Obituary
Majpker of many fine arts docks for the Beeb.
His mid-70s doc on Bowie remains a classic
Alan Yentob
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Musings on the byways of popular culture
Musings on the byways of popular culture
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He seems to have been a man who was interested in all the arts and, I’ve read in a couple of tributes, used his bulging address book to laudable ends for charity events.
Played himself in a later series of “Ideal” quite memorably.
Sense of humour and self deprecation too.
He did a spoof doc on the demise of Never Mind The Buzzcocks and played it dead straight.
Remember seeing him at Kings Cross station a few years back, with an elderly fellow, who my wife after a casual glance thought might be his father. After a second glance, we realised it was actually Mel Brooks! We were returning to Newcastle after a night at the theatre in London and they were coming up for the premiere of Young Frankenstein, which was having a tryout run in Newcastle before opening in the West End. We later learned that Alan Yentob had been making a documentary about him, which was on the box a few months later after the show had opened in London.
Not a “majpker”, but certainly one of the most important BBC figures of our time.
He will be missed. I also admired that he was originally a Leeds University graduate who got onto a BBC entry scheme, so not from the usual Oxbridge set.