The South Bank Show
| The South Bank Show | |
|---|---|
 |
|
| Genre | Arts |
| Presented by | Melvyn Bragg |
| Opening theme | Variation on Paganini's "24th Caprice" by Andrew Lloyd Webber |
| Country of origin | United Kingdom |
| Original language(s) | English |
| No. of series | 32 |
| No. of episodes | 736 |
| Production | |
| Running time | 60mins (inc. adverts) |
| Production company(s) | LWT |
| Distributor | ITV Studios |
| Release | |
| Original network |
ITV (14 January 1978 – 30 May 2010) Sky Arts (27 May 2012 – present) |
| Picture format | 16:9 |
| Original release | 14 January 1978 – present |
The South Bank Show is a television arts magazine show. It was originally produced by London Weekend Television and broadcast on ITV between 1978 and 2010. A new version of the series began on Sky Arts from 27 May 2012. Conceived, written and presented by former BBC arts broadcaster Melvyn Bragg, the show aims to bring both high art and popular culture to a mass audience.
The programme was a replacement for Aquarius, the arts series which had been running since 1970. Presenter Melvyn Bragg was already well known for his arts broadcasting on BBC television, notably Monitor and BBC Two's The Lively Arts. It first aired on 14 January 1978, covering many subjects, including Germaine Greer, Gerald Scarfe and Paul McCartney. It is the longest continuously running arts programme on UK television. From the beginning the series' intent was to mix high art and popular culture. This has remained, and the programme has always focused predominantly on art of the 20th and 21st centuries.
For much of its life, the show was produced by London Weekend Television (LWT) for the ITV network.
In May 2009, ITV announced that the show was to come to an end. Although it was originally reported that the show was ending due to Bragg's retirement, Bragg later made it clear that he decided to leave after they ended the show, and thought ending it was a mistake; according to him, "they've killed the show, so I thought, I'll go as well."
On Monday 28 December 2009 the final edition of The South Bank Show was broadcast featuring The Royal Shakespeare Company as its subject. Melvyn Bragg announced on this programme, after the final South Bank Show Awards in January 2010, there would be a series of ten South Bank Show Revisited programmes transmitted in early 2010 featuring updates on previous South Bank Show subjects.
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