This Country and the BBC across the UK
Stephanie Marshall
Head of the BBC in the West and South West
Residents in the small village of Northleach - population 2,000 - must have been a bit shocked when a convoy of vans pulled up back in 2017 with a TV crew on board. They were there to film two largely unknown sibling actors from Cirencester, the local town 11 miles away. Even more strangely, the siblings had brought half their family with them.
Fast forward three years and it all makes sense. This Country is a Bafta award-winning series. Each episode has been watched by millions on iPlayer. A recent preview screening of the new series in Cirencester - including a Q&A with the actors - received 25,000 requests for tickets.
In short, This Country is now a big deal.
For me the series symbolises everything that is great about the BBC.
Daisy May and Charlie Cooper brought a half finished script full of brilliant ideas to the BBC. Someone spotted the potential and we were able to incubate their amazing talent. They used their family and friends as cast, the places they knew best as a backdrop and told stories that resonated not just with people in the Cotswolds, but anyone who had grown up in a place where buses only come through twice a day.
It’s home-grown, regional shows like this that the BBC is committed to championing in the coming years.
Already half the BBC’s jobs are based outside of London. That’s up from a third just a few years ago. But we can do better - that's why we've recently announced more jobs in Bristol and Newcastle. We want more content than ever before to be made in our great cities and towns and we want to nurture more shows like This Country.
There’s already plenty about: Angels Of The North in Tyneside, Cornwall: This Fishing Life, Gentleman Jack in Yorkshire, to name just a few recent examples. We employ around 6,000 people in our Bristol, Birmingham, Salford offices, not to mention our more than 40 local newsrooms in just about every UK county. Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland employ many more to staff their national TV and radio stations and online services.
We want the BBC to reflect the rich and colourful tapestry of the UK in 2020 - and we want to fill it with the voices and views that make our nation so unique.
We know that for every £1 the BBC spends it generates £2 for the UK economy and it’s vital that we spread that around. We want to give more opportunities to people to make TV and radio, tell stories and make people laugh wherever they live.
More than anything we want this to be an organisation where a brother and sister can come to us with an idea to film their mates in their local town, and watch as it becomes a Bafta-winning, cult classic series.
