My Family was scheduled on BBC One on Friday nights after the 9pm watershed to appeal to its target mass audience. As a long-running, popular flagship comedy program, My Family helped BBC One fulfill its aims of providing entertaining programming and revitalizing family comedy. It also allowed the channel to build its brand identity and draw large audiences on Friday nights. Additionally, reruns of My Family were scheduled on the BBC-owned Watch channel to generate revenue and further entertain audiences with the popular comedy series.

1. BBC One and My
Family
How was My Family scheduled on BBC
and how does this comedy show fit
with the institutional aims of the BBC?
QUESTION 4a IN THE EXAM

2. The BBC – Mission and Values
 “To enrich people’s lives with programmes and services
that inform, educate and entertain”
 “Audiences are at the heart of everything we do”
 “We take pride in delivering quality and value for
money”
 “Creativity is the lifeblood of our organisation”
 “We respect each other and celebrate our diversity so
that everyone can give their best”

3. The BBC – Public Purpose
 The Royal Charter and Agreement sets out six public
purposes
 Sustaining citizenship and civil society
 Promoting education and learning
 Stimulating creativity and cultural excellence
 Representing the UK, its nations, regions and communities
 Bringing the UK to the world and the world to the UK
 Delivering to the public the benefit of emerging
communications technologies and services

4. BBC One in Particular
 “Ambitious UK Drama and Comedy”
 “Revitalise mainstream family comedy”

5. BBC One Target Audience
 Mass audience
 Wide range of ages, both genders, different classes,
different regions and ethnicity

6. Public Service Broadcasting (PSB)
 Regulators can tell TV companies what they can or
cannot do in exchange for giving them the right to
transmit ‘free to air’ – Ofcom
 Key rules
 Quality programmes
 Proportion of British-made programmes
 Reflect the diversity of Britain
 Proportion of programmes must be made outside the M25
 Must have certain genres eg news
 Balanced mix of genres (no stripped schedules)

7. Flagship Programmes
 A Flagship programme will attract the target audience
and build channels brand identity
 Need to be of high quality, popular and long running
 Will draw audiences to the channel
 Will be well known
 The schedule will often be ‘built’ around the show

8. My Family – Key Information
 Eleven Series have so far been made and broadcast by
BBC One
 Series One first aired at 7pm on Tuesday 19 September
2000
 The last series first aired at 9pm on Friday 17th
June 2011

9. The Watershed - 9pm
 Illegal drug use, smoking and alcohol misuse should only
be represented with strong justification, and not
glamorised
 Any violence must be limited and clearly justified
 Violence or dangerous behaviour that can be easily
imitated by children must not be shown unless there is
strong justification
 Frequent use of offensive language (mostly swearing)
must be avoided and the most offensive words must not
be used
 Representation of sexual intercourse must not occur
unless ‘there is a serious educational purpose’
 Documentaries can’t show exorcisms, occult practices or
paranormal activities – BUT comedies can

10. My Family and BBC One
Scheduling
 Friday night is a good night for comedy – wind-down
time of the weekend. Sets the audience up for the
weekend – key pleasure of helping to audience to
unwind form what could have been a difficult week
 Screens just after the watershed so can include some
swearing and rude subjects which can appeal to the
target audience and create audience pleasures
 My Family is a flagship programmes that was hugely
popular with audience and 9pm is a very competitive
audience slot

11. My Family and Watch
Watch is channel that you can only access via a pay/ subscription
service. It is part owned by BBC (via UKTV) It is not covered by
many of the things BBC are
In 2011 it started playing episodes of My family ‘back to back’
(about 4 in a row at times) They rescreened every episode of the
first 10 series in the months leading up to the release of the
series 11.
 Why schedule My Family on Watch?

12. Activity
 Using the information you have just heard create a
poster which highlights how My Family helps BBC1
fulfil its aims
 Look at each area and come up with specific
examples. Note that My Family will not do
everything but try to come up with as many ways
it fits as you can.
 There will be prizes
 Presentation
 Information