Animal attraction to finding danger; The hunt is on to unearth the next David Attenborough for Beeb's Natural History Unit.Byline: SAMANTHA BOOTH WILDEST DREAMS SUNDAY, BBC BBC in full British Broadcasting Corp. Publicly financed broadcasting system in Britain. A private company at its founding in 1922, it was replaced by a public corporation under royal charter in 1927. 1, 10.20pm Shows combining a talent-hunt with reality TV are all the rage General Public's All the Rage was released in 1984 by I.R.S. Records. Track listing
But this one doesn't aim to find the next pop sensation or entertainer or apprentice or model - it wants to find the next David Attenborough Sir David Frederick Attenborough, OM, CH, CVO, CBE, FRS (born on May 8, 1926 in London, England) is one of the world's best known broadcasters and naturalists. Widely considered one of the pioneers of the nature documentary, his career as the respected face and voice of British . Or at least, a BBC wildlife presenter good enough to join the professionals, as the winner gets a coveted job at the Beeb's Natural History Unit. Experienced presenter Nick Knowles fronts this series as he takes nine amateur wildlife enthusiasts to assorted African locations. And they're told to remember one fact above all - only food runs away... The advice proved useful when Nick was helping a contestant to learn tracking and the ranger with them realised that an adult male lion was just 20 metres away and showing interest. A lion can move at 15 metres per second so there's no time for indecision: Nick says: "Any animal in the wild is looking to survive. "It's trying to work out who you are and what you're doing there and it has to decide whether it's looking at food or a danger. If it doesn't know, it will generally treat you as a danger and move away. "On another occasion we found ourselves 15 metres from two-and-a-half tonnes of white rhino and her calf. In such a situation you're in its environment and the animal gets to choose, you don't." The nine contestants were chosen from 2500 applicants. Nick says: "They were given some training before leaving the UK but not too much. "We knew they were going to Zanzibar to film dolphins and whale sharks so we made sure they all had swimming training. But when they left they didn't even know which country they were going to. "They are such a diverse group. Some that you expect to do well don't, others who appear to be struggling seem to come through. I really don't think you'd pick the winner at the beginning." But could they deliver the goods Verb 1. deliver the goods - attain success or reach a desired goal; "The enterprise succeeded"; "We succeeded in getting tickets to the show"; "she struggled to overcome her handicap and won" bring home the bacon, succeed, win, come through ? Nick says: "We knew from the start that it could go disastrously wrong. "At the end of the first week, when they came back with the film from their first expedition, I saw it with James Honeyborne, an award-winning NHU NHU Natural History Unit (BBC) NHU Network Hub Unit producer. "It looked like the worst wedding video we'd ever seen. I thought that we had made a terrible mistake here and this was never going to work. "But boy did they dig in - sunstroke sunstroke: see heatstroke. didn't put them off, stomach upsets, homesickness - they just kept on going." The contestants include a factory night-shift worker with a passion for photography, and a fast food manager who spends weekends tracking otters. Their first task is to look for something bigger - they must film elephants, from an unstable canoe. They have the cameras, local guides and elephant expert Dr Kate Evans to help but only one films an elephant. And he risks capsizing by standing up in the canoe. Surrounded by waters filled with hippos and crocs, he's lucky not to end up as lunch! CAPTION(S): ON LOOK-OUT... James Honeyborne and Nick Knowles |
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