On Saturday 14 June 2014 at 11.30am, a weekly 30 minute dynamic lifestyle and entertainment show called What’s Up will debut on Sky 1 with two young black anchors. Far from being a ‘new’ show, What’s Up has been going for over eight years, as a training initiative aimed at diverse audiences and made by talented young people.
Joy Francis speaks to the show’s founder Bob Clarke and one of the show’s anchors, journalist and presenter Jacqueline Shepherd, about media diversity and the importance of putting diverse talent in front of and behind the camera.
Bob Clarke is a professional editor with over 20 years of experience. He started his television career in 1982 as a video tape operator for Humphries Video Services before having a wide-ranging career editing light entertainment, news and documentaries and working with broadcasters and independents such as BBC, Endemol, Ginger Productions and Tiger Aspect. In September 2005, he funded an experiment and recruited young adults to make an entertainment show called ‘What’s Up’. Its success led Clarke to launch a charity called the MAMA Youth Project which developed a successful programme for trainees to work on ‘What’s Up’. In 2009 he received a Special Recognition Award by the Cultural Diversity Network for promoting diversity.
MAMA Youth Project has moved from being something you self funded for two years to a fully fledged charity with a commercial arm. Where are you at now?
We have two major backers in BSkyB and the BBC. Also Endemol, Hat Trick Productions, Freemantle, Shed Media and Shine Group have just joined us. Procam, one of the largest hire companies for broadcast equipment, has also just come on board. For the last production of What’s Up, they gave our students access to £100,000 worth of equipment. We have a structure where it takes us 22 weeks on each course, from pre-course recruitment to post course. The training is 12 weeks for technical trainees and researchers. As it is a 22 week activity for us, we can only run the course twice a year. The production training is at our offices in Harlesden while BSkyB and the BBC provide soft skills training such as communications and mentors, and they both supply placements for the students. Sky provides six weeks paid placement at the end of the course while the BBC supplies a six week placement with expenses, though they are looking to turn that into a payment. The other companies offer the same package, with a placement and mentorship. Around 98 per cent of our graduates have an opportunity, after the course has finished, to get a placement, but 82 per cent have been in employment for over six months.
How many graduates have you had since your launch and what have some of the highlights been for you?
Over 400 young people have gone through our programme since 2005, when I first experimented with the idea. As for highlights, every time a young person gets a job is a high point. It’s about the wider impact each time they get a job. What I see are their children and great grand children benefiting. It’s about the legacy. I look at my own life. I would have been classed as disadvantaged, so I realise that this is the case for many of our trainees. In some cases they are breaking a chain of unemployment in their family.
You produce the lifestyle and entertainment show What’s Up, which the trainees work on and will make its Sky debut on 14 June. That sounds very exciting as you have kept the show going for over eight years.
Next year will be the 10th anniversary of What’s Up. At the beginning, the show was put out on DVD. It was free and we put them into fashion stores. Sometimes we went out onto the street to give out the DVD. Terri Walker [R&B singer/songwriter] who we interviewed in 2005 said on camera, What you guys are doing, you are doing it for yourself and one day the TV companies will come knocking on your door. Not long after the Community Channel rang up and asked for the show. It aired four episodes. Then, at a BAFTA event, Sophie Turner-Laing [managing director of content] from Sky noticed our show, which was running in the background. She said, that looks like a good show. I think we would like it as an acquisition on Sky. It went on Pick TV, a Sky channel. TV executives see the show as niche, yet the show’s average reach is 110,000 homes, which beats most of the programmes on ITV2. All this is achieved with no advertising. We have built up the audience ourselves each week. That is why it has a trial on Sky 1. I’m proud of the show being representative of the people who make it [the trainees], who are diverse.
What are some of the challenges facing young BME talent who want a career in the media?
Behind and in front of the camera it is still a great challenge. Progress is being made and there is more talk about it, but I don’t have time for insincerity and people who only want to tick boxes. A lot of TV executives say it makes good business sense but this message isn’t reaching the shop floor as the line managers are still employing who they know. Until you reach the line management and get them to understand that this needs to change, nothing will happen. Executives have to make sure the message hits home. It has to be policed.
What next for What’s Up and the MAMA Youth Project?
