Considered one of Britain’s most legendary TV dramatists, Sir Phil Redmond, is not any stranger to tackling tough points on display.
Courting controversy famously together with his hard-hitting storylines on his kids’s present Grange Hill for the BBC in 1978, earlier than he converted to Channel 4 to provide it its two most outstanding soaps, Brookside (1982) and later Hollyoaks (1995).
He is been a pivotal determine at Channel 4 from its inception, broadly thought-about to be a father to the channel.
Picture:
Sir Phil Redmond says the BBC and Channel 4 ought to crew as much as survive
Whereas he is been liable for placing a few of TV’s most impactful storylines to air for them – from the primary lesbian kiss, to our bodies buried beneath patios – off-screen these days, he is equally radical about what ought to occur.
“Channel 4’s job in 1980 was to provide a platform for the voices, ideas, and people that weren’t able to break through into television. They did a fantastic job. I was part of that, and now it’s done.”
It is not that he desires to kill off Channel 4 however – as broadcasting bosses collect for Edinburgh’s annual TV Competition – he believes they urgently ought to be speaking about mergers.
A suggestion which works down about in addition to you may think, he says, when he brings it up with these on the high.
He laughs: “The people with the brains think it’s a good idea, the people who’ve got the expense accounts think it’s horrendous.”
Picture:
A number of the authentic Grange Hill forged accumulating a BAFTA particular award in 2001. Pic: Shutterstock
A ‘struggling’ BBC attempting to ‘survive’
With constitution renewal talks beneath strategy to decide the BBC’s future funding, Sir Phil says “there’s only one question, and that is what’s going to happen to the BBC?”
“We’ve got two public sector broadcasters – the BBC and Channel 4 – both owned by the government, by us as the taxpayers, and what they’re trying to do now is survive, right?
“No paperwork ever deconstructs itself… the BBC is struggling… Channel 4 has bought a few billion quid coming in a yr. If you happen to combine that, all of the transmissions, all of the again workplace stuff, all of the technical stuff, all that money… you’ll be able to preserve that sort of coterie of experience on youth programming after which say ‘don’t be concerned in regards to the cash, simply exit and do what you used to do, upset folks!’.”
Picture:
Brookside’s lesbian kiss between Margaret and Beth (L-R Nicola Stapleton and Anna Friel) was groundbreaking TV. Pic: Shutterstock
How possible would that be?
Redmond claims, virtually, you might pull it off in every week – “we could do it now, it’s very simple, it’s all about keyboards and switches”.
However the screenwriter admits that profitable folks over mentally to his mind-set would take a couple of years of persuading.
As for his ideas on what may substitute the BBC licence price, he says charging folks to obtain BBC apps on their telephones looks like an apparent supply of earnings.
“There are 25 million licences and roughly 90 million mobile phones. If you put a small levy on each mobile phone, you could reduce the actual cost of the licence fee right down, and then it could just be tagged on to VAT.
“These elements are simply shifting the tax system round a bit. [then] you would not have to fret about all of the criminality and single moms being thrown in jail, all this sort of nonsense.”
Picture:
Authentic Brookside stars at BAFTA – L:R: Michael Starke, Dean Sullivan, Claire Sweeney and Sue Jenkins. Pic: PA
‘Subsidising by way of streaming shouldn’t be the reply’
Earlier this yr, Peter Kosminsky, the director of historic drama Wolf Corridor, instructed a levy on UK streaming revenues may fund extra high-end British TV on the BBC.
Sir Phil describes that as “a sign of desperation”.
“If you can’t actually survive within your own economic basis, you shouldn’t be doing it.
“I do not suppose high slicing or subsidising one side of the enterprise is the reply, you need to simply have a look at the entire thing as a totality.”
Picture:
Mark Rylance (L) and Damian Lewis in Wolf Corridor: The Mirror And The Mild. Pic: BBC
Since promoting his manufacturing firm, Mersey Tv, twenty years in the past, a lot of his present work has targeted on appearing as an envoy for the tradition and artistic industries.
Though he is taken a step away from tv, he admits he is upset by how risk-averse programme makers seem to have grow to be.
“Dare I say it? There needs to be an intellectual foundation to it all.”
Picture:
The Hollyoaks forged in 1995. Pic: Shutterstock
TV’s ‘lacking a trick’
He believes TV bosses are too afraid of being fined by Ofcom, and that is meant soaps usually are not going so far as they need to.
“The benefits [system], you know, immigration, all these things are really relevant subjects for drama to bring out all the arguments, the conflicts.
“Nearly all of the folks know the advantages system is damaged, that it must be mounted as a result of they see themselves dwelling on their property with a ten or 12-year-old automobile after which there’s another person down the highway who is aware of how one can fill a type in, and he is driving round in a £65k BMW, proper? These debates can be actually nice to deliver out on TV, they’re lacking a trick.”
Whereas a few of TV’s greatest executives are slated to talk on the Edinburgh Tv Competition, Redmond shouldn’t be satisfied they are going to be open to listening.
“They will go where the perceived wisdom is as to where the industry is going. The fact that the industry is taking a wrong turn, we really need somebody else to come along and go ‘Oi!'”
After I ask if that might be him, he laughs. Cue dramatic music and shutting credit. As plot twists go, the thought of certainly one of TV’s most radical voices making a boardroom comeback to stir the pot, life like or not, is on the very least meals for thought for the trade.
Edinburgh TV Competition runs from 19 – 22 August.
