ITV doesn't budge - no Comedy Awards broadcast
The British Comedy Awards are now just a week away and, sadly, it appears as if the ceremony definitely won't now be broadcast live on ITV1.
The network has scheduled Steve Carell's American comedy film The 40 Year Old Virgin between 9pm and 10:30pm on Wednesday 5th December - this is the slot the Comedy Awards would need for a live broadcast. With next week's TV listings magazines now in print, a last minute change-of-mind would sadly appear to be out of the question.
Organisers have said the ceremony, hosted as always by Jonathan Ross, will still go ahead despite the fact it will not be shown on television for the first time since its inception. BBC3 sitcom Gavin and Stacey leads the nominations after having been listed in an impressive five categories (full nominations list)
ITV has taken the controversial decision not to show the awards because of the on-going investigations into alleged irregularities with the 2005 phone voting (full details).
Observers point out that stubbornly sticking to this decision is likely to prove very costly for ITV - the network has already had to pay producers £70,000 to stop Channel 4 acquiring the brand and, with audiences of up to 10 million in previous years, it is likely to leave a big dent in the broadcaster's advertising revenue too. Additionally, although the reaction to this news from the public has yet to be seen, it would be easy to assume that it is unlikely to be taken well.
A number of comedy fans have already complained to ITV about its treatment of this year's ceremony; pointing out that if the network still has an issue with phone voting the removal of the People's Choice Award, the only award to have been voted for by the public in previous years, should surely have solved the issue?
A number of high profile people have also accused ITV of un-fairly singling out the Comedy Awards. Comedian Jack Dee, nominated for Lead Balloon is one of those that have publically accused ITV of double standards. He told reporters earlier in the month: "It is unfair Blue Peter and GMTV and The X Factor are all allowed to continue; why should this show get punished for a pretty small misdemeanour by comparison?".
It seems a letter from Unique Communications, the parent company of producers Michael Hurl Television, has also been ignored by the broadcaster. In their letter to ITV, Unique argued that not airing this December's awards would be "inconsistent" and "inexplicable" given that Ant and Dec's Saturday Night Takeaway has been re-commissioned despite Deloitte finding very serious editorial issues with that show.
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.
One glimmer of hope for fans is that the ceremony will still be captured on camera. Michael Hurl Television will be delivering tapes of the evening to ITV to fulfill their contract and thus obtain full payment. It remains to be seen whether ITV will ever schedule this footage though.