I really want to turn Licklemor Productions [the charity’s commercial arm] into a respected production company making programmes for mainstream channels. I hope it will be a company that will see new talent coming in from production side. So many people are making good programmes, but for the internet, as they are not being entertained by mainstream media. I would like us to be seen as a trusted company by the broadcasters to produce programmes in partnership with them.
www.mamayouthproject.org.uk
whatsuptv.co.uk
Jacqueline Shepherd, one of the lead presenters on Sky 1’s latest acquisition What’s Up (pictured with her fellow anchor AJ King), is a presenter and voice-over artist. For three years she presented and produced a twice weekly topical discussion show on Colourful Radio. Shepherd also narrates for the Trace Sport Stars Channel, Sky 442, which is available in 105 countries, on shows, including Trace Sports Diaries and Block Work Out. She has interviewed celebrities such as John Legend, Hugh Jackman, Jeff Bridges, Nile Rodger and Maverick Sabre and tackles controversial subject such as FGM.
When did you first join What’s Up and what attracted you to the show?
I had done a few student productions and some professional presenting jobs while holding down a day job. I had just been made redundant when someone from Brent Youth Radio said a presenter was needed for a shoot the next day and asked if I was free. As I had just been made redundant I said yes. I didn’t know anything about the programme. I just rocked up to Angel, Islington, and this crew appeared. I thought, this is quite a big deal. I was given a bit of background about the item they wanted me to present, then Bob [Clarke] said the show would be on Pick TV. After the show, he invited me to his office to talk through everything. I was so motivated to present, which I love, and happy to have the opportunity to work with a team on something meaningful. That first gig turned into me presenting a few more items. By the next series, the show’s original anchor was getting married and I was asked to be the lead presenter with Fusion. My first series of What’s Up, was filmed at the end of 2010 and appeared on Pick TV at the beginning of 2011.
How would you describe the show?
It is a lifestyle magazine show. It is a bit like The One Show [BBC 1] for a younger audience. We tackle so many different items and themes. It is a show with heart. Behind this magazine programme, which is fun, serious, current and topical, there is a back story. What a lot of people don’t know is that behind the scenes there are a bunch of trainees who have the skills and tenacity to pull off the show. We film six episodes in nine weeks. The show embraces diversity in a TV landscape that isn’t as multicultural as it should be. Where, on British TV, is there another programme with two black anchors? It shouldn’t be a big deal but the fact of the matter is that we don’t see that often.
Now What’s Up is on Sky 1. That is a big move.
Yes, it is. I went to the Roundhouse recently to see a film and spoke to a 17 year old who said he recognised me from What’s Up on Pick TV. He admitted that he watched the show before he went to work in the morning and that he enjoyed it as there was nothing on TV like it. He said he wasn’t into Made in Chelsea or TOWIE. This was a person I was talking to by chance who was channel hopping and came across What’s Up, and has watched it ever since. We tackle so many topics of interest, from fashion to health, and have an ability to appeal to a broad audience that isn’t being catered for elsewhere, unless they go online.
How important is it to have diverse talent behind and in front of the camera?
Looking at TV overall, I would say it’s a struggle to get people of colour hosting shows. London Live is much more diverse but before its launch we weren’t seeing black presenters in multiple roles. There are a handful of presenters, which is great, but not in the numbers it should be. I think it’s about attitude. I was told once before that I probably wouldn’t be considered for a show that had multiple presenters as they already had Angellica Bell, yet they had multiple white presenters. If they have one black presenter they don’t feel they need anymore. This is a conversation I have come across so often that it is both demoralising and motivating as I will keep being relentless in my efforts and hope my talent pays off.
Can you give us a sneak preview of what to expect from your first Sky 1 season?
We have some familiar faces to hook people, and we will be dealing with important issues like mental health and politics. There will also be fun stuff like comedy and music festivals. Any spoilers? Not really. It’s nice to have AJ back on the show. He was in the original DVD series but went off to join Kiss FM in 2011. It’s a lot of fun working with him and you will see a lot of banter between us.
What advice would you give to budding journalists and presenters?
In terms of journalism, just start writing. Write a film or music review. Get your pen moving or finger typing and you will start creating opportunities. With presenting, there are so many opportunities. You just need to get in front of a camera, your phone or tablet. Watch the footage and iron out any glitches. It is about having tenacity and sticking to it as there are so many people who want to do presenting.
What’s Up, series 6, debuts on Sky 1 on Saturday 14 June 2014 at 11.30am for six weeks. The show will be repeated on Pick TV (Freeview channel 11) on Sundays at 10am.