Of all the TV studio centres in the UK, Television Centre (TVC) was by far the largest. With eight medium to large production studios, four small ones and a further number of news and weather studios it dominated the industry from the 1960s right up to its closure in 2013. The building itself was huge – only seven stories high, apart from the East Tower, but the area it covered was considerable. As well as the studios, scenery block and restaurant block there were countless hundreds of offices. When they ran out of space in the 1980s they built even more offices on the roof of the scenery runway that encircled the main block. Thousands of people worked there every day – most not having a clue what everyone else did. There was a waitress service restaurant, two cafeterias and many snack bars, coffee bars, delis and tea bars all over the building, not to mention the BBC Club. The Centre contained a travel agent, a hairdresser, a dry cleaner, a florist (called ‘Auntie’s Blooms’) and even a branch of WH Smith.
Its statistics are pretty extraordinary. The main block was 500 feet in diameter and at basement level covered three and a half acres. In the studios nearest the railway line (TC1 – TC3) the walls are 2ft 3ins thick to provide sound insulation. When opened, the building contained 85 dressing rooms, sufficient for 613 artists. There were originally 43 lifts plus 2 escalators to the basement level.
At one end of the building is TC1, which still is a very large studio. In the early years it was used for major dramas like I Claudius, The BBC Shakespeares, various operas and big variety shows like Morcambe and Wise and The Two Ronnies. It was ideally suited in the later years not only to Saturday night spectaculars Like Strictly Come Dancing or The Voice but also the big one-off events such as Children in Need, Comic Relief, Sport Relief and of course every four or five years – the general election. It’s worth pointing out that in the final decade, six of the main production studios were busy for most of the year making programmes that were not sport, news or children’s programmes so were unaffected by the disappearance of those departments to Salford and W1.
Despite the relentless misinformation put out by senior BBC managers (who had never actually made a TV programme there themselves) about the Centre being ‘ill-equipped for the digital age’ it remained very busy right up to the end. Its studios were not only the best designed in the country but were refurbished and refitted for HD between 2006 and 2011. They were very efficient to run, not the most expensive to hire and were popular with many independent programme makers as well as the BBC’s own production departments.
TVC also of course had a unique place in the culture and shared memory of almost every adult living in the UK. The building itself was as easily recognised as Buckingham Palace and somehow felt like home to millions of viewers who had never even been there. It was destroyed by people with no personal experience of the process of making television who relied upon consultants for advice – but they of course were not directly involved in the television industry either.
By the time everyone woke up and realised what a calamitous decision had been taken it was too late. Those responsible moved on from the BBC to well-paid jobs in other industries and indeed in other countries in some cases.
(Reproduced with the kind permission of Martin Kempton)