Series One of Britain's Got Talent, a British talent competition series, began broadcasting in the UK during 2007, from 9 June to 17 June on ITV. The success of America's Got Talent helped to revive production of a British version of the show, after initial development for the programme was suspended when its originally planned host, Paul O'Grady, became involved in an argument with ITV and later defected to another channel. The judges chosen for the series were Piers Morgan, Amanda Holden and Simon Cowell; both Morgan and Cowell had been original choices during the original plans for the programme before O'Grady's departure. The hosts selected for the series were Ant & Dec, while a spin-off show on ITV2, entitled Britain's Got More Talent would be hosted by Stephen Mulhern.
The first series was won by opera singer Paul Potts. During its broadcast, the series averaged around 8.4 million viewers.
Video Britain's Got Talent (series 1)
Series overview
After Simon Cowell pitched to ITV his plans for a televised talent competition, production was green-lighted for a full series after a pilot episode was created in mid-2005. A dispute between Paul O'Grady, the original choice as host for the programme, and the broadcaster, led to filming being suspended, with production not resuming until after the success of the first series of America's Got Talent. When it did resume, production staff focused on a schedule of ten episodes to begin with for the first series of Britain's Got Talent, with major auditions for potential acts held within the cities of Manchester, Birmingham, London and Cardiff. The initial choices for judges changed to begin with following O'Grady's decision to switch broadcasters, with it eventually finalised on Cowell, Piers Morgan, and Amanda Holden.
Of the participants who auditioned to be in the contest for this series, only 24 made it into the three live semi-finals, with eight appearing in each one, and six of these acts moving on into the live final. The following below lists the results of each participant's overall performance in this series:
- Winner
- Finalist
- Semi-finalist (lost Judges' vote)
- Semi-finalist (eliminated)
Semi-final summary
- Buzzed out
- Judges' vote
- Won the public vote | Won the judges' vote
- Lost the judges' vote | Eliminated
Semi-final 1 (14 June)
Semi-final 2 (15 June)
- ^1 Cowell pressed Holden's buzzer.
Semi-final 3 (16 June)
Final (17 June)
Maps Britain's Got Talent (series 1)
Ratings
Criticism & controversies
Unsuitable participants
During the initial broadcast of this series, two of the participants - Richard Bates, and the Kit Kat Dolls - were removed from the programme, after the producers discovered that each had either withheld or failed to disclose information that would have made them ineligible to be a part of Britain's Got Talent. These fact only came to light when, in each case, an outside source contacted the producers with the relevant information. In Bates' case, his removal was the result of a request made by Lancashire Police. The producers learnt that he hadn't disclosed that he had been placed on the UK's Violent and Sex Offender Register (at that time) for an offence he had committed in 2005. Lancashire Police request was accepted based upon concerns over the possibility of either the offence's victim, or the victim's family, being unsettled by Bates' appearance on television.
In comparison, the removal of the Kit Kat Dolls was done under the instructions of ITV. Unbeknown to the broadcaster, or the producers, three of the members from the act were secretly working as prostitutes, which was later considered a serious breach of trust. This information was later brought to light through an undercover investigation conducted by the News of the World, who contacted ITV with their findings. The group were promptly disqualified as a direct result, per Section 24 of the programme's terms and conditions regarding application forms:
"The Producer reserves the right to disqualify you if you have supplied untruthful, inaccurate or misleading personal details and/or information, have failed to abide by the Rules and/or are in breach of the terms hereof."
ITV released a statement later in June 2007, regarding the controversy caused by the act's members:
"We'd like to thank the News of the World for bringing this gross abuse of our trust to our attention. We have removed the group from the show. As a consequence of this incident the whole band has had to be punished. We feel let down as do their fellow bandmates."
Unsuitable act for broadcast
Following the live broadcast of the third semi-final, Ofcom received several complaints from viewers in regards to the magical act conducted by magician Doctor Gore. The complaints focused on criticism over his act being unsuitable for the show, due to the gruesome nature of the magic tricks he performed. Although the production team stated in its defence that the performance had been reviewed carefully to ensure it would not be frightening, the regulator ruled that the programme had been in breach of the broadcasting code that concerned the protection of children from unsuitable material.
References
Source of the article : Wikipedia
0 Comments