In Shoreditch’s uber-trendy Electric Light Station several weeks back, some of the UK’s biggest disabled stars gathered to usher in Channel 4’s coverage of the Paralympics, and there was fire in their bellies.
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The evening featured talks and appearances from the likes of wheelchair basketball star-turned presenter Ade Adepitan, Strictly Come Dancing winner Rose Ayling-Ellis and The Last Leg host Adam Hills, all of whom will play a part in Channel 4’s coverage when the games kick off next Wednesday. Titled ‘Considering What?’, the network’s Paralympics ad was also unveiled, which challenges the notion that disabled athletes are often dismissed with epithets such as “she’s good… for someone in a wheelchair,” when in fact they face the same battle against gravity, friction and time as able-bodied Olympians. Onlookers were inspired by the ad.
In keeping with the name, the atmosphere was electric and the drumbeat for the Paralympics had truly started, coming a few weeks after – on the other side of the pond – NBC unveiled its most comprehensive coverage plans yet for linear and streamer Peacock.
This will be Channel 4’s fourth Paralympics – it picked up the rights from London 2012 onwards – and the Gogglebox network has seen each one as a chance for a legacy to deepen. That legacy wills out with NBC’s coverage, with disability advocate Sophie Morgan, who made her name presenting Channel 4 shows and now has a deal in place with Reese Witherspoon’s Hello Sunshine. Next week, she will become the first disabled host to work on NBC’s Paralympics coverage along with two others – Lacey Henderson and Chris Waddell.
“Legacy of change”
“In 2012 it was all about showing the Paralympics and giving it the level of attention it deserved,” Channel 4 Head of Sport Pete Andrews tells Deadline. “Twelve years on we need to show an evolution by saying this is not a legacy of perceptions it is a legacy of change. And then as well as trying to change attitudes we also want to try and change people’s behavior.”
The Paralympics, which started as a small gathering of British World War II veterans in 1948 and is now a fully-fledged worldwide competition, runs from August 28 to September 8 this year. Channel 4 and NBC alike will be showing more than 1,000 hours of live sport, kicking off with the opening ceremony on the Champs-Elysées followed by two weeks of elite competition including wheelchair tennis, blind football, para cycling and lesser known sports like boccia, which is similar to bowls and pétanque. Unlike the Olympics, European rights to the Paralympics are held by Wanda-owned international sports marketer Infront (bar in France). The games are shown across the continent on a wide range of pubcasters and commercial nets.
Andrews thinks the athletics in particular will be a smash hit and points to British stars such as racer Hannah Cockroft, who audiences could flock to following Keeley Hodgkinson’s success in the Olympics 800 metres. He also highlights swimmer Alice Tai, boccia star David Smith and 13-year-old table tennis player Bly Twomey, the latter of whom is the youngest member of the entire team. On the American side, NBC correspondent Morgan talks up the inspirational Sarah Adams, the first woman to play on the wheelchair rugby team, along with bona fide stars like wheelchair racer Tatyana McFadden, who produced and starred in Netflix feature doc Rising Phoenix, and swimmer Jessica Long.
NBC has had the rights to the Paralympics since 2008 and is also looking to break down barriers this year. Along with Morgan, Sports Broadcasting Hall of Famer Andrea Joyce, 2016 U.S. Paralympic track and field athlete Henderson, longtime NBC Olympics and Paralympics host Carolyn Manno and five-time Paralympic gold medalist Waddell will serve as hosts. Some will be in the French capital and others will be in Stamford, where NBC masterminded its Olympics coverage. “As support for the Paralympics continues to soar, we are growing our coverage to match the American viewer’s interest and passion,” NBC Olympics exec Molly Solomon said in May with 100 days to go until the games.
For Morgan, her move to the States has been a chance to apply learnings picked up in the UK, and she has trained a group of six disabled presenter hopefuls in advance of the games. Last year, her Making Space Media outfit, which she runs with Keely Cat-Wells, struck a first-look unscripted content deal with Witherspoon’s Candle Media-owned Hello Sunshine.
“When I was thinking about my post-pandemic career I felt like I had always wanted to replicate what was happening in the UK [with disability representation] in the U.S.,” she says. “I went over to see what opportunities there would be thinking there would be a pathway to success, but I found there was very little representation so teamed up with a business partner to see what was happening.”
Morgan, who was paralyzed from the chest down in a car accident when she was 18, credits Channel 4’s 2012 Paralympics coverage as her career catapult, during which she worked alongside the likes of Adepitan and JJ Chalmers. Prior to 2012, she was mainly making shows about disability, but after the games she found herself presenting programs in which her disability was incidental, mostly for Channel 4, including its Crufts coverage.
She believes the U.S. has a long way to go to match the UK.
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“I am living it now [in the States] and feel like the U.S. is where the UK was just before the 2012 games,” she says, evidenced by the fact that disabled correspondents have only just started hosting U.S. Paralympics coverage, which has been commonplace in the UK for years. “That’s not just in broadcasting but is in public awareness. Channel 4 did a massive awareness campaign and they have changed the game. It was progressive and disruptive.”
Channel 4’s Andrews says he is delighted Morgan has graduated across the pond and is keen to turn the dial evermore this year. His team has hired Ayling-Ellis to fill what they believe is the first live sports correspondent role for a deaf person.
Sharing the studio with Paralympics regular Claire Balding, the EastEnders and Code of Silence star’s presenting method is still being ironed out but she will be unable to use in-ear talkback and will therefore be signed information by three signers stood opposite her. She will then both sign and speak while on air, during which she will analyze the afternoon’s action with Balding, interview athletes and react to the latest news from the games. It is both a challenging and fascinating undertaking, which could yield trailblazing results.
“We always try and look for the next innovation,” says Andrews. “It can be a risk but that is what we are here for. Rose is brilliant and we are looking forward to it.”
Behind the camera
Channel 4 isn’t only channelling its Paralympic energy in front of the camera. The pubcaster and Paralympics producer Whisper are looking to extend the legacy to off-camera production in Wales, where a studio in Cardiff’s Tramshed has been erected. Around 200 will work from Cardiff, along with another couple of hundred in Paris, and Andrews flags the difficulty finding accessible facilities in the UK, a driving force behind the creation of the Jack Thorne-backed TV Access Project .
“Whisper’s idea was to leave a legacy in Wales,” he says. “The Paralympics focuses on on-screen disability but we can focus off screen. OBs can be completely inaccessible but our gallery is completely accessible, while we will have the most accessible toilet in the whole city.”
Andrews says the impact should last well beyond the games. He points out that many employed on this year’s coverage have been promoted from their roles at the previous games in Tokyo – a games that was majorly stymied by the Covid-19 pandemic – while some will go on to work across Channel 4’s Formula 1 coverage next year, which is also produced by Whisper.
All of these measures add up to something greater than the sum of their parts – deep, long-lasting change for a minority that makes up around 20% of the UK’s population and yet is vastly under-represented in the TV and film industry. Andrews notes that there is a “there is a long way to go, and the percentages leave a lot to be desired.”
For history-maker Morgan, the next step will be the Paralympics gaining parity with its larger, Olympic cousin.
“The Paralympics is absolutely not given enough of a spotlight during the Olympics and that tells you everything you need to know about how people feel about disabled people,” she adds. “In the UK we are doing amazing things for the games but if you look globally that is not replicated everywhere.”
“Change can’t come soon enough,” she adds.
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