29 June 2016

Britain's biggest multichannel broadcaster, UKTV, has started producing the TV review series, Telly Addict, written and presented by broadcaster and author, Andrew Collins, for its YouTube channel. The latest episode can be viewed HERE.

The weekly 10-minute short sees Andrew cherry pick shows from across Britain's eclectic range of television output and deliver engaging insight and opinion. The vlog, which had previously been produced by The Guardian and ran online for over five years and for 249 episodes, utilises Andrew's unique experiences, both in front and behind the camera, and demonstrates him to be an informed and empathetic television critic.

Telly Addict forms part of UKTV's social strategy to increase UKTV's exclusive shortform YouTube content and joins the network's acclaimed Dave TALKS, on the platform.

Broadcaster and journalist Andrew Collins said,

I'm thrilled to be continuing with Telly Addict under the protective wing of UKTV, whose original output, especially in comedy, has long been on my watchlist. It began life as a column in Word magazine ten years ago, and it feels oddly subversive that it should finally arrive at a company that makes TV! I hope new and existing supporters will join me for a chat on YouTube every Tuesday.

Head of Consumer Communications and Telly Addict executive producer, Justine Bower said,

As a company that's passionate about television we jumped at the opportunity to give Telly Addict a new home on our network. We love that Andrew's reviews reflect the craft of television and he has grown an engaged and informed community around it over the past five years. For us it's about being part of the cultural conversation around TV shows.

Senior Digital Press Office Manager and Telly Addict producer, Dave Barnsby added,

We've always been big Telly Addict fans so the brief to Andrew was to continue exactly what he has been doing; talking about the best TV on each week in his own inimitable and knowledgeable way. We're excited to be able to continue our YouTube evolution with Andrew by providing more original shortform content for our viewers to enjoy and complementing our longform programmes available for free on our video on demand service, UKTV Play.

Telly Addict is written and presented by Andrew Collins, produced by Dave Barnsby, executive produced by Justine Bower and filmed by Publicity Producer Matt Hemes.

Last week UKTV announced the first major marketing campaign for its fast-growing on demand TV brand, UKTV Play, along with a product overhaul. The campaign recognises the passion that viewers have for certain shows, and affectionately dubs them 'your thing'. Meanwhile, recent digital shorts for UKTV's YouTube channels include the TED Talks parody, Dave TALKS, also produced by Dave Barnsby.

A new episode of Telly Addict will be available to view every Tuesday on UKTV's YouTube channel, which can be found here: youtube.com/c/uktv.

For all press enquiries and interview requests please contact,

Gem Pinkney - Publicity Manager

Publicity images of Andrew Collins for Telly Addict are available from the UKTV Pictures website.

About UKTV

UKTV is the biggest multichannel broadcaster in the UK.

The award-winning independent has eleven imaginative brands - UKTV Play, Dave, W, Gold, Alibi, Yesterday, Drama, Really, Home, Eden and Good Food. These include the two most popular non-PSB channels in the UK and account for 9.31% of the British commercial TV market. The company's most recent financial results showed record-breaking year-end revenue of £319m and EBITDA of £82m. It invested £148m in programming and related launches last year, and is becoming an increasingly significant investor in UK creativity.

UKTV has a truly innovative model, curating brand-defining commissions, high-profile acquisitions and the very best of BBC, alongside programmes originally shown on ITV and Channel 4. The network embraces technology to deliver inspired channels to audiences through Freeview, Sky, Virgin Media, BT, TalkTalk, YouView, Freesat, Amazon Fire and UKTV Play, and distributes its highly valued original programmes to 200 territories.

UKTV is an independent commercial joint venture between BBC Worldwide and Scripps Networks Interactive, Inc. (SNI) - is proud to be the only British television broadcaster in The Sunday Times top 100 companies list.

corporate.uktv.co.uk / press.uktv.co.uk / @uktv_press

About Andrew Collins

Andrew Collins is an award-winning scriptwriter, journalist, author, critic and broadcaster whose hit BBC1 sitcom Not Going Out (co-written with star Lee Mack) won the Breakthrough Award at the Royal Television Society Awards and the Rose D'Or for Best Sitcom. He wrote two series of Mr Blue Sky for BBC Radio 4, and an episode of Common Ground with Simon Day for Sky Atlantic. He was a script consultant on the hit movie The Inbetweeners 2 and was a regular scriptwriter on EastEnders.

Andrew began his career in music journalism at the NME, going on to edit Q magazine and Empire. On radio, he was nominated for a Writers' Guild Award for his comedy series with Stuart Maconie, Fantastic Voyage, on the original Radio Five. He won a Sony Gold for Collins & Maconie's Hit Parade on Radio 1 and went on to co-present Collins & Maconie's Movie Club on ITV. He was the "Teatime" presenter on BBC 6 Music from its launch and broadcast regularly on the station for over ten years. He hosted BBC Radio 4's weekly film programme Back Row.

He is currently the Film Editor of Radio Times and presents the weekly film show Saturday Night at the Movies on Classic FM.