CITV: Children’s TV channel will close in September following launch of ITVX Kids
Children’s TV channel CITV – loved for kids’ classics including Danger Mouse and Rainbow – will close next month.
It is making way for ITVX Kids, the children’s service on ITV‘s new streaming service ITVX, which launched earlier this summer.
ITV told Sky News: “As a consequence of this new streaming approach and responding to the changing ways children and their parents are increasingly accessing content, the CITV broadcast channel will close after the summer holidays on 1st September.”
Rainbow – with George, Bungle, Zippy and Geoffrey, and Rod, Jane and Freddy, was an ITV Children’s classic. Pic: Fremantle Media/Shutterstock
ITVX replaced ITV Hub in December 2022, with the public service broadcaster making moves to compete with streaming giants including Netflix and Amazon Prime Video.
Children’s ITV launched in 1983, sitting across weekday late afternoons, with the digital CITV channel following in 2006.
Aimed at kids aged five to 12, some of its best-loved shows include My Parents Are Aliens, Fraggle Rock, The Worst Witch, Children’s Ward, Raggy Dolls, Woof, Art Attack and Horrid Henry.
Classics that have earned cult status over time include Ghost Train, Fun House, Knightmare, Press Gang, Danger Mouse, Trap Door and Count Duckula.
Pre-school hits included Rainbow, Rosie And Jim and Button Moon.
Actor Matthew Kelly was the first presenter on the channel in 1983, appearing in the links between the shows, while much later in 1993, Stephen Mulhern and Danielle Nicholls became the hosts of the channel.
CITV celebrated its 30th anniversary in January, with an “Old Skool” schedule of programmes throughout the weekend.
ITV says ITVX Kids will “supercharge” its presence in streaming, doubling its current kids’ content offering with more than 100 shows and over 1,000 hours of programming – including comedy, gameshows, live action, animation and sport.
It will be aimed at both school-age and pre-school age children, the broadcaster said.
Existing favourites, including Lloyd of the Flies, Lily’s Driftwood Bay, Claude, Mumfie, Mystery Lane and The Rubbish World of Dave Spud, will all be available on ITVX Kids.
The animated series of Mr Bean, Teletubbies Let’s Go, Sooty and Bob The Builder will also be there.
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ITVX has also said the service’s ambition is to have all of its children’s content subtitled, and around 20% of it audio described.
ITV will maintain its LittleBe pre-school segment on ITVBe and will also offer some children’s content in the early mornings on ITV2 from September.
Recent BARB viewing data has shown that while the average amount of broadcast TV minutes of children’s TV channels watched by 4-year-olds per week has declined by 62% since 2019, viewing has risen by 30% in the same period, demonstrating the “streaming first” trend in viewing habits for young people.
The BBC has also announced plans to stop broadcasting its children’s CBBC channel – home to shows including Blue Peter and Newsround – on TV in the future.
Despite the rise in online viewing, some have argued that not all children have access to the internet.
Spending on original kid’s content in the UK has been slashed following the 2006 ban on advertising junk food to children.
The Young Audiences Content Fund – a £44m fund designed to help support children’s programming on channels including ITV and Channel 5 – was scrapped by the government last year.
Angelina Jolie says although she appreciates being an artist, she would prefer for her legacy to be “a good mother” and to be known for her “belief in equality and human rights”.
The Oscar-winning actress stars as Maria Callas in the new Pablo Larrain film about the opera singer’s life.
Pic: StudioCanal
She has called Maria “the hardest” and “most challenging” role she has had in her career and put months of preparation into immersing herself into the world of opera.
Jolie, who recently reached a divorce settlement with actor Brad Pitt, told Sky News: “To be very candid, it was the therapy I didn’t realise I needed. I had no idea how much I was holding in and not letting out.
“So, the challenge wasn’t the technical [side of opera], it was an emotional experience to find my voice, to be in my body, to express. You have to give every single part of yourself.”
The biopic combines the voice of the Maleficent actress with recordings of Maria Callas.
