Big Brother (British TV series) series 8

Template:Current television series Template:Big Brother housemates Big Brother 2007 is the current series of the United Kingdom reality television programme Big Brother, airing on Channel 4, with a number of closely associated programmes also airing on E4.

The series began on 30 May 2007, when eleven female contestants entered the house. It has been the subject of speculation that further contestants, including males will be added to the house during the run of the series.

This is the first Big Brother series to air in the UK since the controversial 2007 Celebrity Big Brother, and a number of changes have been made to the show, including the omission of SMS voting, and a reduction in the cost of calls to vote for evictions.

Auditions

The first round of auditions started on 6 January 2007 at the SECC in Glasgow where there was a queue of only three hundred people. Auditions were also held in Birmingham, Cardiff, Dublin, London, Manchester, and Newcastle.

Sponsorship

On 8 March 2007, it was announced that The Carphone Warehouse would not return to sponsor Big Brother 2007 after cancelling its sponsorship of Celebrity Big Brother 2007, and on 21 March, that Virgin Media would sponsor the show, for a reported £3 million.

Broadcasts

On 4 April 2007, it was announced that Russell Brand had quit the spin off show Big Brother's Big Mouth. It was reported in heat that there was to be a new guest host each week on Big Brother's Big Mouth, starting with Chris Moyles who presented the first three editions from launch night.

Dermot O'Leary returned again to present Big Brother's Little Brother and, despite rumors printed in the Daily Mail, Davina McCall was back to present the live eviction shows as well as her own spin-off show; Big Brother On The Couch which will air as an hour long show each Sunday and replaced Big Brother's Big Brain which was axed.

Before the launch programme, Channel 4 presented a statement from Ofcom explaining the racism incidents from Celebrity Big Brother earlier in the year. [1] The statement said:

"This is a summary of findings from Ofcom, the communications regulator, about the Channel 4 series "Celebrity Big Brother."

In January 2007, Ofcom received over 44,500 complaints, mainly about potentially racist material.

Ofcom has concluded that Channel 4 failed to handle appropriately the strong content it was transmitting. This resulted in breaches of the Ofcom Broadcasting Code, which is designed to ensure that when broadcasters show potentially offensive, they do so in a way which offers adequate protection to the viewer.

Ofcom has found that Channel 4 breached the Code on three seperate occasions. Its decision to repeat one of these incidents in its early morning show resulted in a further breach for failing to protect children.

There was also a failure in Channel 4's compliance processes which meant that it was not aware of all the relative activity in the House at a particularly critical time. This compounded its failure to ensure compliance of the Code.

These are significant failings. Ofcom has therefore imposed a formal sanction on Channel Four, directing it to broadcast this statement. This ensures that the largest number of viewers will be made fully aware of the seriousness of Channel 4's failure to comply.

For the full adjudication please visit www.ofcom.org.uk

This was followed immediately by a Channel 4 ident, and then the Big Brother titles. Channel 4 also broadcast the Ofcom statement on the morning of May 31 2007 before the early morning repeat, and on June 8 2007.

The launch attracted an average of 6.2 million viewers, until the end of the British Soap Awards on ITV1 and The Apprentice on BBC One, at which point the figures rose to 8 million.

House

After previous speculation that Big Brother 2007 would be broadcast from a new location in Hammersmith, it was confirmed that the series would still be broadcast from Elstree. However, it will be the last series to be so, with a new house being built in Hammersmith for 2008.

The layout of the house remained much the same as the previous series, however the kitchen was moved to the other side of the main living area. Many of the kitchen appliances were scattered around the house, with the oven and heat proof surface in the bed room and the fridge in the garden. The area where the kitchen was situated in the previous series was replaced with a bath and the kitchen sink. This would mean that to prepare food, housemates would have to walk to various rooms in the house and then to the living room to wash up. It also meant that if a housemate wanted to take a bath they would have to do so in front of anyone who would be sitting in the living room where the bath was situated.

The bed room contains one single bed, one double bed, one triple bed and two four person beds. Outside the bedroom window, in the main living area is a lip shaped sofa that the presenters of the show refer to as "the lips". A small room was added between the entrance stairs and the front door, which contained a door to possibly the white room. It has also been reported that there are also many other secret rooms in the house, including a Romany Caravan hidden behind one of the walls in the garden.

