The South Bank Show

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,^[4] 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."^[5][6]

On Monday 28 December 2009 the final ITV edition of The South Bank Show was broadcast, featuring The Royal Shakespeare Company as its subject. Melvyn Bragg announced on this programme that, after ITV's last South Bank Show Awards in January 2010, there would be a series of ten The South Bank Show Revisited programmes transmitted in early 2010, featuring updates on previous South Bank Show subjects.

The production archive for the ITV series, including unaired footage, is housed at the University of Leeds.^[7]

ITV had 33 series with 743 episodes, from 1978 until 2010.

In July 2010, it was revealed that Bragg had bought the rights to the brand and had first right of access to The South Bank Show archives.^[8] Sky Arts broadcasts South Bank Show archive editions and hosted the South Bank Sky Arts Awards on 25 Jan 2011, presented by Melvyn Bragg, accompanied by a new arrangement of The South Bank Show theme.

Sky Arts revived The South Bank Show with a new series starting 27 May 2012.^[1]

Since 2012 most series only have around 4–6 episodes.^[9][10]

The theme music is taken from Andrew Lloyd Webber's Variations composed in 1977 for his brother, the cellist Julian Lloyd Webber. This is based on the theme from Paganini's "24th Caprice". The brand image of the programme is an animated version of a detail from Michelangelo's Sistine Chapel ceiling painting, specifically the image of the Hand of God giving life to Adam. It shows the two hands meeting, generating a lightning bolt.

There have been many subjects of the show,^[11] including:

Directors who have made editions of the programme include:

From 18 September 2006, ITV released podcast of the interviews from the show, including extra material not included in the broadcast editions.^[14]

The programme has been awarded more than 110 awards (including 12 BAFTAs, 5 Prix Italia and 4 RTS Awards). Pat Gavin's animated title sequences have won two BAFTAs.

The comedy series Dead Ringers often parodied The South Bank Show. It does this in a series of sketches called South Bank, a cross between The South Bank Show and the American cartoon South Park, set in the South Bank of London. In these sketches, Melvyn Bragg is Stan Marsh, Alan Yentob is Kyle Broflovski, Mark Lawson is Eric Cartman and Kenneth Branagh is Kenny McCormick.

A sketch in The Smell of Reeves and Mortimer featured Vic Reeves as Melvyn Bragg (with felt-tip marks on his face) presenting a feature on fictional folk singers Mulligan and O'Hare. Reeves depicts Bragg as an unlikely A-Team obsessive.

Harry Enfield's TV film Norbert Smith - a Life is a parody edition of The South Bank Show.

Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant's second series of Extras featured a reference to a fictional episode of The South Bank Show focused on madcap children's television presenters Dick and Dom.

Private Eye tends to parody Melvyn Bragg's name, and Spitting Image would rather accentuate his nasal accent. As Spitting Image was often aired immediately before The South Bank Show, episodes would often end with a send-up of Bragg, most notably in one episode having him advise viewers to switch off their televisions to avoid watching it.

Benny Hill once parodied Bragg in a 1978 episode of The Benny Hill Show as Melvyn Dragg. The name of the show was also parodied, and it was called "The South Blank Show."

• The South Bank Show at itv.com (Archive)
• South Bank Show Production Archive at the University of Leeds
• Complete list of subjects from epguides.com
• The South Bank Show at IMDb
• Variations performance by Julian Lloyd Webber and Colosseum II, from YouTube