on that Goggle Box clip. So then I said to the lovely girls that are in charge of the Goggle Box format, just, you know, I am now using your show to sell my shows.

Speaker 1 That's like when you see a trader for a horror movie that's just the audience watching

Speaker 5 reactions. Well, I mean, so much of everything is reaction gifts now.
Isn't it just? You know, I'm a massive horror fan. Can I just say that? That's the one thing I love.

Speaker 5 Sorry, I'm spilling my coffee now.

Speaker 5 I love horror and I'm always always a big fan of horror does BBC ever do anything horror because it's such I know if I say this now I'll get loads of horror things I know and it's low and it's low budget and it's it's it's about being together it's about it's about such horror with proper jump scares I think is the hardest thing to do and I never think it gets enough recognition in sort of film awards and anything on a big and it makes more money than yeah for pound for spent than any other genre by a long way in Hollywood by a million by a million miles there will now be doctor who bulletin boards which are full of they're going to take doctor who in a horror direction no no they weren't.

Speaker 5 We loved it, but I did.

Speaker 5 I did used to love Hammer House of Horror when I was young, and I remember my mother frog-marching me back to Blockbusters because I took out a VHS of the Texas Chainsaw Massacre, and I was too young, and she made me go back, and she gave the guy a real earful for letting me take it out.

Speaker 5 So I am a big horror fan. But no,

Speaker 5 I'm not looking for a prime-time horror format.

Speaker 5 Although Traitors is a bit sort of

Speaker 5 can be horror.

Speaker 1 Well, you know, when people are sort of leaning into the Range Rovers in masks and dragging people out, you are afraid of that.

Speaker 5 I know, and the dolls. And I think when Nun Diane was buried by her own son, I remember editorial policy, who are brilliant at the BBC and really do keep us in check, but they did say,

Speaker 5 you know,

Speaker 5 are you sure about this? And I said, look, I think it is in keeping with the show.

Speaker 5 You're so right.

Speaker 2 That could have become one of these random culture war moments. Could it be? It just didn't.

Speaker 5 Yeah, it could have.

Speaker 2 And you never know. Yes.

Speaker 1 Can I ask you a question? Lots of people have asked questions in this area, but I will use Chloe Martin's question. Thank you, Chloe.

Speaker 1 Can you share how the BBC is embracing emerging technologies like AI and virtual production to shape the future of storytelling?

Speaker 5 Yeah, it's fascinating AI. I mean, we definitely want to be at the forefront of how the media are using it.
And we're in a very test and learn phase at the moment.

Speaker 5 We actually just did an internal week of AI for all staff with lots of different presentations and how we can use it. So at the moment, we're piloting it.

Speaker 5 I know News have done a couple of Gen AI pilots on the website and apps. In sounds.
We've just done a pilot where we've used it for subtitling our program, so it's a real benefit.

Speaker 5 We're looking at how we use it in bite-size to improve the tutor offering to children. There's a great one we've just done,

Speaker 5 it's a pilot where you take football clubs. So I think we've tried it with Plymouth and Southampton, Newcastle, Liverpool, and Aston Villa.
My family are all big Aston Villa supporters.

Speaker 5 I did not have a say in which ones they tried it on, but it was interesting. It was Aston Villa.

Speaker 5 They have done Villa. But just to have a kind of daily

Speaker 5 targeted audio programme about your club and what's going on. But when we use AI and when we use it in the pilot, it is still checked editorially.
It doesn't go out without checks.

Speaker 5 But I think it is an exciting creative tool. What I'd be really interested to ask you about this.

Speaker 5 What I find fascinating, I went to a talk about AI and I think as a research tool, it's amazing because you can say, tell me what have been the big Saturday night hits in recent years and what have been the key ingredients.

Speaker 5 I mean, you could use Richard Osman for this, or you could use AI, but say we're using AI.

Speaker 5 There's AI. So it's so kind of lost a job.

Speaker 5 But it comes really, you know, within like seconds, it's amazing. Then I think I saw a demonstration when they said, okay, so I want to do a Saturday night show.

Speaker 5 I want it to have drama, Jeopardy, fun. And then it literally, again, within a minute, came up with ideas.

Speaker 5 But what I found is those ideas were quite derivative of what had come before because they're borrowing on what's already out there. So I'm really interested.
I think

Speaker 5 AI is a research tool and it can certainly enhance creativity. It can help with films.
You don't have to do G V's. You could use AI and things.

Speaker 5 But when you're looking at a new format, which we all love,

Speaker 5 would AI have come up with the traitors? That I'm not sure.

Speaker 1 I think every single producer I talk to,

Speaker 1 they all use AI in the way you're talking about, is they all

Speaker 1 use it as a sounding board on certain things.

Speaker 1 Every single one I've spoken to and I try and speak to people regularly because AI is changing regularly they all say the one thing it cannot do is come up with an original idea and in fact people say look you feel free please to use AI in your deck or anything like that if you come to me with you know occasionally you'll get an idea through and you go

Speaker 1 was this yours yeah and the producer goes oh no it wasn't because you can just you can just tell there's something about it like the music

Speaker 2 can be like a note right it can be like an executive note no not like that but hang on and then it sparks a conversation where you take it on.

Speaker 2 It can suggest things I think that people can kick back against or say, yeah, that wouldn't work because of that.

Speaker 5 But

Speaker 1 I've got to produce a friend who's trained his own AI to argue with him now, he said, because his AI was so polite. He said, no, you have to absolutely know what you know what I'm like.

