Comments | ontd_political: BBC TV boss: No all-male panel shows

chaya in ontd_political

BBC TV boss: No all-male panel shows

Feb 10, 2014 10:37

Panel shows such as QI and Mock the Week will no longer have all-male line-ups, the BBC's director of TV has said.

"We're not going to have panel shows on any more with no women on them," Danny Cohen told the Observer. "You can't do that. It's not acceptable."His comments come two months after the BBC Trust was reported to have told executives ( Read more... )

television, bbc, sexism

Comments 84

Favorite female panalists? yndigot February 10 2014, 19:36:49 UTC

Since we shall -- finally -- be seeing a bit more of them...

Who are your faves?

Who have you not seen on particular shows (or any shows) who you think would be fab?

(I know the one per show quota is still pitiful, but I'm still excited not to have anymore all male panels.)

Re: Favorite female panalists? chaya February 10 2014, 19:41:37 UTC

Sandy Totsvig is fab.

Re: Favorite female panalists? yndigot February 10 2014, 20:14:56 UTC

I'm watching one of her eps of QI right now. :) So sharp.

Re: Favorite female panalists? ms_mmelissa February 10 2014, 20:44:01 UTC

Miranda Hart and Sarah Millican are my faves anytime I see something with them on it I have to watch it.

Thread 44

blackjedii February 10 2014, 19:46:28 UTC

On one hand - yay.

On another hand - they have a female commentator on NBC Sports to handle their Premier League coverage.

She's a pretty blonde who mainly smiles and gives the report and defers to her male commentators to provide coverage and analysis on the games themselves.

Which lessens the impact.

yndigot February 10 2014, 20:58:21 UTC

I will say that most of the most successful female panel show guests I can think of that you see a lot of now ('a lot' being sort of a relative term) actually do not tend to be the young/blonde/conventionally pretty types. There are a couple who are 20s/30s, thin, conventionally pretty, but also several older women, several less conventionally feminine gay women, heavier women... You really don't see many WoC, though. (Someone mentioned QI as being generally better than some of the other shows at having women, although still quite bad. I'd say QI can be relied on to have at least one woman in more than half the episodes in a series, at least for the last few series, but off the top of my head, I can only think of one WoC who has been featured...)

They do hold their own pretty well too, although some of that depends on the particular shows. Some shows seem to have more of a culture of men talking over any women panalists no matter what they do to be heard. :/

bethan_b_bad February 11 2014, 02:31:54 UTC

To be fair - the number of British female comics who fit the 'traditionally pretty, thin young blonde' mold are fairly small and massively outweighed by those who don't, so I don't think we're going to see that happening. (If only because there just aren't the numbers for it.)

checkerdandy February 11 2014, 02:11:28 UTC

For being more light and fluffy than the other shows mentioned, Never Mind the Buzzcocks is actually one of the best at having women and PoC on their panels.

bethan_b_bad February 11 2014, 02:29:04 UTC

Would I Lie To You? is pretty good as well. And the way it's set up means that there are parts of the show which are always focused on them, so it's harder for them to get drowned out.

In related news: Rebecca Front needs to do more TV as herself.

mdemvizi February 11 2014, 05:41:14 UTC

Love British panel shows a lot. Been watching 8 out of 10 Cats Does Countdown and sometimes they have an all-male panel but luckily Rachel Riley is always there and Susie Dent too. But adding a woman onto the panel would be nice too.