NG
The other thing was that the ITV companies after 1993 had to commission a minimum 25% of their programming from independents. It could be suggested that if you went back to the old business model, with 14 separate companies, with their own studio facilities, then if ITV wished to commission a series, the ITV companies could tender for the right to produce the series, as could independents.
Still would never have guaranteed that the studio complexes, such as Eastern Way in Carlisle, or City Road in Newcastle, would be filled will wall to wall productions.
The reality is that ITV as evolved into a single, unified channel, it didn't and couldn't commission or broadcast enough studio shows from : STV, Grampian, UTV, Border, Tyne Tees, Yorkshire, Granada, Anglia, Central, HTV, TSW/Westcountry, TVS/Meridian, Thames/Carlton, LWT, Channel to justify all of them having studio centres (in some cases - TVS, Central, Anglia, Thames - multiple studio centres)
The writing was on the wall before 1993 - that's why both Carlton and Meridian (and Westcountry?) effectively pitched successfully and launched as pubcasters. Meridian kept Northam running but wasn't really that interested in making their own studio productions, and post 1993 the closures started as the inevitable mergers started.
If you count the number of studios ITV had in total in the late 80s - it was clear there was a ridiculous level of overcapacity based on ITV network output - and ITV regional output of large studio shows was hardly going to be a significant element of output moving forward.
There was a degree of mitigation as Channel Four commissioned some studio shows (The Tube from Tyne Tees for instance) - but even then the capacity wasn't needed where ITV had it - and facilities like Limehouse picked up more C4 work than ITV regional studios I guess.
The irony is that we've gone from ridiculous over capacity (even the BBC had too much studio capacity in the 90s) - to having to convert film studios rather than using purpose built studios... The pendulum has swung too far - but that's probably inevitable.
(C4 Racing also kept Thames / Anglia / Yorkshire's OB fleets viable for a bit longer than would otherwise have been the case too)
I do wonder if anyone in the late 80s would have predicted TVS at Vintners Park would be the last real ITV studio centre from that era that survived as a fully flexible studio centre 30 years later (*)? I can't think of any other properly equipped studio centre left that's still making a decent amount of output (Granada Quay Street may come back into that fold) I'm sure people would have though Granada, LWT and Thames studios would have been more likely to have survived.
(*) EPIC (ex-Anglia studios) in Norwich could also be considered I guess - and it is occasionally used for network productions like World of Sport Wrestling, but it's not quite the same as Maidstone Studios in on-air use.
You could also look back from the 70s and add the ATV Elstree operation (now BBC Elstree and home of Children in Need and General Election shows I guess)
noggin
Founding member
ITV abandons the South Bank
The other thing was that the ITV companies after 1993 had to commission a minimum 25% of their programming from independents. It could be suggested that if you went back to the old business model, with 14 separate companies, with their own studio facilities, then if ITV wished to commission a series, the ITV companies could tender for the right to produce the series, as could independents.
Still would never have guaranteed that the studio complexes, such as Eastern Way in Carlisle, or City Road in Newcastle, would be filled will wall to wall productions.
The reality is that ITV as evolved into a single, unified channel, it didn't and couldn't commission or broadcast enough studio shows from : STV, Grampian, UTV, Border, Tyne Tees, Yorkshire, Granada, Anglia, Central, HTV, TSW/Westcountry, TVS/Meridian, Thames/Carlton, LWT, Channel to justify all of them having studio centres (in some cases - TVS, Central, Anglia, Thames - multiple studio centres)
The writing was on the wall before 1993 - that's why both Carlton and Meridian (and Westcountry?) effectively pitched successfully and launched as pubcasters. Meridian kept Northam running but wasn't really that interested in making their own studio productions, and post 1993 the closures started as the inevitable mergers started.
If you count the number of studios ITV had in total in the late 80s - it was clear there was a ridiculous level of overcapacity based on ITV network output - and ITV regional output of large studio shows was hardly going to be a significant element of output moving forward.
There was a degree of mitigation as Channel Four commissioned some studio shows (The Tube from Tyne Tees for instance) - but even then the capacity wasn't needed where ITV had it - and facilities like Limehouse picked up more C4 work than ITV regional studios I guess.
The irony is that we've gone from ridiculous over capacity (even the BBC had too much studio capacity in the 90s) - to having to convert film studios rather than using purpose built studios... The pendulum has swung too far - but that's probably inevitable.
(C4 Racing also kept Thames / Anglia / Yorkshire's OB fleets viable for a bit longer than would otherwise have been the case too)
I do wonder if anyone in the late 80s would have predicted TVS at Vintners Park would be the last real ITV studio centre from that era that survived as a fully flexible studio centre 30 years later (*)? I can't think of any other properly equipped studio centre left that's still making a decent amount of output (Granada Quay Street may come back into that fold) I'm sure people would have though Granada, LWT and Thames studios would have been more likely to have survived.
(*) EPIC (ex-Anglia studios) in Norwich could also be considered I guess - and it is occasionally used for network productions like World of Sport Wrestling, but it's not quite the same as Maidstone Studios in on-air use.
You could also look back from the 70s and add the ATV Elstree operation (now BBC Elstree and home of Children in Need and General Election shows I guess)
Last edited by noggin on 10 November 2018 11:57am - 2 times in total