Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
After the war, I went to the BBC monitoring service in Caversham, a suburb of Reading. It was a big aerial system to listen to radio programmes all over the world.
It was sad leaving the BBC; not quite like being divorced, but you don't leave after a period stretching from 1960 to 1999 without feeling a certain number of pangs.
I once worked with Emma Thompson's mother, Phyllida Law. I worked with her on a BBC drama, and she was hilarious. I loved her so much, and she was great to work with.
Hair is also a problem. I remember once, when I was reporting from Beirut at the height of the civil war, someone wrote in to the BBC complaining about my appearance.
I have always loved broadcasting - as a child in Liverpool, I would wake up and listen to Morning Merseyside on BBC Radio Merseyside and wonder, 'How do they do that?'
The BBC does a sterling job, but I'd like to see it do more. ITV does four arts programmes a year; it used to be 28. At least Sky, with its two arts channels, is trying.
For the BBC and others, a free website is an obvious and relatively cheap addendum to their main purpose of streaming news and entertainment on screen to a mass audience.
I'm working harder now than ever before. I couldn't turn down the BBC job because I've never been offered the opportunity of killing three or four people on screen before!
China is starting an English-speaking television network around the world, Russia is, Al Jazeera. And the BBC is cutting back on its many language services around the world.
The other two things are... well, I had a huge appetite for old black and white movies on BBC 2. At the weekends they used to run matinees, and the more romantic the better.
The BBC were not playing the music that was happening on the street so we did an independent production because we knew we had an audience. Then we licensed the album to EMI.
I wish I hadn't lost it, and for the rest of my life I can never again lose my temper on TV. The BBC could have sacked me and that would have been the end of my career on TV.
What comes with a job as a staff member of the BBC is a certain self-censoring that you get utterly used to. You don't say everything you think. You hold back on some things.
SM:TV' is where we learned our trade. It was young, we could try out new sketches every week. When we got better ratings than our BBC rival, 'Live And Kicking,' it was amazing.
It was regarded as a responsibility of the BBC to provide programs which have a broad spectrum of interest, and if there was a hole in that spectrum, then the BBC would fill it.
I come out of TV. I come out of live television, BBC drama: that's where I started first as a designer, then a director. Then I went independent TV, then television advertising.
I have been in discussions with the BBC regarding my involvement with SPOTY after hearing what I believe to be very outdated and derogatory comments from a fellow SPOTY nominee.
It's a 'Doctor Who' budget. A BBC budget, although a very good one. But you know you can't do dinosaurs endlessly for 45 minutes, so there has to be a big 'other' story going on.
Radio 2 feels like I'm still at the pub with all my friends but now my father-in-law has joined the table. But I love it. If I was a stick of rock I'd have BBC written through me.
Sewing is getting more mainstream, helped by the BBC show, 'The Great British Sewing Bee,' and we have to look at those types of things to see how we can use it as an opportunity.
I'm not sure I buy the argument that the public is more mistrustful - the debate will always garner that kind of traction because anything the BBC does is always in the spotlight.
If you are a fan of my BBC series 'Great Continental Railway Journeys,' you'll probably not be surprised to learn that one of my great aspirations is to travel on Egypt's railways.
Inspector Rebus is a great character, so when the opportunity came up to revive the role for 'BBC Children in Need,' and really have a bit of fun with it, I was happy to take part.
When the BBC decided to bring Doctor Who back as a feature film a few years ago, one national newspaper ran a poll to ask its readers who should be the new Doctor, and I topped it.
I used to do all my programming on a BBC computer. It was limited to 16 tracks, and you used the keyboard, not a mouse, to input, but I was using it so long, I got quite fast at it.
Growing up, there was only classical music on BBC Radio. We had to listen to the American Forces Network in Germany, which played pop songs, or the pirate radio boats off the coast.
I am greatly impressed with the BBC's TV adaption of Charles Dickens' 'Bleak House.' The costumes, the sets, the acting and the screenplay are all superb. Every episode is riveting.
When Bob Wilson left the BBC for ITV, I got the 'Football Focus' job, and it went from there. It came completely out of the blue, but the fact I had a high profile certainly helped.
I had a somewhat charmed life. I was brought up at the BBC. I did meet so many people cleverer than myself in those years. Often, I was slapped down and made to feel not good enough.
I did an audition for Henry Hall, a well-known dance man at the BBC, when I was about 15. I have lost the letter I was sent, but it said: 'your voice is unsuitable for broadcasting.'
I've downloaded the BBC's 'Cranford' with Judi Dench because I like a bit of bonnet acting, and I can turn it on and off without worrying about whether I can follow what's happening.
I plan with the BBC African Player of the Year award to become an agent of hope and positive change in the lives of the millions of African youths who have lost hope and are deprived.
My YouTube videos have literally millions of views... Yet I'm still airbrushed out of the BBC Stalinist revision of history; the chart shows have been instructed not to play my music!
I always got very excited about the Masters as a kid. I could hardly wait until the Wednesday when you'd get the BBC's preview. And I'd then be glued to the screen until Sunday night.
I want the BBC to be a mass market public service broadcaster still funded by the licence fee... and the licence fee is more durable than many people in the commercial sector believe.
Following the principle that you should know your enemy, the BBC has assiduously recorded the relentless rise of Rupert Murdoch and his assault on the old 'decadent' elites of Britain.
I've played the leads in two British TV series. I've done a bunch of mini-series. Everybody in Australia is a bit in awe of BBC. I've worked for there, and that was a great experience.
When I was a young kid, the best stuff on television was always the BBC period dramas - it was what we sat down as a family to watch and what people talked about and looked forward to.
The BBC is locked to the reading of the economy that is run out of Ed Miliband and Ed Balls' office. They think if only you spend and borrow more money you can create growth everywhere.
Prior to doing a 'Bond' film, I was a young actor doing classical theater and some BBC dramas. Then, suddenly, I was thrown into this franchise. I had never experienced anything like it.
Americans have this patrician attitude that they have a God-given right to produce these boring newspapers and not be challenged to do it. 'The New York Times' really thinks it's the BBC.
You can talk to someone relatively famous, and they say, 'What do you do? What do you do for a job?' and I say, 'I make documentaries for the BBC,' and you see their eyes just glaze over.
In my opinion, the BBC are one of the best producers of drama in the world, and it made me incredibly happy to get the opportunity to be one of the leading men in one of their productions.
When the news is good, the BBC view is: 'Get the government out of the picture quickly, don't allow them to say anything about it.' When the news is bad: 'Let's all dump on the government.'
The BBC is consistently manipulated by Brexiteers into providing them with false parity in arguments where their views add nothing, represent nobody and are demonstrably and factually wrong.
They respect rappers in the U.S., but in England, it's the Queen's country. She'll forever be putting out the message on these BBC networks that there's no hood: it's tea and red phoneboxes.
An adaptation I was working on of Trollope's 'The Pallisers' has been axed by the BBC... I was also going to do Dickens' 'Dombey and Son' but they've asked me to do 'David Copperfield' instead.
There was a long period where every time someone was shot or stabbed the BBC would call me. I started to think, 'I'm an actor and a musician, I don't want to be a politician or a spokesperson.'
My first boss at the BBC was Aubrey Singer. The main thing I learned from him was discipline. I also learned things about myself: namely, that I hated commuting and didn't really want a 9-5 job.
The BBC TV programme 'Back In Time For Dinner' doesn't just have one of the cleverest titles ever. It is a more-than-usually-serious attempt to recreate the recent past, the day before yesterday.