BBC Appoints Head of Flagship Channel as Director of Television

LONDON -0 The BBC has appointed Danny Cohen, controller of its flagship channel BBC One, to the post of director of television.

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He takes on the last major executive role, which previously came with the title "director of vision," that new BBC director general Tony Hall has been looking to fill. In his new role, Cohen will oversee the BBC's four main TV networks, their online content, BBC Films and TV production arm BBC Productions.

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The BBC's former Olympics coverage supervisor, Roger Mosey, had taken on the job on an interim basis in August.

Cohen has been in charge of BBC One since 2010 and is the youngest person to be appointed as its head. He took over the network after three years as controller of BBC Three where he ordered such programs as Afghanistan documentary series Our War.

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Cohen previously worked at Channel 4 as head of factual entertainment and was also in charge of channel E4. During that time, he brought in such shows as Skins, The Inbetweeners and Supernanny.

For BBC One, which remains the most watched network in the U.K., 2012 was a banner year in the ratings that included coverage of the London Summer Olympics. The network did draw some criticism, though, for parts of its coverage of Queen Elizabeth II's Diamond Jubilee celebrations.

Hall recently also named James Harding, the former editor of Rupert Murdoch's The Times, as the head of BBC News.

Email: Georg.Szalai@thr.com
Twitter: @georgszalai