The ITN Nostalgia Thread

Yeah. He also mentioned in the interview how he was told to abandon his labour views when joining Southern

I'd put him in the same place on the political spectrum as Paxo.
Paxo's column in Saga magazine last month was a viscous attack on the competence and integrity of the present government, which speaks volumes (about the government)

Quite rare to see Julia Somerville presenting the EEN - complete with a proper voice over, too. Not just a standard 'the news' one. I guess it's because it was over Christmas.

Was a shame when they axed their full intro. I'd have thought though with her being one of the lunchtime presenters at the time she'd have been regular cover, though perhaps she did News at Ten more often in those days.

Yeah I've often wondered why the Big Ben titles were dropped for the EEN from August/September 1997, yet they remained intact on the Morning and Lunchtime News. What was the point? Surely it only saved a matter of 5 seconds, if that. The other change they made was to change the VO from "the news" to "the early evening news" but didn't also change the Morning and Lunchtime VOs to match. Very strange if you ask me.

In terms of cover, maybe I'm wrong, but I always thought it was Dermot Murnaghan or Nicholas Owen who stepped in to cover most often for John Suchet on the EEN during that era. NAT seemed to be covered more by Julia, John and sometimes Dermot I think. The only person who didn't cover anything for anyone was Sir Trevor. I do feel like they started to sideline Carol Barnes a bit more during this era. She had been one of the main stand-ins on most bulletins back in the 80s and early 90s but by the late 90s she seemed mostly confined to the Lunchtime News and was a main weekend newscaster. By the time 1999 came I think Carol had been largely dropped and then ended up on the ITN News Channel, for a short time at least. Katie Derham seemed to take her place on the Lunchtime and Weekend News.

Yes, I don't recall Carol at all in the early ITV News era. They didn't think twice about dropping Julia Somerville either, though even if they hadn't replaced her (with Kirsty Young) in 2000 I suspect she'd have gone a year later when they revamped the Evening News.

Me neither. I do recall hearing a DAT of Andrew Burt recording VOs for the March 1999 rebrand and Carol definitely had some recorded, though I don't think they were ever used. They definitely voiced a Weekend News one for her, can't remember about other programmes. She must have still been on ITN's books at the time but I don't recall her presenting anything after the 1999 rebrand. She was definitely part of the News Channel launch team and she came back for a stint in 2003 for the Iraq War. But she was most certainly sidelined after 1998.

I'd forgotten that Kirsty Young came onboard at that time. Can you remember how that happened at the time? I do remember there was lots of shuffling about of presenters, particularly female, in 1999-2001. This was the launch team in March 1999:

LTN: John Suchet and Julia Somerville
EN: Trevor McDonald
NN: Dermot Murnaghan
Weekend: Katie Derham, Mark Austin, Nicholas Owen (were there others?)

Can you remember how that changed over time? Did Kirsty come in specifically to replace Julia then? How did Mary Nightingale appear? And Andrea Catherwood? I just seem to recall that at one point Kirsty seemed very high profile and then all of a sudden Mary came from nowhere and took over. Katie never really seemed that high profile to me - she was mostly confined to the Lunchtime News with occasional relief on the Evening News.

The other change I remember is the ITV presenting pool suddenly getting larger in 2000, especially with relief newscasters, due to the News Channel. Andrew Harvey, Ros Childs, Leyla Daybelge et al started filling in gaps here and there as I recall. There may have been others.

I have a vague memory of Mary Nightingale being brought in as maternity cover for Kirsty Young.

Andrea Catherwood left when Kirsty Young started didn’t she? She went over to Channel 5 - did she return to ITV after that?

Vague memory too of Fiona Foster doing some weekends.

Andrea Catherwood returned to ITV when Kirsty went back to Channel 5 (or Five as it was at that time). FWIR, I think she was the most regular presenter of the Weekend News at this point, and occasionally covered during the week.




BIB I certainly remember this. Discounting the Morning News, I remember during the 1995-99 look (and looking back on YT since I was only a kid), ITN's main pool were Trevor McDonald, John Suchet, Julia Somerville, Dermot Murnaghan, Nicholas Owen, Carol Barnes and Denis Tuohy, and other than Katie Derham and Mark Austin joining the roster towards the end of the period, they would all cover each other, compared to the BBC, who seemed to have a much bigger pool of presenters (as evidenced by the recent Presenters count thread). Dermot/Julia were LT presenters, but both regularly covered EE and NaT, and John covered NaT. While Nicholas and Carol covered LT as well as the Weekend posts, with Nick being Royal correspondent, and Dennis doing Weekends as well as Morning.

Did anyone other than Trevor, Dermot, Julia or John present NaT during the 1992-99 era? Only ever seen clips with those four, but it wouldn't surprise me if anyone else had stepped in. Where as during the News at When era, I've seen clips of what seems to be most of the ITV News rota (which was larger at this point) presenting the flagship bulletin.

This article helps a little: https://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-7581/Newsreader-Kirsty-told-rest.html

So, Kirsty must have moved to ITV from C5 in January 2000 (and didn't C5 actually relaunch its news presentation in Jan 2000 with Andrea Catherwood at the helm? They must have done a swap of sorts then) and took early maternity leave in December 2000. I think Mary Nightingale was brought in from January 2001 or thereabouts. According to the article, in December 2000 Kirsty must still have been fronting the Lunchtime News with John Suchet, having replaced Julia Somerville. But, didn't the big move happen in January 2001 when News at Ten came back? I seem to recall Trevor moved to NAT, John Suchet stayed at lunchtime and Mary (Kirsty) moved to the EN alongside Dermot Murnaghan. That probably explains why Mary rocketed to a prominent position out of nowhere. She had been intended to fill Kirsty's shoes at lunchtime but almost immediately Kirsty's job moved to the Evening News.

This is the next article of interest: https://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-77391/The-rising-star-newsreading.html

That one suggests Kirsty left ITV for C5 again towards the end of 2001. Wasn't it around this time, or 2002, when they shook things up again and Mark and Mary settled on the Evening News and Lunchtime became Nick and Katie alternating? Trevor and John seemed to mostly present NAT.

In terms of Andrea Catherwood, she definitely returned to ITV News after her stint at C5. Not sure when exactly. By 2002/3 she was back on ITV and stayed for a number of years then as I recall.

I vaguely remember Fiona Foster doing a stint in about 2002/3 or so. I don't think she stayed long.

I seem to remember Kirsty being brought in for Lunchtime but it we all knew she was really there to replace Sir Trev when he moved on.

Felicity Barr did a lot of weekends too.

Then we had a few random names brought in for the Iraq coverage didn’t we?

You're absolutely right about that pool of presenters in the mid/late 90s. Except for Trevor, who covered for nobody, they all used to cover each others bulletins. I don't recall Denis doing much on weekdays outside of the Morning News but he was a stalwart of weekends alongside Carol, Nicholas and Anya Sitaram. I think Dermot may still have done some weekends in 1995 and shortly thereafter but I think he stopped once he became more high profile on the Lunchtime News.

I honestly haven't seen any evidence of anyone other than Trevor, Julia, John or Dermot presenting NAT between 1992 and 1999. I do know that in 1992, titles were prepared for Trevor, Carol, Alastair, Dermot, John, Jon Snow and Nicholas - in that order. By 1993 Alastair's titles had been replaced by Julia's. And then when the VOs were changed in late 1994 (to "from ITN" rather than "from the HQ of ITN") they had reduced to Trevor, Julia, John, Dermot, Nicholas and Carol, in that order. Although I don't believe Nick or Carol ever presented. I've certainly seen no evidence to suggest otherwise.