In conversation with Ian Christie, Emeritus Professor of Film and Media History, Birkbeck, University of London and Lisa Kerrigan, Senior Curator of Television at the BFI National Archive.

Dallas Bower was one of the pioneers of British television and cinema. Before joining the BBC at Alexandra Palace as a senior television producer in 1936, he worked as a sound recordist on Alfred Hitchcock’s Blackmail (1929) and Under the Greenwood Tree (1929). Long before television became a household medium, Bower recognised its extraordinary potential, predicting the profound impact it would have on cinema and the film industry.

At Alexandra Palace, he was responsible for an extraordinary series of broadcasting firsts, including the opening night programme Television Comes to London and the pioneering BBC Television Demonstration Film.

Join Ian Christie, one of Britain’s leading film historians and broadcasters, as he explores Bower’s remarkable career, his creative vision and his lasting contribution to the birth of British television. The event also includes a screening of the BBC Television Demonstration Film (1937), introduced by Lisa Kerrigan, Senior Curator of Television at the BFI National Archive.

Created to be broadcast each day at 11am so television retailers could demonstrate receivers to prospective customers, the film recreates the experience of Britain’s earliest television broadcasts through talks, variety performances and drama. Although shot on 35mm film in a studio rather than taken from live transmissions, it remains one of the most remarkable surviving records of the BBC’s pioneering television service at Alexandra Palace.