Speaker 1 Here are my shows. You have to stop being nice to me.

Speaker 1 And he says he's got this great. You're on television now.

Speaker 2 Yeah.

Speaker 1 But again,

Speaker 1 not for coming up with ideas. I think when people think about AI, they think people, you know, they think, oh, that's the way to get ideas.
And it just, for various reasons, it just.

Speaker 2 But in terms of creative costs and things, like, say you want to do a show, say you want to do something that's set in an incredibly expensive location and certain things have had to come down so much in costs, comedy, things like that, because really for what, for what, you know, because of the kind of harsh economics of the market.

Speaker 2 But if you could use, as you say, for GVs, for other things, for other aspects of it, for background almost, it makes different things possible and it makes bigger worlds possible to some extent than if you just said, okay, well, we can only do it if it's all practical and it's all real.

Speaker 5 Yeah, I think that that will really help in the future, definitely, and sort of and help indies. And that can lead, what is that? You know,

Speaker 5 necessity is the mother of invention. And I think that will be a big part of AI.
I think for the BBC, we just have to be very open and very transparent when we're using it. That's really important.

Speaker 5 And we are very clear. We've been trialling sort of labels online when people can see where we've used AI.
And that for me is key going forward. But I'm excited about it.

Speaker 5 And I think creatively it is an opportunity, but

Speaker 5 let's sort of see where. I mean, it's moving so fast at the moment as well.
That's the other thing. But I think we've got a big series next year, actually.

Speaker 5 Hannah Fry, the amazing Hannah Frye, is presenting, which is looking at AI and that, should we be excited? Should we be scared?

Speaker 5 And giving as much information as we can about it for the audiences, because I think there's a lot of questions about AI that still need answering.

Speaker 1 But I also think that's where having an organization like the BBC at the heart of your culture is very, very useful because it does need guardrails and we do want to protect jobs and we do want to be excited about it.

Speaker 1 But at the same time, if you just want to use AI for profit, it goes in a certain direction. If you want to use AI for creativity, it goes in a different direction.

Speaker 1 And it's important to have public service broadcasters who have,

Speaker 1 you know, who use it but understand that

Speaker 1 human beings are the heart of creativity.

Speaker 2 Feeds on to the like our last question, because sadly we are running out of time.

Speaker 2 But given the current climate, given everything that's happened at the BBC, I wanted to ask you something about public service and what it means to you.

Speaker 2 Do you and your team feel a responsibility to make the world a better place? And if so, how do you try and put that right at the heart of your programme making?

Speaker 5 Oh, God, I mean, absolutely. I mean, public service for me is about...

Speaker 5 God, you could get emotional actually because it is an amazing thing, but I think the BBC is an amazing organisation. And for me, it's about enriching the lives of everyone in the UK.
And

Speaker 5 it should be of value for everyone in the UK. And whether that's, I don't know, through using bite size,

Speaker 5 looking at the weather, looking at the news, looking at the cookery website, having an amazing documentary,

Speaker 5 a wonderful entertainment show, you know,

Speaker 5 inform, educate, and entertain is at the heart of the BBC. But we can do all those things.
Sometimes one programme can do all three.

Speaker 5 Sometimes, actually, it's just a great comedy and it's just a brilliant laugh.

Speaker 5 But for me, it really is about sort of serving the public and giving the audience yeah I think you're right make making I would hope that life is better in the UK because of the BBC and I feel really passionately about it it's why I'm still working at the BBC and I think we have a lot to be proud of with our content god I didn't think I get emotional but you you sort of do because it's just

Speaker 5 it's just it's just fantastic the the range of content that we that we bring to audiences and we're really proud of that.

Speaker 5 And the other, you know, public broad, I mean, ITV, Channel 4, I think we've all got Channel 5, but there's always a lot of content on all of them that we should be really proud of.

Speaker 5 And we have to sort of keep going that and remember that that's what's important, that people are loving our shows and enjoying them.

Speaker 5 And I would just finish by saying there are a lot of treats for Christmas. We've got a lovely Christmas.
We have Wallace and Grommet and the best wedding in Barry Island last year.

Speaker 5 But actually, there's some really lovely treats coming. And I think people

Speaker 5 will just really enjoy it.

Speaker 5 Yeah, sorry, God, now I get emotional, but yeah, it's just a privilege to do the job I do and that's just what we're doing going forward, focusing on giving everyone in the UK, across the UK,

Speaker 5 the best shows possible and reflecting their lives in everything we do. Oh, Kate, thank you so much.

Speaker 2 Thank you so much. It was a privilege.
Thank you so much.

Speaker 5 Oh, it was great fun. Thank you.
Chief Condent of the BBC. And if not celebrity traitors, Richard, how do you feel about celebrity gladiators?

Speaker 1 now you said that you're taller than giants if I had to do either it would be celebrity traitors yes yeah I think we would insist that is for sure so yeah it's gonna have to be marina I'm afraid for celebrity traitors

Speaker 2 Thank you so much, Kate. Thank you so much for coming in.
It was wonderful.

Speaker 1 Thank you so much, listeners, for all your wonderful questions as well. Much appreciated.

Speaker 1 We will see you all next Tuesday, unless you're a member, in which case we have the final part of our MTV story tomorrow. Yes.

Speaker 1 Clue, it doesn't end well.

Speaker 1 But for everyone else, we will see you next Tuesday.

Speaker 2 See you next Tuesday.

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