0/5

Banff TV winners

Australian TV finalists Mortified and Curtin failed to win an award at the Banff World Television Festival in Canada this week. The two entries lost out in the Children’s and Made for TV Movie categories.

Amongst the winners were The Vicar of Dibley and Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip, which won for Best Continuing Series, rather ironic given it has been axed in the US.

The Grand Prize went to Spike Lee’s Hurricane Katrina documentary When the Levees Broke: A Requiem in Four Acts.

Winning the Reality category was Spanish / Dutch format The Prison Choir in which inmates are seen to bond together to form a musical choir. Prisoners are guided by a music teacher and a psychologist for 2 months.

Given the success of Choir of Hard Knocks for the ABC, this is a format a local broadcaster should option, if it hasn’t been tied up in this territory already.

Under choirmaster Jonathan Welch, the ABC’s observational series attracted good reviews, strong word of mouth and a finale just under 1.1m -an excellent figure for the ABC.

Leave a Reply