Jolie believes it “would be a crime to not have [Callas’] voice through this because, in many ways, she is very present in this film”.
Who was Maria Callas?
Born in New York in 1923, Maria Callas was the daughter of Greek immigrants who moved back to Athens at the age of 13 with her mother and sister.
After enrolling at the Athens Conservatory, she made her professional debut at 17 and went on to become one of the most famous faces of opera, travelling around the world and performing at Covent Garden in London, The Met in New York and La Scala in Milan.
Callas’s final operatic performance took place at Covent Garden in 1965 when she was 41 but she continued to work conducting master classes at Juilliard School, doing concert tours and starring in the 1969 film Medea.
Written by Peaky Blinders creator Steven Knight, Maria focuses on the artist’s final years in the 1970s when she moved to Paris and disappeared from public view.
She died on 16 September 1977 at the age of 53.
Pic: StudioCanal
Jolie on changing motivations as an actor
Maria follows the life of an artist fully consumed by the art she creates and even remarks that “happiness never developed a beautiful melody”.
Reflecting on her own life in the spotlight, Jolie said she noticed her own career motivations change over the years.
“There’s this kind of study of being human that we do when we create, and we communicate with an audience because our work is not in isolation – it’s a connection.
“I think when I was younger, I had different questions about being human and different feelings and now as I’ve gotten older, I understand some things and now I have different questions.
“It’s a matter of life, right? And so maybe that’s interesting that this now is a character really contemplating death and really contemplating the toll of certain things in life that I, of course, couldn’t have understood in my 20s”.
Jolie at the New York Film Festival in September with three of her children (L-R) Pax, Zahara and Maddox. Pic: AP
A family affair
Two of Jolie’s children, Maddox and Pax, took on production assistant roles during the filming of Maria and witnessed their mother perform opera for the first time in public.
She says the film allowed them to create new experiences together and for her children to see her approach to playing a difficult role.
“Everyone in my home, we all give each other space to be who we are and we’re all different.
“I’m the mom, but I’m also an artist and a person and so my family has been very kind and gives me their understanding. They make fun of me, and they support me and just as you’d hope it would be.”
She adds: “When you play somebody who is dealing with so much pain, it’s very important to come home to some kindness.”
Maria is in cinemas now.
Tom Holland’s dad has confirmed his son’s engagement to Zendaya – revealing how the 28-year-old meticulously planned the proposal.
Zendaya, also 28, sparked engagement rumours when she attended last Sunday’s Golden Globes wearing a sparkling diamond on her ring finger.
Neither star has publicly addressed the rumours but Tom’s comedian father, Dominic Holland, has now confirmed the pair are set to wed.
He wrote in a post on his Patreon account: “Tom, as you know by now was very incredibly well prepared. He had purchased a ring.
“He had spoken with her father and gained permission to propose to his daughter.”
“Tom had everything planned out… When, where, how, what to say, what to wear,” he added.
Zendaya arrived at the Golden Globes with a noticeable piece of new jewellery. Pic: Invision/AP
Dominic also noted that while most men worry about being able to afford an engagement ring, he suspects his actor son was “more concerned with the stone, its size and clarity, its housing, which jeweller”.
Tom and Zendaya met on the set of Spider-Man: Homecoming in 2016, when they played the titular hero and his love interest MJ, respectively. Their romance was confirmed in 2021.
In his post, Tom’s father admitted fears over whether being in the spotlight could put a strain on the couple’s relationship.
He wrote: “I do fret that their combined stardom will amplify their spotlight and the commensurate demands on them and yet they continually confound me by handling everything with aplomb.”
“And even though show business is a messy place for relationships and particularly so for famous couples as they crash and burn in public and are too numerous to mention […] yet somehow right at the same time, I am completely confident they will make a successful union.”
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Zendaya rose to fame after landing a role in Disney sitcom Shake It Up, and became a household name after starring in Euphoria.
Holland – who has starred in three Spider-Man films opposite his now-fiancée – made his stage debut in Billy Elliot the Musical in 2008.
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