John Birt – TV Cream

59. The plumply pretty female duo

LWT poured all of its resources into the production of the pilot edition of Saturday Live, using their largest studio and determinedly...

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It's Saturday Night

58. The most important entertainment programme of my time

Saturday night television in the 1970s and 1980s belonged jointly to BBC1 and ITV. These two goliaths slugged it out, ensuring...

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It's Saturday Night

55. The Most Sexless Person In Television

Unsurprisingly the press seized upon the failed Blind Date pilot and David Glencross and the IBA felt compelled to act. Birt, comfortable that...

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It's Saturday Night

54. We would be the spoilsports

“It’s wallpaper TV,” claimed Daily Mail entertainment columnist, Baz Bamigboye in 2000. “But watching Cilla is like using an illegal substance. You know you...

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It's Saturday Night

53. I shouldn’t have accepted it

LWT’s head of comedy, Humphrey Barclay was growing increasingly concerned. Much effort had been made in the late 1970s to sort out...

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It's Saturday Night

47. Scope for humour and danger

As the new age of ITV co-operation started to bear fruit in 1984, further promises were made. Granada, still resistant to Birt’s...

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It's Saturday Night

46. We’ve got the fucking lot!

The steady trickle of new weekend ITV programmes made by the traditionally weekend-averse Granada and Central Television was taken as a personal triumph...