ITV's Tonight - fewer episodes

Tonight is getting cut back. I would hardly say its a flagship programme it just dressed up tat. what are the new Current affair programmes?


http://www.broadcastnow.co.uk/broadcasters/itv-scales-back-tonight/5080114.article?referrer=RSS

TV is making a number of producers on Tonight redundant and plans to reduce the number of episodes it makes next year as it cuts costs on its flagship current affairs brand.

ITV Studios label Shiver is in consultation with “a handful” of permanent Tonight producers amid plans to introduce a self-shooting model on the show.

The move follows a period of upheaval on BBC current affairs show Panorama. In July Broadcast revealed the corporation was to make all of the programme’s in-house reporters redundant, while there are also plans to scale back its investigative journalism and feature more news analysis.

ITV stopped short of putting a number on the scale of the redundancies, but Broadcast understands that fewer than five roles are at risk. Tonight is not heavily staffed and relies on freelancers when its investigations enter production.

As well as the redundancies, ITV will ask Shiver to make fewer Tonight episodes next year. The ITVS team currently makes around 40 episodes a year, while ITN contributes around 10 instalments to the strand.

The reduced order is understood to be for a number of reasons, including the availability of fewer schedule slots and the introduction of new current affairs output.

An ITV spokesperson said: “Tonight is an important strand in our current affairs slate and we remain absolutely committed to it. We are in a consultation period with a number of individuals, so it would be inappropriate to make any further comment at this stage.”

Tonight investigations

Tonight airs throughout the year on ITV, usually in a 7.30pm slot on a Thursday, and is introduced by Julie Etchingham. The programme has been running since 1999, when it was known as Tonight with Trevor McDonald.

Tonight’s recent investigations include fuel poverty and the UK’s poor numeracy record, while last week’s instalment focused on “lad culture” and sexism.

An April instalment of the show (pictured) is currently being investigated by Ofcom after Broadcast revealed that the production team paid the bar tab for a group of students during a probe into binge drinking. Tonight’s series producer David Warren resigned at the time.

Tonight is executive produced by Mike Blair and the redundancies will be among the first major decisions taken at ITVS since the arrival of UK managing director Julian Bellamy a few weeks ago. He joined from Discovery Networks International.

Tonight is a former shadow of itself... it was of course the replacement of World in Action but over time I watch it recently it frequently broadcasts some fluff.

Perhaps it's time to retire Tonight and have a brand new Current Affairs programme, though Panorama has taken the same cutbacks so maybe it's just following a trend.

Generally the Tonight programmes produced by ITN are much more news-led. Time to give ITN more power over ITV's current affairs?

The Agenda
On Assignment
Exposure (although this has only had a couple of editions this year)

Thanks for that. I never really thought of the Agenda as current affairs, mind you watching it last night It seems I was wrong.

On Assignment, it seems is monthly, but I never seen them. When do there go out? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_Assignment

I always thought it was an one off block, good to see ITV putting out some harder stuff: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exposure_(UK_TV_series)

I believe the next On Assignment is a week tomorrow.

I've made a quick updated to that page. Its seems August edition went out in September. It reminds be a bit of First Tuesday.

Usually post News At Ten either on a Wednesday or Thursday. I can't say I care much for the Tonight programme these days, it feels like watching Watchdog or consumer affair news than a current affairs show, yet The Agenda, Exposure and On Assignment are so much stronger.

I do think that's the problem with Tonight (and Dispatches on C4) - they seem to have to cater for two ends of the current affairs market and it doesn't really do the brand any favours. It seems good news though that it's the Shiver episodes rather than ITN episodes being cut.

I totally agree. I seem to remember 'Tonight' was on twice a week at one point...with one being a lighter programme than the other? I guess (when they reduced the programmes to once per week) they never decided which type of format they wanted the programme to be. This left the current unwatchable mess...it was never as good as World In Action anyway.

I didn't used to be on every week back then, if used to be off all summer for example when they'd show old episodes of Airline.

They are between a rock an a hard place, everyone if asked would say they want a serious investigation, but the highest rating episodes of this and Panorama are always episodes about supermarkets or featuring Martin Lewis or Jonathan Maitland.

Lets be fair here, when it comes to his type of show, I do think current affairs should be covering them. People are saving alot of money thinks him etc and I wouldn't class this type of CA as fluff. Right I looked into your power and if you change you can save £400! The last time Tonight did this a month ago, there did speak to power companies.