Archive Wild Weather TV man breaks cover for £3m show
| TV man breaks cover for £3m show |
|
The BBC is grooming the investigative reporter Donal MacIntyre to be a "face" of BBC1. After the reputation of his programme, MacIntyre Undercover, was shored up with the conviction of two football hooligans featured in one his programmes, the BBC is eager to promote him as a ratings winning presenter. Lorraine Hegessey the controller of BBC1 has given her backing to a £3m, four-part series about the weather, to be presented by MacIntyre. The programme, co-funded by the cable and satellite channel Discovery, will examine four extremes of weather: hot, cold, wet and dry. It will explore how people live in such conditions, and give an insight into how the weather works. McIntyre and a production team are shortly to begin filming in Greenland. The series will be hailed as a delivery on the BBC's commitment to keep popular science programmes in peak time. There have been concerns that under a reorganisation of BBC channels, science programmes would be relegated. A member of the show's production team said it would be thoroughly researched - not just an excuse to put "dishy Donal in waterproofs standing in the middle of a tornado". McIntyre is regarded as an asset by the BBC, which has had difficulty retaining its talent. His value "wobbled" recently when his investigative series became caught up in legal action. But the football hooligan convictions have given him a fillip and the BBC, after initial caution, is backing his libel suit against Kent police, which criticised his programme about practices at a Medway care home. MacIntyre is still attached to the BBC investigation unit, but it is not thought he will make more undercover reports in the format of his original series. His position at the BBC has not been without controversy within the corporation - the resources allocated to his undercover programme were well in excess of those given to other current affairs series such as Panorama.
|