ITVX

The final quarter of 2022 is likely to go down as one of the most significant periods in the long and remarkable TV career of Kevin Lygo, ITV’s Managing Director of media and entertainment.

For starters, there’s been one of the most successful ever series of the entertainment flagship I’m a Celebrity… Get Me Out of Here!, not forgetting ITV1’s high-profile coverage of the Qatar World Cup, with plaudits for the irascible studio pundit Roy Keane and, crucially, the overdue launch of the broadcaster’s shiny and heavily marketed new streaming service, ITVX.

ITVX drama Riches breaks new ground by putting female Black British creatives to the fore, reports Shilpa Ganatra

You could practically hear the eye roll of black actor Steve Toussaint, Lord Velaryon in House of the Dragon, when he responded to the backlash about his casting in the role earlier this year. “They are happy with a dragon flying. They’re happy with white hair and violet-coloured eyes, but a rich, black guy? That’s beyond the pale,” he sighed.

How refreshing it is to hear ITV being negative about its own online service, ITV Hub. Apparently, it is clunky, looks dated, isn’t a destination, and there is nothing on it. All pretty much true, and expressed only a good chunk of a decade after all those things were clear to the UK consumer. Why this sudden honesty? The imminent launch of Hub’s replacement, of course: ITVX will debut on 8 December.

The trio will return for a new trip to the sunny country of Spain. 

Gordon, Gino and Fred will be travelling across Andalusia and Galicia in their trusty RV to discover the best seafood, wine and tapas the country has to offer. 

In the past, the trio have travelled across France, Italy, Scotland, Morocco, the US, Lapland and Greece.

Viewers will get to watch the bromance and bickering between the good friends as they compete to be the best in everything from driving, cooking, jamón tasting and flamenco dancing.

Sir Peter Bazalgette – ­known simply as “Baz” to colleagues and so many others across the creative industries over which he has towered for the past four decades – recently stood down as Chair of ITV, marking the end of another chapter in his long career.

The two-part series will use exclusive interviews with those who know Becker the best, including other tennis champions. 

Never before seen personal and family archives will help build a picture of who Becker is and how he went from three-time Wimbledon champion, and one of the world’s greatest sporting stars, to sitting in Wandsworth prison guilty of hiding assets to avoid paying back debts.

The highly publicised bankruptcy trial found Becker guilty of concealing £2.5m worth of assets, which led to his prison sentence of two and a half years. 

Session chair Amol Rajan: I understand that ITV has a new product you are keen to talk about: what is ITVX that ITV Hub is not? 

Carolyn McCall: ITV Hub was a catch-up service that was launched six or seven years ago with very basic technology. It was a very clunky user ­experience and it had about 9,000 hours of content. It was never really intended to be a destination…. 

The drama tells the story of Lisa, who, after witnessing a horrific event on platform 7 of a railway station, is made aware of a connection between her own life and that of the event.

Describing the series, Milne said: “This is no traditional ‘spooky’ ghost story. It’s the tale of a ghost on a quest to discover who she was and the events that led to her untimely death. Her story is a celebration of indignation versus passivity and truth versus lies.

The ITV documentary Life and Limb: The Missing Millionairess from Freemantle’s Naked will explore the mystery of the disappearance of Melissa Caddick. 

Caddick was an Australian millionairess who left her home for a morning run in November 2020 but never made it home. 

Three months later a group of surfers on a beach 250 miles south of Sydney made the shocking and gruesome discovery of a washed-up trainer containing human remains.