Neil Nightingale to leave BBC's Natural History Unit

From Wildlife Film News

After six years as Head of the BBC's Natural History Unit, Neil Nightingale is to stand down and return to programme making. Neil's first project will be a six part BBC One landmark series, Africa – a definitive television series on the greatest wildlife continent on earth.

During his time as Head of the NHU its output has gone from strength to strength, including a diverse range of natural history programmes on television, radio, online and for the cinema. The unit has constantly excelled and created a world-class reputation for ambitious and groundbreaking factual programmes that inform and entertain audiences.

Recent output from the Natural History Unit on television includes Life In Cold Blood, Planet Earth, the Saving Planet Earth season, Wild China, Big Cat Live, The Secret Life Of Elephants, Lost Land Of The Jaguar, Expedition Borneo, Springwatch, Autumnwatch, Galapagos and Natural World. On radio, recent series include Nature, Living World, Soundscapes and a major live event, World On The Move.

Peter Salmon, Chief Creative Officer, BBC Vision, says: "Neil has made a huge contribution to the BBC’s Natural History Unit. His in-depth knowledge, passion and skill for programme making meant that he was a first-class head of the BBC's Natural History Unit. I wish him every success with his next move, to return to programme making. Thanks to Neil and his teams the NHU is at the top of its game and in great shape for the challenges that the future will bring."

Tom Archer, Controller, BBC Factual Production, BBC Vision, says: "I am thrilled that Neil will be staying within the BBC to resume his brilliant programme making career. He's been a superb head of the NHU and I am sure he will now make some world-class programmes across the BBC."

Neil Nightingale says: "I have enjoyed my time as Head of the NHU immensely. It has been a great privilege to lead the world's most innovative group of wildlife producers but now I feel is the right time to return to my first love, programme making. Africa is an ambitious project and I can't wait to get started on it."

An announcement about the new Head of the NHU will follow in due in course.

Read more Wildlife News at http://wildlife-film.com/

94 staff, 35 tons of kit, a £300-a-night hotel...BBC defends cost of Big Cat Live

By Caroline Grant, Mail Online
The programme might have been about Big Cats, but its crew apparently acted more like fat cats. The BBC has been criticised for housing 94 staff on its Big Cat Live series in a £300-a-night luxury safari camp in Kenya. The production team also chartered 17 planes over the three weeks of filming.


The hotel and travel bill for the programme potentially came to almost £600,000, it was reported. The news comes at a time of widespread cost-cutting across the BBC, which is also reeling from the backlash against the taunting of Fawlty Towers star Andrew Sachs by two of its star presenters, Russell Brand and Jonathan Ross.
The corporation's Natural History Unit has been forced to reduce its staff and budget by nearly 30 per cent.

The unit has lost ten of its 25 producers and scores of other jobs have been cut. Its radio output has also been slashed. Big Cat Live was promoted as one of the most ambitious outside broadcasts ever attempted on television and audiences were promised a journey into 'the heart of wild Africa'. Its crew, including presenters Kate Silverton and Simon King, were treated to four-star hotels during their stay. The show, which was broadcast on BBC1 and the web, tracked the movements of leopards, lions and cheetahs 24 hours a day. It attracted around 4million viewers when it was aired in October last year.

The production crew reportedly needed 13 lorries and dozens of cars for the 35 tons of equipment used. Generator trucks, giant batteries and satellite equipment were transported into the heart of Kenya's Masai Mara, according to the Guardian newspaper.

Neil Nightingale, the head of the BBC Natural History Unit, defended the cost of the programmes. 'We produced eight hours of primetime TV, as well as providing material for news, Radio 4 and CBBC,' he said. 'The cost per hour was very reasonable in terms of output. This took 90 people three weeks.' Mr Nightingale could not say what the programme had cost.

'Young, attractive' wildlife show presenters slated for ignorance

From the Independant

One of the grizzled old beasts of the television wildlife world has condemned programmes that made stars of presenters rather than animals.

Terry Nutkins, the former presenter of The Really Wild Show and Brilliant Creatures, said yesterday that television companies were alienating viewers by attaching more importance to presenters' looks than their knowledge.

He was speaking the week before the BBC Natural History Unit's newest signing, Saba Douglas-Hamilton, 31, appears in Going Ape, the first of three wildlife documentaries. She follows the actress Tamzin Outhwaite, who plays Mel in EastEnders, and Charlotte Uhlenbroek, whose appearances have earned her the tabloid sobriquet "telly wildlife stunner".

Ms Douglas-Hamilton and Ms Uhlenbroek have strong academic and family backgrounds in studying wildlife, while Ms Outhwaite professed to a lifelong desire to swim with dolphins before appearing in Tamzin Outhwaite goes Wild with Dolphins last month.

But Mr Nutkins, 49, said they were being used for their looks. "[Programme makers]will do anything for ratings, which has made it very competitive for us old hands," he said. "I don't mind that, but the people they are taking on board know nothing about what they are presenting.

"They think that an attractive mini-skirted young girl will bring in the ratings, but ... the viewing public are not as stupid as they think they are. People come up to me in the street and say wildlife programmes are not as good as they used to be. The presenters don't know their subject so well and are just reading from a script.

"I have nothing against a young, attractive female presenting a wildlife television programme, but I do have an objection to a young, attractive female if she doesn't know anything about it."

Mr Nutkins said Ms Outhwaite's programme was "all very nice" but not a natural history programme. He claimed Ms Uhlenbroek "gave the game away" when she was "given a good kick" by a gorilla and sat there "looking pathetic" while four support staff with sticks chased the animals away. "It wouldn't have bothered me a bit," he said. "I ... certainly wouldn't have had people chase it away."

He also condemned the Discovery channel's Crocodile Hunter presenter, Steve Irwin – described by the channel as part Indiana Jones, part Tarzan – for being more interested in his ego than the animals.

"When I did it the animals were the star and the presenter was second," he said. "The animals should always be the stars. Now it's a vehicle for the presenter to put themselves up as the big star."

Mr Nutkins' criticisms may surprise Ms Uhlenbroek, who is a doctor of zoology and spent years studying chimpanzees in the forests of Tanzania. They will also raise eyebrows at the BBC's Natural History Unit, which made the widely acclaimed The Blue Planet, produced by Alastair Fothergill, who devised Going Ape. Mr Fothergill has said Ms Douglas-Hamilton's experience with elephants made her a natural presenter because she understood animal behaviour and was used to rainforests.

Keith Scholey, head of the BBC's Natural History Unit, said glamour could be a factor in choosing presenters but that expertise was vital. "You want a presenter that stands out," he said. "Glamour can be one thing that stands out, but Bill Oddie is one of our favourite presenters and I hope he won't mind me saying that ... he is not in that category." He said Ms Outhwaite's programme had presented her as a celebrity who wanted to learn about dolphins, not an expert.