An illustration of how big Doctor Who is in the UK

[23skidoo]

Quick, name the last time NBC promoted the upcoming season premiere of the Fox series House.

OK, how about the time CBS put on a special promoting a TV movie airing on ABC?

Sure, we've seen individual actors make network crossover appearances on talk shows and the like, but face it, in American TV it's simply unheard of for (unrelated) networks to cross-promote series. After all, why give viewers a reason to NOT watch your network? Even in cases where networks are related in some way through corporate ownership, you hardly ever see this.

Yet in the UK, this has happened, and more than once, with regards to Doctor Who.

For those unfamiliar with UK TV, not every station is a variant of the BBC. There's ITV, which is a series of regional commercial networks under one banner (or at least that's how they used to work - I think they consolidated into one a few years back). And there's Five (which aired the non-BBC spinoff "K-9" over the holidays). And cable networks, of course. But ITV and Five are the ones who sell ads. Ergo they (theoretically) have more at stake financially when it comes to ratings.

Nonetheless, here is an ITV morning show promoting A Christmas Carol, complete with a visit to the set and interviews with cast!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f9sbcxpfBP8

You have to know your show is huge when competing networks actually throw their counterprogramming to the wolves! Imagine the Today Show on NBC paying a visit to the set of Fox's series-killer American Idol the week Idol is pitted against some expensive new show NBC wants to see survive. I don't know what ITV aired opposite Doctor Who on Christmas night, but I would assume it wasn't a test pattern.

Alex

 

[wamdue]

There is also C4, however I find it hard to believe that whatever the US version of This Morning is, does not feature similar segments for all of US TV shows.

This maybe more of a cultural thing about UK TV, than about Doctor Who itself, I recall many a Radio 2 DJ blabbing on about Downton Abbey.

ITV aired a 1 hour episode of long running soap opera Emmerdale against Doctor Who.

Talking of culture differnces Emmerdale is not Days of Our Lives, UK soaps are of a much higher quality, and air in primetime.

 

[Rosalind]

^ I suppose Emmerdale targets a totally different audience from Doctor Who.

 

[VDCNI]

This isn't unique to Who - BBC Breakfast will promote X-Factor which is on ITV for example and the competing soaps will get coverage on all channels. DT got coverage on ITV shows ahead of his new BBC drama being shown etc.

Though yes it does indicate how big the show is since ITV obviously decided this segment would be good for their ratings.

Yeah Emmerdale has a different (older) core audience so it held up pretty well against Who. After having seen every show put against it on a Saturday night get destroyed (apart from the odd Britain's Got Talent clash) ITV doesn't put much effort into scheduling against it anymore.

 

[wamdue]

Same show talking about the BBCs EastEnders

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WRlZPet4880

and a BBC Breakfast segment on ITV1s Law & Order UK

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dx5w6jFnNC8

 

[WillsBabe]

I think these days the terrestrial channels all band together in a way to compete against the satellite channels. I remember years ago when I was a kid and the competition between ITV and BBC was immense, so much so that acts would "defect" occassionally from one side to the other resulting in bad will and all sorts of negativity.

 

[Captaindemotion]

This maybe more of a cultural thing about UK TV, than about Doctor Who itself, I recall many a Radio 2 DJ blabbing on about Downton Abbey.

That's what I was thinking. That's not to say that DW isn't a big deal and the Xmas special has become part of UK tv fabric but the significance of this shouldn't be overstated. The stars of 24 were on BBC1 to promote it when it was airing on Sky 1, Jonathan Ross used to feature guests plugging Channel 4 shows, etc etc.

 

[Rarewolf]

Yet in the UK, this has happened, and more than once, with regards to Doctor Who.

David Tennant's resignation from the role was announced at an awards ceremony on ITV. There's generally been a level of respect in regards to cross promotion more so since the early 90s, especially with the institutional shows.

Look at Children In Need. Characters from ITV and BBCs biggest soaps can meet. ITV have always loaned their stars to the BBC's Charity evenings (they used to do their own in the 80s from the BT Tower)

Then you have Red Dwarf's visit to Coronation Street, a BBC4 Docudrama to Celebrate Corrie's 50th

It works both ways. Do you refuse the chance to interview a big actor because he's famous on you rival's channel? Getting them brings their fans to your show, as much as it provides publicity to them

In 1971 Jon Pertwee was celebrated on ITV's This Is your Life, with a scene from a Dr Who location, I think Peter had one during his time too. That was a show that started on BBC, went to ITV than back to the BBC much later on.

That's not to say there aren't some underhand tactics, ITV in particular had a habit of poaching BBC stars, occasionally it backfires. Channel 4 has a tendancy to grab spin-offs of shows other channels sucesfully import - BBC had Buffy, they grabbed Angel (and didn't know what to do with it!) BBC did well with Simpsons, so they got Futurama. BBC Family Guy, they get Cleveland show. They even got Enterprise after BBC being the sole terrerestial Trek Broadcaster. But they do take a lot of risks with shows themselves

Sky do have their own talent shows, they get a few million viewers compared to maybe 5 times that on ITV. Yet strangely the results of the Sky ones make the headlines on Sky News. Its really not big news.

 

[Sindatur]

We have both Morning shows, and evening shows that are Entertainment in general, that will prop for shows on other networks

I actually saw a commercial though, recently, on one Network for a show from a Rival Network, which was really surprising to me. I believe it was a Cable FOX Channel running an advertisement for an NBC channel show.

 

[wamdue]

That's not to say there aren't some underhand tactics, ITV in particular had a habit of poaching BBC stars, occasionally it backfires. Channel 4 has a tendancy to grab spin-offs of shows other channels sucesfully import - BBC had Buffy, they grabbed Angel (and didn't know what to do with it!) BBC did well with Simpsons, so they got Futurama. BBC Family Guy, they get Cleveland show. They even got Enterprise after BBC being the sole terrerestial Trek Broadcaster. But they do take a lot of risks with shows themselves

C4 now have The Simpsons, and C4 had Family Guy when it first started, it also has How I Met Your Mother which was firat on the BBC.

Five has Neighbours from the BBC, Home & Away from ITV, Joey as the Friends spin-off (Friends airing on C4) and Five also had a series of Robot Wars once it finished on BBC.

I remebe the new owner for Channel 5, saying he was going to bring X-Factor, Corrie, TOTP & Panaroma to Channel 5. Only one of those ha he come close to doing so.

I actually saw a commercial though, recently, on one Network for a show from a Rival Network, which was really surprising to me. I believe it was a Cable FOX Channel running an advertisement for an NBC channel show.

yes we have started to see that here as well, has been the case for a couple of years.