BENEDICT Cumberbatch’s World War I drama Parade’s End has received four honours at this year’s Broadcasting Press Guild Awards.
The BBC drama series, co-starring Rebecca Hall, took home best drama and also won individual prizes for best actor and best actress, as well as one for Sir Tom Stoppard, who took the writer’s award for adapting Ford Madox Ford’s novels.
The show won widespread critical acclaim when it aired, often being described as a more high-brow alternative to Downton Abbey.
The awards, presented in London, were voted for by media journalists.
Another notable award went to ITV, which picked up best documentary for its expose on Jimmy Savile, which led to a national inquiry into child abuse.
Broadcast in October last year, Exposure: The Other Side of Jimmy Savile featured a series of interviews with alleged sexual abuse victims of the DJ and TV presenter, prompting a UK-wide police investigation into historical abuse.
It set off a chain of events that resulted in the departure of the BBC’s then director general, George Entwistle.
John Humphrys, whose interview with Entwistle on Radio 4’s Today programme preceded the director general’s resignation, also won the Harvey Lee Award for outstanding contribution to broadcasting.
The judges hailed Humphrys’ “tenacious interviewing of politicians and others in the news”, saying that it had “made his name a byword for fearless inquisition”.
Last year’s Olympics coverage featured prominently among the other prizes, with the BBC recognised in the innovation category for its coverage of the 2012 sporting spectacular.
The accolade recognised the corporaton for its live and catch-up coverage of all 304 events across a number of platforms and devices.
While spoof BBC2 comedy series Twenty Twelve, which took a humorous look at the preparations for the games, was named best entertainment/comedy for what the judges called its “uncanny ability to predict real-life events”.
A further Olympics-related show earned Australian comedian Adam Hills the breakthrough award for his Channel 4 show The Last Leg, which offered an alternative view of each day’s sporting events during the 2012 Paralympics.
BBC2 also won awards for Shakespearean single drama The Hollow Crown: Richard II, documentary Inside Claridge’s and The Great British Bake Off, which was bestowed with the best factual entertainment award.