BBC Radio 2 is a radio channel that started transmitting on the 30th September 1967. It replaced Light Programme.

BBC Radio 2

Radio 2

Michael Grade: On the Box

Michael Grade: On the Box: Episode 3: New Kid on the Block

Factual: Arts, Culture & the Media

Episode 3

Episode 3: New Kid on the Block

New Kid on the Block

BBC Radio 2 - Michael Grade: On the Box, New Kid on the Block

How everything changed for UK television in 1982 with the arrival of Channel 4.

The story of TV seen from Michael's unique and personal viewpoint. How everything changed for UK television in 1982 with the arrival of Channel 4.

He's the only man who's run the BBC, Channel 4 and ITV. In this new series for Radio 2, Michael Grade tells the inside story of Britain's television industry. It's a story that takes us from Alexandra Palace in London to Southfork Ranch in Dallas. The series examines the key milestones in the story of TV, as seen from Michael's unique and personal viewpoint. 

In the third programme, New Kid On The Block, Michael recalls the broadcasting landscape of the early 1980s, when there were only three channels in the UK and how that all changed in 1982, with the arrival of Channel 4. With its distinctive logo made up of multicoloured blocks and a simple four-note signature tune, the new channel unleashed a new approach to programme-making and commissioning. It also, "quite frankly, gave the nation's other broadcasters a much needed kick up the bum". 

Michael considers some of the shows that helped to define Channel 4 as "edgy, different and distinctive": Brookside, Channel 4 News, The Tube, The Word and Big Brother. He talks to Chris Evans and Producer Charlie Parsons about the genesis of The Big Breakfast and to the former C4 Chief Executive Jeremy Isaacs, who explains the significance of Film Four. Michael also assesses the importance of Friends with its co-creator and writer Marta Kauffman.

This programme features newly recorded interviews with: Bob Geldof, Jon Snow, Anthony McPartlin and Declan Donnelly, TV Executives Peter Bazalgette, Brian Tesler, Roger Bolton, John Yorke, Mal Young and Mark Thompson, historian Asa Briggs, professors Anthony Smith and Christopher Frayling, and actresses Sue Johnston and Maureen Lipman.

Amazing music. Played by an amazing line up.

Radio 2: Amazing music. Played by an amazing line-up. The home of great music, entertainment and documentaries

Michael Grade tells the inside story of Britain's television industry

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Michael Grade: On the Box

Episode 3: New Kid on the Block

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