Alan Yentob

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Alan Yentob

Alan Yentob (born March 11, 1947) is a British television executive. He was born into a Jewish family in London. After initially joining the BBC as a trainee in the BBC World Service in 1968 he has spent his entire professional career with the Corporation.

In 1973 he became a producer and director working on the high-profile documentary series Omnibus, for which in 1975 he made a famous film called Cracked Actor about the musician David Bowie. He went on later in 1975 to initiate another famous BBC documentary series, Arena, of which he was to remain the Editor until 1985, and the series itself still returns for semi-regular editions as of 2006.

He left Arena to become the BBC's Head of Music and Arts, a position he occupied until 1987 when he was promoted to Controller of BBC Two, one of the youngest channel controllers in the BBC's history. His time in charge of the BBC's second channel was seen as a great success, with a wave of new successful shows being fostered under his aegis, in particular the popular satirical news quiz Have I Got News For You.

Yentob was rewarded for his success in 1993 when he was promoted to Controller of BBC One, responsible for the output of the BBC's premier channel. His time here was seen as another success and he remained in the post for four years until 1996, when he was promoted again to become BBC Television's overall Director of Programmes.

This appointment was only a brief one, however, before a re-organisation of the BBC's Executive Committee led to the creation of a new post, filled by Yentob, of Director of Drama, Entertainment and Children's. This placed Yentob in overall supervision of the BBC's output in these three genres across all media - radio, television and internet. He occupied this post until June 2004, when new BBC Director-General Mark Thompson re-organised the BBC's executive committee and promoted Yentob to the new post of BBC Creative Director, responsible for overseeing BBC creative output across television, radio and interactive services.

In the 2000s, he has also begun fronting BBC programmes as a presenter. These have included a series on the life of Leonardo da Vinci and a new regular arts series, Imagine.

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