Inside Look North

From scoop to broadcast with the BBC Look North TV news crew in Newcastle, featuring legendary presenter Mike Neville.

This quick-fire cartoon day in the life of the BBC Look North TV news crew and their ad-libbing anchorman will simply leave you … breathless. Cut to the instrumental track Zorba the Greek, the pressure and pace of the daily race from scoop to live studio broadcast is frantic. There’s a starring role for the genial Geordie presenter Mike Neville, the face of television news in the north east for decades, whose legendary ability to cope in a crisis is sorely tested here.

The South Shields animator Sheila Graber won a Movie Maker magazine 10 Best competition in 1974 with The Boy and the Cat. Spotted by BBC producer Roger Burgess, the animation was broadcast on the children’s show Clapperboard, and the award-winning 12 Days of Christmas was shown on BBC Look North in 1975. This led to a commission from BBC news producer Ronnie Burns for Inside Look North. Mike Neville later agreed to narrate the short story The Pigeon Cree in Graber’s 1986 tribute to the influential writer Sid Chaplin. Born in Willington Quay in 1936, Neville launched his broadcast career with Tyne Tees TV in 1962, later presenting BBC Look North, Nationwide and North East Tonight. He died on 6 September 2017.