Iannucci secures an Oxford chair

Armando Iannucci has been made a professor at Oxford University.

The writer, producer and performer has been appointed as the university’s next Visiting Professor of Broadcast Media.

As part of his job, Iannucci will give four lectures in Oxford, starting with  British TV Comedy: Dead or Alive? on January 24.

He said of his lecture series: ‘If British TV has a heritage, then comedy is its most precious commodity.

‘Most people's lists of the best television from the past forty years invariably have great moments of comedy at the top. Today, though, British TV comedy is at a crossroads. Just as it get more daring and varied in format and technique, and just as audiences get more sophisticated in the breadth of comedy they're willing to watch, viewing figures for comedy shows are in decline.

‘Less comedy is being made for the mass audience channels BBC1 and ITV1, while the commissioning of comedy shows is increasingly in the hands of TV professionals under pressure from advertisers and schedulers not to take risks. And reality TV has recently shown that mass audiences can be won over by programmes far cheaper to make than the average comedy show.

‘Over the next five years, TV comedy has the chance either to reclaim the mass-appeal, large viewing-figure slots that were previously theirs by right, or become a fragmented web of innovative, interesting but niche programmes.

‘These lectures will outline precisely how British TV comedy arrived at this crossroads, and the possible routes it can take.'

Iannucci, whose credits include The Day Today, I’m Alan Partridge and The Thick Of It is a graduate of Oxford’s University College and was recently appointed to the BBC’s new team of executives overseeing comedy production.

Published: 1 Nov 2005