Talent Television

CBBC has commissioned Talent TV to produce a second series of "Best of Friends", the breakthrough reality entertainment show for children.

Tony Humphreys, Managing Director of Talent Television said "We are delighted to announce this CBBC re-commission. The first series worked well for CBBC Channel when it was stripped across three weeks in Spring, earlier this year. We are looking forward to going back out to the CBBC audience and making a second run of 'Best of Friends' with them."

'Best Of Friends' features teams of five real-life friends, aged between 10 and 11 years old. Each team faces an escalating series of horrible tasks or tantalising treats, designed to test their humour, loyalties and, key to the format's appeal, their friendship itself. For example, in the first series, one lot of friends found themselves solving mathematical problems against the clock in a stink-bomb filled room, whilst others luxuriated in being pampered at a top beauty salon.

The format is based on an original idea by Mark Robson, developed by Jonathan Wolfman, produced by John Marley and executive produced by Annie Miles. The second series has been commissioned by Anne Gilchrist, CBBC Head of Entertainment and Dorothy Prior, Controller of CBBC.

Annie Miles, Executive Producer and Director of Talent Kids, said " 'Best of Friends' is a breakthrough format which, as with all new reality shows, means that there is a degree of risk when producing it for the first time. Add working with real children and it really was venturing into the unknown! Everyone is delighted in how it turned out - not only was it entertaining and compelling viewing for the CBBC audience, but it showed ordinary kids, in their regular worlds, sharing their views and feelings with us. In this second series we intend to carry this approach further, this time going out to all the regions and nations across the UK, so that we can really reflect kids and their mates in Britain today."

For further information:

Debbie Lawrence
The Lippin Company
+44 (0)20 7745 7189
dlawrence@lippingroup.com

Notes to editors:

Talent Television (part of Talent Group plc) is a leading independent UK format creator and producer of innovative television, video and interactive programming. The Company's reputation for prime-time entertainment programming is unrivalled. The "Test the Nation" series for BBC1 is now well established as a scheduling event which combines the excitement of live network television with state-of-the-art interactive television and web technology. Subjects covered so far include "The Nation's IQ", "Relationships", "General Knowledge" and "The End of Year Test". Talent was also a pioneer in reality television with "The Villa", which was first produced in 1999 for Sky One.

Talent Television also has strong ties with major Japanese broadcasters and indie production companies, having produced several HDTV documentaries for both NHK and TV Asahi networks. And, last October, the "Test the Nation" format was successfully launched on TV Asahi, in association with Japanese indie TV Man Union.

Talent Kids, the children's division, was established last year to develop high quality, innovative programming for kids. Its first commission was for the Disney Channel, with "Inside Clyde", an original adventure game show, the first 13 x half-hours of which was screened earlier this year. This was followed by a breakthrough reality entertainment format for 6-11 year olds called "Best of Friends". Produced for CBBC, the first series of 15 x half-hours was stripped on CBBC Channel through March 04 and is currently being repeated early on weekday mornings.