Comedy Awards will not be televised
It has emerged that the 2007 British Comedy Awards will not be shown on television this year. After ITV opted out of broadcasting the event it was hoped it would be shown on another channel; however it has now emerged that ITV is blocking rival broadcasters from televising the ceremony in their place.
When ITV dropped the show from its schedule, producers of the event quickly began talks with the channel's rivals about screening the Jonathan Ross-fronted show on December the 5th; according to reports, Channel 4 were particularly keen to pick up the rights. However it has now emerged that Michael Hurl Television - the firm holding the TV rights - is still under contract with ITV. The Sun reports that ITV are enforcing their contract with the production company, blocking them from selling the footage to another broadcaster.
Michael Hurl Television will produce the event and record the show as normal in December. It will be delivered to ITV as normal, and paid for by the broadcaster under the terms of its contract however ITV will not be airing the footage.
This news is a huge blow for The Comedy Awards. Although the event will still take place, it is clearly now unlikely to be as well-attended or as popular an evening as it has been in previous years. It is also a blow to comedy fans - the event is normally the highlight of the awards season with an average audience of 5 to 6 million viewers tuning in to hear the risque jokes from Jonathan Ross and see their favourite stars pick up awards.
This will be the first time the public have not had access to The British Comedy Awards since their inception in 1990; until this year they have always been broadcast on ITV, later ITV1.
ITV announced earlier in the month that they would not be broadcasting the awards after it was discovered that the programme was embroiled in a phone-in scandal. In July, it was revealed by The Sun newspaper that there were problems with the voting in the 2005 ceremony. Viewers rang a premium-rate phone line to vote for the People's Choice award, believing the show was a live broadcast. However, when the televised ceremony cut to a news broadcast the ceremony continued regardless. When the news ended and ITV started the broadcast of the recorded coverage viewers were still invited to continue voting - despite the fact Ant and Dec's Saturday Night Takeaway had already been named the winner at the ceremony.
ITV has called in law firm Olswang to conduct an investigation into what happened. Although there is not any known problems with the 2006 ceremony the broadcaster will not allow the event to be on television this year. An ITV spokesperson said: "It wouldn't be right showing the awards when there's still an investigation". However, it is expected ITV will resume coverage of the awards in 2008.
The comedy awards have seen several memorable moments over the years, from Julian Clary claiming he had been fisting Norman Lamont, to Spike Milligan calling Goon Show fan Prince Charles a "groveling little bastard". At the 2006 awards a snake nearly escaped, video below...