The BBC iPlayer has been named as the winner of this year’s BPG Innovation Award. The Broadcasting Press Guild, comprised of journalists who specialise in writing and broadcasting about television, radio and the media in general, said the iPlayer was “a breakthrough service that has brought online catch-up TV to a mass audience”.
Margaret Thatcher: The Long Walk to Finchley took the Multichannel Award. The BBC Four programme was also named as the Best Drama while its star Andrea Riseborough was Best Actress.
The Harvey Lee Award for Outstanding Contribution to Broadcasting has been awarded to Sir David Frost. The BPG said the film version of one of his greatest encounters – Frost/Nixon – “served as a reminder just how much he has brought to the television business. First as a presenter and interviewer, who managed to combine entertainment with hard-hitting exposes, and later interviewing any world leader who is anybody….. and also as one of the founders of two ground-breaking commercial TV companies, London Weekend and TV-am.”
The awards are being presented at a lunch held at the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane and is sponsored for the third year running by Turner Broadcasting.
Full list of winners on the Broadcasting Press Guild website.
