Open Media

Open Media
After Dark with Harry Belafonte, Denis Worrall, Breyten Breytenbach and others

Open Media is a British television production company, best known for the discussion series After Dark, described by The Daily Mail as "the most intelligent, thought-provoking and interesting programme ever to have been on television".[1]

The company was founded in 1987 and has produced over 400 hours of television for all the main UK network broadcasters, including BBC TV, the ITV network and Channel 4. It has made entertainment series and factual specials which have sold all over the world. It also produces communications and corporate media for some of Britain's most important businesses.

Open Media programmes have been nominated for many awards by the Royal Television Society and the British Academy BAFTA.

Two different Open Media productions were featured during the 25th anniversary of Channel 4 in autumn 2007: The Secret Cabaret [2] and After Dark [3] were shown again on More4 during the celebratory season.

In 2009 the British Film Institute announced that Open Media, in partnership with The National Archives, the Parliamentary Broadcasting Unit, FremantleMedia and the BBC, makes programmes available online through InView as "examples of how some of Britain's key social, political and economic issues have been represented and debated".[4]

In 2010 the Open Media series Opinions and After Dark were praised as "two of the best talk-shows ever seen on British television" in a well-reviewed book of social and cultural history[5].

Contents

Productions

Entertainment

Entertainment series include Don't Quote Me[6] and The Secret Cabaret.

Factual

Factual series and specials include After Dark, Brave New World, The Great Pot Debate, The Greatest F***ing Show on TV, Is This Your Life?,[7] James Randi: Psychic Investigator, The Mediator,[8] John Wells and the Three Wise Men,[9] Natural Causes,[10] Opinions, Orient: Club for a Fiver,[11] The Spy Machine, The Talking Show, and Weird Thoughts, as well as various films for Channel 4's Equinox, e.g. The Big Sleep,[12] Secrets of the Super Psychics, Superpowers?[13] and Theme Park Heaven.[14]

Stars

Stars of Open Media productions include Simon Drake, Ricky Jay, Andrew Neil, James Randi, Jerry Sadowitz, Sandi Toksvig and John Wells.

After Dark featured appearances by such well-known figures as Buzz Aldrin, Harry Belafonte, Andrea Dworkin, Edward Heath, Patricia Highsmith, Shere Hite, David Irving, Bianca Jagger, Christine Keeler, Adnan Khashoggi, Eartha Kitt, Yehudi Menuhin, Sinéad O'Connor, Bruce Oldfield, Richard Perle, Edward Teller and Peter Ustinov.

The two series of Is This Your Life? featured extended and in-depth interviews with Jeremy Beadle, Ian Botham, Morris Cerullo, Max Clifford, Germaine Greer, Olivia Newton-John, Albert Reynolds, Jimmy Savile, Peter Tatchell and Fatima Whitbread: "a must-see, the most incisive chat show on the box"[15].

Open Media has produced talks by Edward de Bono, Linda Colley, James Goldsmith, Paul Hill, Dusan Makavejev, G.F. Newman, Dennis Potter, Andrew Roberts, George Soros and Norman Stone. One such - an Opinions talk for Channel 4 in 1993 by Alan Clark - was described in his diary (later published) as "It was good. Clear, assured, moving. I looked compos and in my 'prime'. Many people saw it. All were enthusiastic. Today acres of coverage in The Times."[16]

See also

and

and

External links

References

  1. ^ Jaci Stephen, The Daily Mail, 9 May 1997
  2. ^ TheDigitalSpy, accessed 3 March 2009
  3. ^ After Dark
  4. ^ BFI website page, accessed 14 August 2009
  5. ^ Alwyn W. Turner, Rejoice! Rejoice! Britain in the 1980s, Aurum 2010
  6. ^ UKGameshows, accessed 3 March 2009
  7. ^ BFI, accessed 3 March 2009
  8. ^ BFI, accessed 3 March 2009
  9. ^ MemorableTV, accessed 23 November 2011
  10. ^ BFI, accessed 3 March 2009
  11. ^ IMDB, accessed 3 March 2009
  12. ^ BFI, accessed 3 March 2009
  13. ^ TCM, accessed 3 March 2009
  14. ^ BFI, accessed 3 March 2009
  15. ^ A.A.Gill, The Sunday Times, 6 August 1995
  16. ^ Alan Clark, The Last Diaries, Weidenfeld, 2002


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