Alan Yentob, the broadcaster, programme-maker and longtime BBC executive, has died aged 78.
The news was shared by Yentob’s family, who said he died on Saturday.
“For Jacob, Bella and I every day with Alan held the promise of something unexpected,” his wife Philippa Walker said. “Our life was exciting, he was exciting.
“He was curious, funny, annoying, late and creative in every cell of his body. But more than that, he was the kindest of men and a profoundly moral man. He leaves in his wake a trail of love a mile wide.”
In a lengthy statement, BBC director-general Tim Davie said: “Alan Yentob was a towering figure in British broadcasting and the arts. A creative force and a cultural visionary, he shaped decades of programming at the BBC and beyond, with a passion for storytelling and public service that leave a lasting legacy.
“For nearly 60 years Alan championed originality, risk-taking and artistic ambition. From Arena to Imagine, from commissioning groundbreaking drama to giving emerging voices a platform, his influence is woven into the fabric of British cultural life.”
Davie said that Yentob believed “profoundly in the BBC’s role as a home for creativity, curiosity and the arts, accessible to all”.
He described the broadcaster as an “unforgettable presence” who was “engaging, witty and endlessly curious, he brought energy and warmth to every conversation. He was generous with his time, fierce in his convictions, and full of joy in the work of others”.
Yentob was born in London in 1947 to a family who left Iraq for Manchester. He grew up in Didsbury until he was 12. The family then moved back to London and Yentob went on to study law at the University of Leeds, where he became heavily involved in drama.
He joined the BBC in 1968 as a general trainee. At the time, he was the only non-Oxbridge graduate and took his first job with the corporation’s World Service.
In 1975, he secured unprecedented access to David Bowie for Cracked Actor, by the BBC’s Omnibus strand, which captured the British artist in the throes of a cocaine-induced identity crisis in Los Angeles.
“Bowie had come to America with an extraordinary cast of characters, all of whom he had determined to kill off by the end of the Diamond Dogs tour,” Yentob said while reflecting on the programme in 2013.
“I’d caught him at what was an intensely creative time, but it was also physically and emotionally gruelling. Our encounters tended to take place in hotel rooms in the early hours of the morning or in snatched conversations in the back of limousines. He was fragile and exhausted but also prepared to open up and talk in a way he had never really done before.”
The filmmaker Nicolas Roeg later said it was Cracked Actor that prompted him to cast Bowie in his 1976 film The Man Who Fell to Earth, as he was struck by the musician’s other-worldly quality: “Almost from that moment, I couldn’t believe it. I felt this was the man,” he said.
Yentob, after working as a producer and director, was appointed head of music and arts in 1985, a position he maintained until being appointed controller of BBC Two in 1988. He was controller of BBC One between 1993 and 1997 and announced as the BBC’s creative director in 2004.
Among the shows Yentob commissioned were the BBC hits Absolutely Fabulous, which was created, written by and starring Jennifer Saunders, and The Late Show. He launched the children’s strands CBBC and CBeebies, and appeared onscreen interviewing figures including Toni Morrison, Maya Angelou, Bob Geldof and Kazuo Ishiguro.
He also commissioned the successful comedy panel show Have I Got News for You, and the BBC’s 1995 series Pride and Prejudice starring Colin Firth and Jennifer Ehle, and widely considered one of the best adaptations of Jane Austen’s 1813 novel.
Over the years, he became friends with figures including Orson Welles, who was the subject of a programme Yentob made in 1982, and Mel Brooks.
Perhaps one of the friendships that caused the most intrigue was one with rapper and music mogul Jay-Z, who hosted Yentob at a Hollywood Bowl show and then at Glastonbury, where Yentob was seen standing on the side of the Pyramid Stage during his history-making 2008 headline performance.
“When I walked in to see Jay-Z for the first time, I was given champagne from Jay Z’s own brand, which he delivered himself and cost no less than 800 bucks a bottle,” Yentob recalled to The Independent in an interview that year.
“He saw me and handed me my own bottle, he was already in the midst of going on stage at the Hollywood bowl. As he walked off I could see Diana Ross arriving to give him a hug and Jerry Seinfeld was walking down the corridor. It's the champagne and the bling. I remember thinking I feel rather stupid standing in the middle of this lot – but that's showbusiness.”
Yentob also defended himself from accusations that his programming strand, Imagine, was a vehicle to puff up his own acquaintances, dubbed “Al’s Pals” by critics.
“People say they’re all puffs, they’re not puffs,” he argued. “If something amazes me or enthuses me I want to share it.”
In 2015, he stepped down as BBC creative director, saying at the time that his role at the charity Kids Company was a “serious distraction”.
Yentob, who was chairman of trustees at the charity, faced scrutiny over his role as well as claims he tried to influence coverage at the corporation of its troubles.
He always insisted there was no conflict of interest in his decision to call Newsnight about its investigation into Kids Company and had not “abused my position at the BBC”.
He was presented with a CBE in the 2024 birthday honours list for services to the arts and media.
“To work with Alan was to be inspired and encouraged to think bigger,” Davie said. “He had a rare gift for identifying talent and lifting others up – a mentor and champion to so many across the worlds of television, film and theatre.
“Above all, Alan was a true original. His passion wasn’t performative – it was personal. He believed in the power of culture to enrich, challenge and connect us. We have lost one of the great creative spirits of our time. But his programmes, his voice, and the generations he inspired, will live on.
“Our thoughts are with his family and loved ones. Alan will be hugely missed as a friend, a colleague, and one of the defining figures in the story of British culture.”
Amol Rajan, the BBC Radio 4 presenter and former Independent editor, paid tribute to Yentob with a video on Instagram and a caption that described him as “such a unique and kind man: an improbable impresario from unlikely origins who became a towering figure in the culture of post-war Britain”.
He continued: “Modern Art never had a more loyal ally. His shows were always brilliant, often masterpieces, sometimes seminal. So much of Britain’s best TV over 5 decades came via his desk. That was public Alan. In private, he was magnetic, zealous, and very funny, with a mesmerising voice and mischievous chuckle.
“He oozed fortitude until the very last. He had his foibles and failures, but Alan Yentob was one of the most generous, influential, singular, passionate, supportive, creative and loved men of his generation. I commend his spirit to the living.”
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