Sue Nicholson, who worked in Regional Television at Pebble Mill in the 1970s and early 1980s, sadly died on Saturday 3rd May 2014. She was diagnosed with cancer some years ago and after surgery and treatment appeared to have recovered. Unfortunately the cancer returned last year and despite further surgery and chemotherapy the tumour spread further. She died at home, surrounded by her family. She celebrated her 62nd birthday on Thursday 1st May.
Sue worked on a range of regional output at Pebble Mill, before returning to London and working in the Sports Department.
(Thanks for Katie Cooper for sharing this information)
Copyright resides with the original holder, no reproduction without permission.
BBC Birmingham used to cover the Variety Club Awards each year for a period in the late 1990s and early 2000s. The awards were often held in the Hilton in London, and televised. They celebrated the best performers in film, television, radio and theatre.
Katie Wright was the executive producer of the show in 2001 and 2002, along with Nick Vaughan-Barrett. Dale Winton was the presenter in 2001, and Ulrike Jonsson in 2002.
Thanks to Ian Collins for making the title grab available.
The following comment was left on the Pebble Mill Facebook page:
Nicola Silk: ‘I directed the inserts in 2002. interviewed a very charming Ant & Dec, a doddery but still funny Eric Sykes, who won the lifetime achievement award, a very young Daniel Radcliffe, there with his mum and an extremely rude and possibly drunk Alan Rickman.’
Thanks to film editor Charles White for sharing this document, and for keeping it safe since 1987!
This document shows the allocation of regional editing suites in summer 1987.
The programmes listed are the regional opt documentaries. These were weekly, 30 minute programmes about all sorts of subjects of interest in the Midlands. They included regional versions of shows like Crimewatch. The standard editing day seems to be 8.30-16.30.
Each programme had a separate programme number, which is shown under the episode title.
Ros Gower adds the following information: ‘The initials show who was producing and directing the programmes – KW Katie Wright, JC John Clark, DN David Nelson, MD Mike Dornan, RG – me, Ros Gower. Not sure who CC was. I can remember all of them! The one with my initials against it, and presenter Mike Dornan’s, was a doc we made in Shropshire at Condor Hall, an amazing school for deaf blind children.’
The final column shows how the programme was made e.g. studio, PSC (portable single camera), TK (film transfer), VT (videotape editing).
Copyright Sue Robinson, no reproduction without permission.
‘Good Morning with Anne and Nick’ did a live outside broadcast from Berlin, to celebrate the fifth anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall in Nov 1994. The show was transmitted from the Radisson Hotel in Berlin. The presenters included Anne Diamond, Nick Owen, Will Hanrahan, Tania Bryer, and Jeni Barnett.
The photos include: Sue Robinson, Sangeeta Modha, Katie Wright, Will Hanrahan, Nick Owen, Nick Thorogood, Marco, Steve Pierson.
The furniture for the broadcast was delivered to the hotel – but it was flat-packed, which meant that the first job was to literally build the set!
The following comments were left on the Pebble Mill Facebook Group:
Conal O’Donnell: ‘The Doolan programme did a show out of the former GDR studios in Liepzig a year after the wall came down .Strangely we still had a sort of old style communist minder with us who got terribly drunk over dinner & talked endlessly about the ghastliness of the fallen regime. Ashen faced & hung over the next morning he approached in tears begging us not to repeat anything he’d said the night before “it could ruin my career”(!)It was apparent that the old cultural cringe at saying anything remotely controversial was very much still there.Impressed too at our free wheeling ” anything goes” broadcasting style were the former GDR broadcasters who watched the show go out in some awe.A pleasant reminder of a time when the BBC was regarded as a free speech beacon to the world not a Saville style cess pit..’
Katie Wright (now Cooper): ‘God…memories! Yes it was the 5th Anniversary. The furniture arriving ‘flat’ was unbelievable but in the way of Pebble Mill folk, everyone just got on with building the stuff. I’m amazed it lasted the two hours…there were a lot of bits left over?! It was a great show with some very moving memories from Andrew Sachs. Then we all had to pile onto a rather ancient chartered aircraft to get back in time for the next day’s show……’
Photo from Sue Robinson, no reproduction without permission.
The photo was taken in the Studio C, Foyer. It is of the ‘Daytime Live’ team on a ‘Children in Need’ day – when production staff from many programmes would answer the phones and take pledges from members of the public.
Included left to right are:
Back row: Katie Wright, John McNish,Celia Marks, ?,?,Maria Needle, Pam Creed, Kevin Gill,
