BBC
Who's laughing now? Cancel culture is killing comedy
The BBC and Channel 4 are self-censoring their comedy output because they are so terrified of offending people. So says…
The Beeb could turn this script into TV gold: Howerd's End reviewed
It’s touch and go whether the theatre will survive this latest assault. Some venues have pushed back their entire programme…
Is The Undoing properly great or just a run-of-mill thriller with a brilliant casting director?
There must be some people somewhere who vaguely know their own spouses — but if so, they don’t tend to…
Did Panorama use tabloid methods to lure Diana?
As time passes, there is — blessedly — ever less need to pay attention to ‘untold’ stories about Diana, Princess…
Spare us David Hare
Having not watched television for nine months and already growing bored of the 1,000-piece jigsaw of General Alfredo Stroessner (part…
A beautiful radio adaptation: Radio 4’s The Housing Lark reviewed
Nineteen fifty-six: the Suez crisis, the first Tesco, Jim Laker takes 19 wickets in a match. But also: Trinidadian pianist…
Who’s missing from that list of Great Black Britons
There are two striking things about the new book, 100 Great Black Britons, which was compiled to celebrate the achievements…
Letters: The sorry state of BBC sport
Misplaced Trust Sir: Charles Moore is as ever bang on target (The Spectator’s Notes, 26 September). National Trust members have…
BBC sports coverage is becoming unwatchable
BBC sports coverage is becoming unwatchable
Impartiality and the battle for broadcast
Two big kites were launched by the Sunday Times that could, should they fly, redraw the broadcasting landscape. ‘BBC critics…
Charles Moore on BBC reform
Former editor of The Spectator and Daily Telegraph Charles Moore is tipped to become chairman of the BBC. Despite being…
Paul Dacre and Boris Johnson: 'the Boston strangler' and the 'alley cat'
Paul Dacre, the former editor of the Daily Mail, has reportedly been asked by the Prime Minister to chair the…
What I would do if I were in charge of the BBC
Gstaad I’ve been wrestling all week with indecision, the kind that tests one’s soul, and the uncertainty is killing me.…
Affectionate and unthreatening, just like usual: Last Night of the Proms reviewed
The Last Night of the Proms came and went, and it was pretty much as anyone might have predicted, if…
Letters: In defence of seagulls
China’s covered Sir: If Charles Moore had contacted the BBC, rather than conducting a fruitless Google search, we would have…
Our Belarusian blind spot
I’d always rather liked the Finns, until I came across the conductor Dalia Stasevska. When I asked my mother what…
A convincing and hair-raising depiction of showbiz at its most luridly weird: I Hate Suzie reviewed
Fifteen minutes into the first episode of I Hate Suzie, main character Suzie Pickles was doing a photoshoot in her…
The BBC’s future is hanging by a thread
Reading the speech Tony Hall gave to the Edinburgh Television Festival, I was struck by his upbeat, confident tone. The…
My pronouncement on the BBC
Radio 4 recently ran an adaptation of Albert Camus’s The Plague in which the protagonist, Dr Bernard Rieux, was transformed…
The absurd self-pity of Stuart Broad
You are, shall we say, a famous commentator, one of a tiny elite in the British media. You are paid…
Is Chris Packham finally facing facts on shooting?
Chris Packham is widely seen as the most extreme of well-known animal rights activists. His obsessions against hunting and shooting…
The only things left worth watching on the BBC are foreign buy-ins like The Last Wave
Soon, very soon now — even sooner than I imagined, if A Suitable Boy turns out to be as lacklustre…
From riveting Hitchockian melodrama to bigoted drivel: BBC’s Unprecedented reviewed
Back to the West End at last. After a four- month lay-off, I grabbed the first available chance to catch…
The real Rupert Murdoch, by Kelvin MacKenzie
The BBC documentary on Rupert Murdoch is pure one-sided bile, says Kelvin MacKenzie
Young people have never paid attention to the BBC
In January, the director-general of the BBC, Lord Hall of Birkenhead, announced that the corporation intended to shift away from…
