BBC News

The BBC had three comedy series running this week, none of which were funny. It's a serious matter when the financial and creative resources of the world's greatest broadcaster can't raise a smile.

The building nicknamed "the concrete doughnut" by Sir Terry Wogan, BBC Television Centre in Wood Lane, west London, has been listed as Grade II on the advice of English Heritage .

Phone-in scandals, the Jonathan Ross-Russell Brand saga, expenses revelations ... the BBC has taken some fearful hits to its reputation in the past year.

"Walking with Dinosaurs -- The Arena Spectacular" is a theatrical arena show based on the award-winning BBC television series.

One of the world's leading singers , the silver-haired Russian baritone Dmitry Hvorostovsky is coming to Israel for only one concert with the Ra'anana Symphonette this week.

PBS' "Masterpiece Mystery" series is devoting a good chunk of the summer months to new productions based on Agatha Christie's classic mysteries, under the umbrella title "Six by Agatha." Two episodes featuring David Suchet as the fussy Belgian detective Hercule Poirot - "Cat Among the Pigeons" and "Mrs. McGinty's Dead" - have already aired.

The corporation is under massive pressure to justify its licence fee revenues, and is being a lot more careful with the content it broadcasts.

The BBC is to tone down the amount of sex and swearing screened following the 9pm watershed, because viewers were dismayed by the moral decline in programme standards.

The BBC's director-general claimed more than 2,000 in expenses for cutting short a family holiday in the middle of the Andrew Sachs telephone call scandal, it emerged today.

A BBC study will attempt to draw a line under the scandal caused last October by the foul-mouthed behaviour of Jonathon Ross and Russel Brand enlarge The BBC yesterday pledged to ban "malicious intrusion, intimidation and humiliation" from its entertainment programmes as part of a review of its editorial standards in the wake of the "Sachsgate" ...

A REPORT commissioned in the wake of the Andrew Sachs scandal recommended new guidance yesterday to ensure BBC programme makers understand that "malicious intrusion, intimidation and humiliation are unacceptable". The BBC commissioned what it says is its most extensive piece of research yet into what its audiences think about the standards it ...

BBC Director-General Mark Thompson used more than A 2,000 of licence fee-payers' money to fly his family home from holiday in the wake of the Andrew Sachs obscene phone calls row, it has been revealed.

Its longevity has been attributed to its family-friendly humor and non-derogatory portrayal of the elderly.

Jonathan Ross is among a select group of high-earning presenters who benefit from lucrative arrangements Jon Ungoed-Thomas and Steven Swinford JONATHAN ROSS is being paid twice for his BBC chat show by picking up a fee for selling it overseas in addition to his reported 6m-a-year salary.

HAVING to say sorry seems to be in fashion. Jonathan Ross and Russell Brand issued snivelling apologies in October for messages left on the answering machine of Fawlty Towers' Andrew Sachs.

It was the moment everyone had been waiting for. The BBC Radiophonic Workshop have a greatest hit of sorts, the theme from 'Dr Who'. Played live and loud during a 'Dr Who' medley it created an unexpected communal euphoria.

The House of Commons will vote on Wednesday on plans to freeze the TV licence fee for one year.

'I have a great idea!' ... Jonathan Ross returning to work at the BBC after his three-month suspension.

THE survival of the wittiest is turning comedians into ego-maniacs ruthlessly calculating how to exploit an audience, a new academic study has found.

Telly star Jonathan Ross is learning Japanese - to make a new show about the country he loves.