Celebrity Big Brother - Show News, Reviews, Recaps and Photos - TV.com
Celebrity Big Brother
Daily 9:00 PM on Channel Five Premiered Mar 01, 2001 In Season
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Emma Willis presents this channel 5 show, made famous on Channel 4, With Marcus Bentley as the narrator of the daily highlights show. Since the original series of Big Brother in 1999 in the Netherlands, over 40 different countries have adapted the series with varying rules, all over the globe. From the successful British version a spin-off show containing celebrities as the housemates was launched in March 2001 originally in aid of BBC charity Comic Relief. The concept of the celebrity series is similar to the original series, as a group of celebrity's are locked into a house, sealed off from the outside world and are recorded by dozens of cameras all day long. These Housemates are controlled by "Big Brother", an all-seeing entity whom we never see but frequently hear. During the course of the show (running shorter than the main series, which normally lasts three months), the housemates are required to nominate other housemates for eviction in secret, the names of the housemates who come up the most frequently in the nominations then face a public vote. The housemate who gets the most amount of votes to be evicted out of the house is then required to leave, leaving one winner and a lot of cash raised for various charity's in the UK.
The show is represented in the media by a eye, which has changed for each series, trying to incorporate a theme for the individual series. They are often released before the show actually began and are also used in the opening titles of the show. The theme tune by Paul Oakenfold and Andy Gray is released under 'Big Brother Theme' by Element Four - tweaks are made to the theme used throughout each series. Davina McCall presented the series since its beginning in 2001, until its end on Channel 4 in 2010. BB2 and Ultimate Big Brother winner Brian Dowling took over when the show moved to five. Marcus Bentley has been present in the presenting team since 2001, narrating the daily show which showcases highlights from the previous day in a daily hour long show. However it should be noted that the show has only aired for seven nights a week throughout certain series, the airtimes of shows often differ from series to series as well.
Before each series of the show began on Channel 4, a teaser show aired, Dermot O'Leary hosted the majority of the shows, before his departure to ITV1 in January 2008. The Big Brother house is located in Elstree Studios, Elstree, and Borehamwood. The house links directly to a staircase (adapted for each series), which leads down into a walkway, which is held off to hold the audience. The walkway leads into a TV studio, which consisted of a seat for Davina, a seat for the interviewee and screens behind them. Eviction shows tend to air in two parts, incorporating Thursday's highlights within the first hour long show. These shows were broadcast as live; however there was always a slight 5-10 minute delay as the following Saturday night highlights would show housemates leaving 5-10 minutes before we saw the housemate leave on the eviction show. The announcement of the evicted housemate was made at the end of the first show and then in the second show we would see highlights of the previous half an hour. Davina would then meet the housemate at the bottom of the stairs and lead them through the audience into the studio; she would then interview them about their time in the house. The Finale show went on for up to three hours previously and is broadcast as live; it never featured highlights of the final day in the house, but often featured the return of the previous housemates, seated in an area away from the rest of the audience. In series 2-5, Dermot O'Leary and from series 6 to 7, George Lamb (who co-hosted with, Michael Barrymore and Emma Willis ) had hosted Big Brother's Little Brother , the show what brought viewers up to date with the latest from the house, featured housemates friends and family and revealed exclusive upcoming twists. After the nightly shows had broadcast, E4 broadcast Big Brother's Big Mouth , Russell Brand hosted the show when it began at the start of series 3 and left at the end of series 5, Jack Whitehall presented for series 6. This format changed from series 7, as Davina took the helm and hosted one show a week on Friday nights for an hour. The show was heavily edited for daytime repeats to air on Channel 4 Breakfast in the morning and early afternoon on E4. The shows were also in later series shown on the HD output of the stations and the +1 channel. On a weekend the shows from the night before were also broadcast on teen strand T4 . Throughout the main shows run, the Celebrity series took two years off to make way for spin-offs, Big Brother Panto and Big Brother: Celebrity Hijack . An official announcement was made on August 26th 2009 regarding a renewal of the shows contract which was due to end in September 2010. It was announced that the show would be axed after airing its last series in 2010 due to a large decline in viewing figures. The first series lasted a full week and raised over £500,000 for Comic Relief, been simulcast on both Channel 4 and BBC One. The eventual winner was comedian Jack Dee , followed closely by Brookside's Claire Sweeney . In Series 2, Mark Owen walked triumphant as the winner. Les Dennis came second and Melinda Messenger came third. The charities that benefitted were Centrepoint, The Samaritans, Rethink and the National Missing Persons Helpine. In 2005 a third series was made and this time Bez was the winning celebrity. All of Channel 4's and Endemol's profit from this series' phone vote was being donated to the Tsunami Emergency Disaster Appeal. In addition housemates each chose their own charities who received a share of the money raised. The show lasted 18 days making it the longest Celebrity Big Brother, so far. Celebrity Big Brother 4 was shown in January, 2006 and in a new twist was won by the one non celebrity in the house, Chantelle Houghton . In 2007, Celebrity Big Brother 5 aired, however this series came under a lot of scrutiny as a racial bullying scandal erupted over housemate Shilpa Shetty , involving Jade Goody , Jo O'Meara and Danielle Lloyd . Channel 4 decided that airing a sixth series in 2008 would be too soon, after what had gone on in the previous series and instead aired Big Brother: Celebrity Hijack on sister channel E4. In 2009, Celebrity Big Brother 6 aired, with strict restrictions put upon the housemates entering after the controversy caused within the last series. The series lasted for 22 days and saw Ulrika Jonsson win the series, with Terry Christian coming in second place. This series also saw Mutya Buena walk out of the show 15 days in. In 2010, Celebrity Big Brother 7 aired, with this series thought to be the last, it aired for a record 27 days and promised the biggest names yet. Alex Reid won the series with Dane Bowers coming in second place. Boy George was due to appear as a housemate, however due to legal issues was excluded. Kerry Katona was also due to appear, but due to failing the psychiatric exams beforehand, she was also excluded from the series. In 2011, Celebrity Big Brother 8, will air in August on its new home, Channel five. The show will see Brian Dowling takeover as host.
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