Goodwin: 'People like fairy stories'

A session on factual entertainment provoked some lively debate at MGEITF this afternoon, discussing the success of shows that try to change people's behaviour.

Kelvin Mackenzie, former editor of The Sun, said that too many factual entertainment shows that try to do good are bad for a channel.

Speaking at a MGEITF session today - called F'*ck off, I'm a TV God - he said: "They keep making these things and they don't work, and then it takes over a network."

The panel also discussed the motivations of production companies to make such shows. "Producers should do it to make money, but not to try and get any kind of political capital from it as well, " Mackenzie added.

Of the likes of Jamie's School Dinners, which provoked a policy-changing campaign, he said: "It was a fantastic story...monumentous TV, which was a triumph for him and his production company."

Joining Mackenzie on the panel was Daisy Goodwin, founder and 'head girl' of indie Silver River, the company behind many successful factual entertainment shows. She defended the format, pointing to Grand Designs as an example of where a fact-ent show had 'done some good'. "It has raised people's awareness of what can be done in architecture in this country, " she said.

Goodwin said the popularity of using experts in fact-ent shows is because they are like 'fairy godmothers'. "People like fairy stories and that is what these experts are," she added.

Goodwin also talked about a new show she was working on which campaigned to get parents out of their cars and get their children to walk to school one day a week. In the pilot, made in Marlow in Buckinghamshire, the traffic in the area was reduced by 40%. As a result, Channel 4 is now considering a series from the format.

Martin Durkin, managing director of WAG TV, said the purpose of good factual television was to take a "counter culture stance", as in his Channel 4 programme The Great Global Warming Swindle. "It questioned the science behind climate change," he said.

But Durkin criticised fact-ent shows like Supernanny for merely showing "a bunch of proletariat beating up their kids".

Mackenzie added that we shouldn't get away from what these shows are about: "It's the lowest common denominator, designed so you really enjoy yourself, and to make stars of people who will be forgotten about."