Natural history will continue to be a cornerstone of BBC programming, said BBC chief content officer Charlotte Moore addressing the Wildscreen Festival conference, which is taking place in Bristol this week.
Pointing out that landmark BBC shows Wild Isles and Planet Earth III were the most watched factual shows in the UK market in 2023, Moore said: “we’re committed because it’s the story of who we are, what our place in the world is.” She added, “I don’t just believe in factual television, I believe in specialisms that fit within that.”
This week the BBC has announced several new natural history shows, including Secret Garden, a new blue chip series about our back gardens, from Plimsoll,
While this is good news, it comes at a low point for the industry, with audience behaviour changing and funding hard to come by. Moore described a TV industry in “crisis” and delivered a call to action: “This is our moment to be really inventive. Rather than run away from risk, we absolutely have to run towards it…to be courageous in our vision of what natural history filmmaking really means. ”
“With what is happening to our planet, it matters more than ever before. We have to find a way to push at those boundaries.”
In conversation with Silverback co-founder Alastair Fothergill, Moore talked about her TV roots in the genre, having first worked for Bristol’s Icon Films. The fact that Icon has now closed underscored the on-stage discussion about the need for funding and how funding models need to change.
Moore expanded on the evolution of natural history, with shows since Blue Planet now showing context, some of it presenting uncomfortable truths, plus revealing behind the scenes on wildlife shoots. More recently, finding “the courage to talk about climate and biodiversity issues.”
She talked about the BBC’s seven-year Our Changing Planet series, visiting fragile ecosystems and the Earthshot prize, with Prince William and David Attenborough; and the coverage of conservation stories in upcoming landmark Asia (pictured), produced by BBC Studios NHU.
Moore and Fothergill further explored how the genre has found new stories and new ways of telling stories.
Green Planet changed the lens from animals to plants and Wild Isles applied the landmark treatment to home territory.
Curve Media’s series On Thin Ice: Putin v Greenpeace took a thriller approach.
The insect world shown with shades of horror, deep oceans with a sci-fi feel.
The newly announced series Secret Garden will go into the detail of our gardens.
Moore said Attenborough’s film on bioluminescense Life that Glows (2016) is one of her favourite shows of all time.
She also pointed out that it’s possible to make lower budget productions, such as the hugely successful Springwatch and Autumnwatch.
Asked by Fothergill if landmark natural history was stuck in a rut, Moore replied that it was “a pretty good rut when you’re getting millions watching it.” She also said that soon-to-air Asia was an example of a different approach.
What is an issue is that the streamers piled into the market for major series with similar epic approaches. “Things can become repetitive,” she said.
“The toughest thing is how to make sure there isn’t fatigue over some of those stories,” said Moore. “It’s beholden on all of us to constantly evolve the stories we’re telling.”
Technology has stepped in to help differentiate. Green Planet was in part made possible because of macro cinematography. Using drones to keep track of tigers in Nepal made it possible to follow the stories of individual animals in Asia.
To work in the digital world means keeping people hooked and while BBC natural history has high viewer retention rates, natural history has been experimenting with scripted tenets. “Borrowing the clothes of drama is extremely difficult to do,” says Moore. But Dynasty aimed to tell the story of a family, while Kingdom – the story of four animal species – was scripted with cliff-hangers at the end of each episode.
“It’s a challenge for all of us how we adapt from this channel world to an on-demand world….What is the next turn of that wheel? How do we bring some of the clothes of drama to the storytelling? How do we bring people emotionally and make people really care.”
Pippa Considine
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