Antony Cotton

The Betty Driver Story

That Antony Cotton Show

That Antony Cotton Show is a British comedy chat show that was broadcast on ITV & STV for one series in 2007. It was presented by Coronation Street actor Antony Cotton, and aired on weekdays at 5pm. The show was not broadcast in Northern Ireland, due to UTV's news programme beginning at 5.30pm. The show was filmed in front of a live audience at the ITV Granada studios in Manchester. Preview tapes of the pilot circulated before the series began, mainly on YouTube, and were panned by critics as it was simply a copy of The Paul O'Grady Show, which originally was shown on ITV. ITV Productions Granada thought Anthony Cotton would have been either more popular or as popular as with viewers as Paul O'Grady was. That Antony Cotton Show launched with 2 million viewers at 5pm on Monday 13 August 2007. This was significantly up on the slot average of 1.7 million viewers. It also attracted more than Channel 4's flagship daytime show, Richard & Judy, which pulled in just 1.1 million viewers at the same time. However, by its third episode, the show had lost 500,000 viewers, drawing 1.5 million and a 13% share. Viewership continued to fall further for Cotton's show. On 24 August 2007, only 1.1 million tuned in. The show's viewership slumped to below 1.1 million on 11 September 2007.

Soapstar Superstar

Soapstar Superstar is a British reality singing competition produced by Granada Productions which first aired on British television station ITV in 2006. In the competition, ten soap opera actors perform in front of a celebrity panel, which included Cilla Black, Billy Sammeth and Chris Cowey. The contestants are judged on their singing ability, in a format similar to Pop Idol and The X Factor. However in this show, the audience decided which song contestants would sing in the next round. The two with the fewest votes were then put up for the public vote, and the one with the fewest votes from that round was eliminated from the competition. However, the eliminated contestant did get the honour of being part of the judging panel for that show and they got to save one contestant and decide which song they got to sing. Series one was presented by Fern Britton and Ben Shephard, with the ITV2 coverage presented by Jayne Middlemiss and Duncan James. The Voice Over was provided by Peter Dickson The second season began on Friday 5 January 2007. Zoë Ball became the new host on ITV, with the ITV2 show being fronted by Mark Durden-Smith, Sheree Murphy and Rob Deering. Billy Sammeth and Chris Cowey returned as judges. However, Martine McCutcheon and Michael Ball replaced Cilla Black as judges. David Gest was also a guest judge for one episode. This was due to Michael Ball coaching the stars on how to sing songs from musicals. The Vocal Academy based in Manchester supplied the vocal coaching for the stars. The second season coaches were Joe, Jerone & Mandy.

Burn It

Carl, Jon and Andy have been mates forever. They are Generation X-hardened party animals but their party train is grinding to a halt. Andy is getting married. They never thought it would come to this. They have spent 10 years running away from responsibility but now they've reached 30 it has suddenly hit them between the eyes.

Having It Off

Having it Off is a one-off TV comedy series for BBC Choice made by Red Production Company in 2002. It was set at a cheap hairdressing salon in Eccles, Greater Manchester. It was shown only once and is not available yet on DVD. Out gay bitchy stereotype Guy La Trousse, desperately tries to escape the drudge of daily wash and crop and change the fortunes of the salon - and his career. This is all thwarted by April, nymphomanic loud-mouthed wife of the hairdressers owner. The BBC website describes it as "rude, crude, strongly working-class sitcom on the lesser-seen BBC Choice, Having It Off promised much yet fell curiously short of the mark, lacking the key that would have propelled it to a higher level". However, tapes have been known to change hands on eBay for high prices.