The Cube and Flying Monsters 3D amongst Bafta Winners

Graham Norton hosteda Baftas which served up a few surprises and a few popular decisions tonight.

Best Special Factual went to Sir David Attenborough’s Flying Monsters 3D for Sky. Producer Anthony Geffen commented that Sir David had now won Baftas for programmes in black and white, colour, high definition and now 3D and that that would never be equalled.

A shocked Lauren Socha picked up Best Supporting Actress for her role in Misfits but there were no surprises when Eastenders won Best Continuing Drama. Martin Freeman joked that he expected to win his Best Supporting Actor award for Sherlock and thanked co-star Benedict Cumberbatch.

Artist Tracey Emin stuttered through her presentation of the Best Current Affairs award which finally went to Zimbabwe’s Forgotten Children. The producers described BBC Four as ‘awesome’ for commissioning the project and spoke about viewers who raised a fund via Facebook to take care of the children in the film and provide a feeding programme in the Zimbabwean town in which the show was filmed.

Best Sitcom was presented by Bradley Walsh and went to Rev starring Tom Hollander. He and co-creator James Wood thanked Big Talk productions and all the vicars from whom they gathered the writing material. Best Single Drama went to The Road to Coronation Street starring David Dawson, Linda Baron and Jessie Wallace.

BBC Two’s Welcome to Lagos won Best Factual Series whilst Richard Curtis and James Cordon presented a Special Bafta to Tiger Aspect exec and Comic Relief board member Peter Bennet Jones. He championed the relationship between the BBC, Comic Relief and the general public. He said “The BBC’s ongoing commitment to Comic Relief is exemplary and I’m thrilled to be able to announce that thanks to this support the 2011 campaign has broken all records and is now at £102 million pounds and rising”.

Male Performance in a Comedy Programme went to Steve Coogan for The Trip. He joked “This was the hardest role I’ve ever had to prepare for.” He revealed that he and Rob Brydon thought the show was a terrible idea but that director Michael Winterbottom persuaded them otherwise.

Best Drama Serial was awarded to Any Human Heart and Best Female Performance in a Comedy Programme went to a clearly delighted Jo Brand for Getting On on BBC Four. She said “Over the years I have been so slagged off by the critics for my acting performance and I’m gettin an enormous amount of schadenfreude.”

The Lou Grade award for Best Entertainment Programme went to The Cube. On his twitter presenter Philip Schofield said “The Cube wins a Bafta! Yahooo!”.  The Sport award was won by BBC 1′s coverage of the Abu Dhabi Formula 1 Grand Prix.

The only award voted for by viewers was the YouTube Audience Award which was presented by the cast of The Inbetweeners, who reassured nominees that it was ‘a real Bafta’. The victor was The Only Way is Essex.

Daniel Rigby was the surprise recipient of the Best Actor award for Eric and Ernie. He beat off stiff competition from Jim Broadbent, Matt Smith and Benedict Cumberbatch. He said “I am absolutely gobsmacked. I’m aware that this comes from hanging off the coat tails of Eric Morecambe and I’m grateful to him for being alive and being funny.”

Best Leading Actress went to Vicky McClure for This Is England ’86. “I want to thank Shane Meadows, who’s a genius and Johnny Harris, my best friend and the most stunning actor I’ve ever worked with” she said.

The Fellowship was awarded to Sir Trevor McDonald and presented by Jon Snow and cricketer Kevin Pietersen. Accepting the award to a standing ovation he said “This represents the solid good fortune of a lifetimes workd but also work ehich has involved a number of people. To them all I am terribly terribly grateful.” Talkingabout the challenges of the newsroom he said “these people that govern us are responsible to us and they must speak in our name. We must keep pioneering the business of challenging investigative journalism because they must be held accountable for what they do.”

Also awarded

Comedy Programme – Harry and Paul

New Media – Wallace and Gromit’s World of Invention

Single Documentary – Between Life and Death

International – The Killing

News Coverage – ITV News at Ten for the Cumbria murders

Features – Hugh’s Fish Fight

Posted by Kirsty Walker on May 22, 2011. Filed under Awards,Featured,Headline,News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. Both comments and pings are currently closed.