UTV Presentation Thread

On the subject of old announcers, whatever happened to Barbara Palmer, Johanne Woods, and Keith Burnside ?

Barbara Palmer is now known as Barbara Bradley and I believe now works for the Royal Victoria Hospital.

Joanne Woods became a transmission controller at Havelock House and, according to The TV Room Plus, has also been heard on U105.

Keith Burnside now reads the news on BBC Radio Ulster.

Would be nice to see the three of them back

I would be keen to see Barbara and Joanne return, but I also think it would be good for UTV to get some new announcing staff (not ones seconded from the newsroom - especially Jar-Jar Clarke) to cover daytime shifts. But I've been wishing that for over ten years so it'll never happen.

I'd offer my services to the Presentation department myself but I've said too much on here and in other places about what I think of the current state of UTV and its staff roster, on-screen and off-screen, to get a job there ever. <joke>No need for me to book that sex change operation, then.</joke>

Interesting - looks like the Peter Robinson taking to an audience part of this DUP PEB was done in Studio 2 at Havoc House. Even has some of the bamboo walls and chairs from the "Gerry Meets" era.

Its always amazed me that they don't make more of daytime, wouldn't cost that much. What time does continuity start at weekends night, is it in vision ?

UTV stopped doing daytime continuity during the week in the late 1990s, not sure exactly when but it seemed to happen around 1997 and 1998. They then jettisoned daytime continuity on weekends and Bank Holidays last year, so now the only times you'll hear an announcer on live duty are from 6.00pm to midnight in the evening. Idents into programmes in the daytime do not have any announcements, while pre-recorded ECPs are run after daytime programmes. I don't think UTV ever stated why they disposed of duty announcers in the daytime, but I'm sure most of us can guess the an $ w £ r.

In-vision links appear each evening; generally, there are three or four in the evening schedule, but if Julian Simmons is on duty, almost all links, apart from those into news bulletins, are in-vis. Until May last year, only Julian appeared in-vision, usually on Friday-Sunday only; when Pamela Ballantine and Rose Neill returned to continuity duties they soon began doing IVC, and Gillian Porter resumed presenting in-vision links last July.

Sadly, the recent departures from the UTV presentation department; Robin Taylor (who did in-vision links sporadically until he left), Aidan Browne, Audra Thomas - and those seconded from the newsroom - Sarah Dobson/Clarke (although she did appear one evening a few months ago), Marc Mallett (who also tried his hand at IVC in the brief time he was also among the CA team) and Lynda Fulford - left their announcing roles before IVC became universal to the UTV team again.

Oh, and UTV are now running with a "Britain's Got Talent" theme break bumper.

Shame really, as I was just speaking to a former ITV regional announcer a few weeks back and he said he'd love to do it again some time "just for the crack", implying that he'd probably not charge very much (he's in semi-retirement now but his voice is as good as ever).

If UTV wouldn't mind a few English-accented announcers....

Would this be a certain announcer who kept in-vision continuity alive at a particular company in spite of a change of ownership?

Mind you, UTV have had their share of English-sounding (and native English) announcers down the years so it would be nothing new; indeed, all the current duty team at UTV all had English-sounding accents in the early part of their careers at Havelock House.

Which one ? PM me !

Regional series on UTV alert: a third series of Ultimate Ulster is on its way.