大象传媒

WARNING: Some scenes in this video may be upsetting. They reflect the time when made.

大象传媒 has universality at its core, but has it addressed all socio-demographic groups equally? Or has it - with its patrician tone, lofty ideals and RP () vowels - pitched itself too overtly at the middle classes?

Early 大象传媒 radio programmes of the 1920s set up a high ideal for broadcasting and reflected the post-World War One society of the time, determined to create a better world but still bound by a rigid class system.

Enter Wilfred Pickles

One of the first notes of change was the famous appointment of Wilfred Pickles as the first non-RP voice on the 大象传媒 airwaves. A Yorkshireman and the son of a builder, Pickles began his career as a regional announcer before moving to the national radio in the 1940s, and then onto his own hugely popular radio and television show.

Pickles was part of a general opening up of the 大象传媒鈥檚 airwaves during World War Two to a broader range of voices, and especially to working class stories, humour and music. The hugely popular comedy of Gert and Daisy (real-life sisters Doris and Elsie Waters) featured throughout the 1940s on Workers Playtime and in the shop-based radio comedy Floggits. Meanwhile, East Ham girl Vera Lynn, who became the Forces' Sweetheart, had her own hugely popular show Sincerely Yours (1941).

Early documentaries of the 1930s found a place for these working class stories too, via the pioneering radio programmes of Olive Shapley. She travelled round the country, determined to give unheard voices a platform, simply saying: 鈥淚 felt the 大象传媒 should be doing something about this.鈥�

Changing society

Things were changing in society at large. The Butler Education Act 1944 made education mandatory for everyone up to the age of 15. It created a new stream of educated working class men and women attracted to the new medium of TV, including the likes of Melvyn Bragg and Joan Bakewell.

There were vivid changes in drama too 鈥� especially in the socially rooted dramas of the Wednesday Play (1964) and Play for Today (1970), written by and directed by many working class figures who would go on to have long TV and film careers. They included Ken Loach, Alan Bleasdale, Willie Russell, Dennis Potter and Barry Hines. Their dramas put a spotlight on working class lives, perhaps most memorably in Cathy Come Home (1966), which created the campaigning agency for the homeless, Crisis.

One of the Wednesday Play actors, Tony Holland, would later go on to co-create (with Julia Smith) the hugely successful 大象传媒 soap EastEnders, in 1985. Designed to compete with Granada TV鈥檚 Coronation Street, half of the key characters of the original EastEnders were famously based on Holland鈥檚 own family members, bringing a new range of authentic working class voices to the drama serial formula.

Comedy and Children鈥檚

Comedy had a gear change in this period too. The sitcom moved away from its middle class milieu to the rag and bone shop of Steptoe & Son (1962) and Johnny Speight鈥檚 iconoclastic Till Death Us Do Part (1965), which gave Warren Mitchell the role of his career as the foul-mouthed Alf Garnett.

But the British obsession with class was never so memorably captured as in the classic Two Ronnies sketch of 1966, which used the extreme height of John Cleese to epitomise upper class superiority, set against diminutive Ronnie Corbett as working class humility with a crick in his neck, while Ronnie Barker is stuck in the middle鈥�

By the 70s, children鈥檚 programmes also shifted socio-demographic portrayal. Tea-time drama became edgier in the comprehensive secondary school Grange Hill (1978); while the 大象传媒鈥檚 educational output would launch major campaigns around literacy and computer skills. A decade or so before that the ground-breaking Open University (1969) also opened up degree-level education to all for the first time ever.

News and Documentaries

Then in 1974 the first 鈥榝ly-on-the-wall鈥� TV documentary, The Family, captured the life of a working class family by simply filming their daily lives without direct interviews. For 1970s England, it controversially highlighted issues around class, race and manners.

General news reporting through the 80s and 90s was still, however, dominated by the classic 大象传媒 voice. When Liz Forgan was running 大象传媒 Radio in the mid-90s, she made her much misunderstood announcement about wanting different accents on the 大象传媒 including 鈥榣ovely Brummie鈥�. Radio 4 listeners were not happy.

The last decade has seen broader socio-economic representation in front of and behind the camera/microphone, with presenters such as Stacey Dooley reinventing the look and feel of the 大象传媒 documentary.

Today, the 大象传媒 continues its efforts to open up access for employment to a more socially diverse range of people through projects such as  and , alongside new apprenticeship schemes.

The vision for the future is for a 大象传媒 that is more reflective of society, across its staff and its output.