On the evening of Sunday 14th May the British Academy of Film and Television Arts (BAFTA) announced the winners of the Virgin TV British Academy Television Awards, celebrating the best television programmes and performances of 2016.
The ceremony was hosted by Sue Perkins at the Royal Festival Hall in London with presenters including Sean Bean, Kim Cattrall, Joan Collins, David Haye, Louis Theroux, and Cuba Gooding Jr.
BBC true crime drama Damilola, Our Loved Boy, scooped up two awards; Best Supporting Actress for Wunmi Mosaku and the award for Best Single Drama.
West Yorkshire drama Happy Valley also won two awards; Sarah Lancashire winning Best Leading Actress and the programme winning Best Drama Series. Emmerdale was awarded the BAFTA for Soap and Continuing Drama for the second time
Adeel Akhtar took home the BAFTA for Best Leading Actor for his role as a single father juggling the pressures of a community based on honour in BBC 3’s Murdered by My Father whilst Tom Hollander won Best Supporting Actor for his performance in The Night Manager.
There was a stunning sixth BAFTA awarded to Steve Coogan as he won Best Male Performance in a Comedy Programme for Alan Partridge’s Scissored Isle and Phoebe Waller-Bridge was awarded Best Female Performance in a Comedy Programme for Fleabag. Meanwhile the award for Scripted Comedy went to mockumentary series, People Just Do Nothing. Michael McIntyre, Ant and Dec and Charlie Brooker took home the awards for Entertainment Performance, Entertainment Programme and Comedy and Comedy Entertainment Programme respectively.
In the category of Reality and Constructed Factual BBC series Muslims Like Us, a show where ten British Muslims of different denominations, backgrounds and faith interpretations lived together in a house in an attempt to show the diversity within the community.
The Special Award was presented to Nick Fraser, one of the leading figures in the documentary field, for his outstanding contribution to television in a career that saw him launch and grow BBC’s Storyville strand and develop hundreds of award-winning documentaries including India’s Daughter, Man on Wire, Notes on Blindness, Project Nim and Pussy Riot: A Punk Prayer.
The Fellowship, the highest accolade the Academy bestows, was presented to Joanna Lumley. With a career spanning 40 years, she has become one of the most acclaimed and distinctive performers in British television.
The evening was an overwhelming success for the BBC who received 19 accolades with closest challenger ITV receiving only 3. Sky and Channel 4 shared the remaining 3 awards between them.
A full list of nominees and winners can be found at the BAFTA website and a full list of winners is below
Fellowship
Joanna Lumley
Special Award
Nick Fraser
Current Affairs
Teenage Prison Abuse Exposed (Panorama) Production Team – BBC Productions/BBC One
Drama Series
Happy Valley Sally Wainwright, Juliet Charlesworth, Nicola Shindler, Neasa Hardiman – Red Production Company/BBC One
Entertainment Performance
Michael McIntyre Michael McIntyre’s Big Show – Hungry McBear/BBC One
Entertainment Programme
Ant & Dec’s Saturday Night Takeaway Production Team – ITV Studios/Mitre Television/ITV
Factual Series
Who Do You Think You Are? Colette Flight, Sarah Feltes, Anna Kirkwood, Helen Nixon – Wall to Wall Media/BBC One
Female Performance in a Comedy Show
Phoebe Waller-Bridge Fleabag – Two Brothers Pictures/BBC Three
International
The People V O.J. Simpson; American Crime Story Ryan Murphy, Nina Jacobson, Brad Simpson – Fox 21 Television Studios/FX Productions/BBC Two
Leading Actor
Adeel Akhtar Murdered by My Father – BBC Studios/BBC Three
Leading Actress
Sarah Lancashire Happy Valley – Red Production Company/BBC One
Live Event
The Queen’s 90th Birthday Celebration Production Team – ITV Studios/Spun Gold Television/ITV
Male Performance in a Comedy Programme
Steve Coogan Alan Partridge’s Scissored Isle – Baby Cow Productions/Sky Atlantic
Mini-Series
National Treasure George Ormond, Marc Munden, Jack Thorne, John Chapman – The Forge/Channel 4
News Coverage
Victoria Derbyshire: Footballers’ Abuse Victoria Derbyshire, Louisa Compton, Jo Adnitt – BBC News/BBC Two
Reality and Constructed Factual
Muslims Like Us Kieran Smith, Nicholas Packer, Oliver Manley, Mobeen Azhar – Love Productions/BBC Two
Scripted Comedy
People Just Do Nothing Production Team – Roughcut TV/BBC Three
Single Documentary
Hillsborough Production Team – Very Much So Productions/Passion Pictures/BBC Two
Single Drama
Damilola, Our Loved Boy Levi David Addai, Euros Lyn, Susan Horth, Colin Barr – Minnow Films/BBC One
Soap & Continuing Drama
Emmerdale Production Team – ITV Studios/ITV
Specialist Factual
Planet Earth II Michael Gunton, Tom Hugh-Jones, Elizabeth White, David Attenborough – BBC Studios/BBC Natural History Unit/BBC America/ZDF/France Television/BBC One
Sport
The Open Production Team – Sky Sports/European Tour Productions/Sky Sports 1
Supporting Actress
Wunmi Mosaku Damilola, Our Loved Boy – Minnow Films/BBC One
Virgin TV’S Must-See Moment
Planet Earth II: Snakes vs Iguana Chase – BBC Studios/BBC Natural History Unit/BBC America/ZDF/France Television/BBC One