As well as the kitchen fridge, the garden also contains a swimming pool, a seating area and, due to the smoking ban that will come into effect in all public places during the series, a smoking area that housemates will have to use to smoke. The grass from the previous series was replaced with Astroturf as during the last series the housemates (and the hosepipe ban) failed to keep the grass alive.

A corridor was added between the diary room door and the diary room which changed colour when the "eye" button to open the door was pressed. The diary room chair was changed to a much larger see-through chair which contained white neon lights. The house also contains a salon/bathroom which contains two large hair dryers and two steam suits.

Housemates

File:BB8 Housemates.JPG

The 11 female housemates entering on Day 1.

Twelve housemates are participating in this series of Big Brother in the UK where they are observed by television viewers 24 hours a day and each week, a housemate will be voted to be evicted by the general public until the winner is left. All of the housemates that entered on the first day were female, before a male housemate - Ziggy - entered the house on Day 3.

Sam and Amanda Marchant

Sam and Amanda Marchant (born June 24 1988) are the first twins ever to appear on Big Brother (UK). They are 18-year old social-care students from Newcastle-under-Lyme. They consider Paris Hilton to be their celebrity counterpart. Their favourite colour is pink and their favourite word is 'discombobulate'.

Lesley Brain

Lesley Brain (born 13 February 1947) is a retired head-hunter and former stand-up comedian from Gloucestershire. She claims to be an acquaintance of the Prince of Wales and Duchess of Cornwall. She is currently living off capital from her previous business.

Charley Uchea

Charley Uchea (born July 1985) is an unemployed self-styled 'it girl' from south east London. She is a former lapdancer and first cousin to Manchester United footballer Kieran Richardson. Charley's entry was speculated by the British tabloid press. She was negatively received by the live audience on the launch night.

Tracey Barnard

Tracey Barnard (born June 5,1970) is a cleaner from Norfolk. During the Live Launch show, Davina likened her to Bez. She rates herself "ten out of ten for weirdness", likens herself to Julie Walters and according to Davina, that when evicted she will wear "just a smile". Newspapers see her to have potential to be a winner as similarities have struck with Pete, the winner of Big Brother 2006.

Chanelle Hayes

Chanelle Hayes (born November 15,1987) is a 19-year old student, at Pontefract NEW College, from Wakefield, West Yorkshire who models herself on Victoria Beckham in, it appears, almost every aspect of her life. Her favourite word is 'Bitching'

Shabnam Paryani

Shabnam Paryani (born October,1984) is a 22-year old temp receptionist from North London who describes herself as "an enigma" and "crazy". She loves clashing her makeup.. She had previously appeared on the Channel 4 programme Embarrassing Illnesses complaining of a "flaky scalp"

Emily Parr

Emily Parr (born,April 151988) is a drama student from Bristol who is told she resembles Peaches Geldof. She describes herself as an "indie rock and roll queen", while she also considers herself highly intelligent, saying she could read from the age of two. She claims she will vote for the Conservative Party at the next election. She has referred to "indie" music as a new genre that was "taking over the country". Her favourite word is 'hoodwink'.

Laura Williams

Laura Williams (born September, 1983) is a nanny from Rhondda, South Wales. She wants to train to be an embalmer. She auditioned at Cardiff City Hall and has tried unsuccessfully every year to get on the show. Laura says her friends have likened her to television character Vicky Pollard and comedian Peter Kay.

Nicky Maxwell

Nicky Maxwell (born 3 June 1979) is a bank worker, born in Mumbai but now living in Watford. She was adopted at the age of one from Mother Teresa's orphanage, and is a Roman Catholic who "drinks, smokes and parties hard" . She expresses views which could be seen as being misandry, but which Davina McCall laughed off as being likely to recent 'man trouble'. Her half-brother stars in the British teen television drama Skins; he plays Anwar Kharral.

Carole Vincent

Carole Vincent (born 1954) is a 53-year old bisexual former sexual health worker, political activist and demonstrator from East London. She has been arrested on numerous occasions for breaching the peace during demonstrations. She was given the loudest and most positive applause from the audience . She also stood for the Respect Party in the 2005 UK General Election.

Zac "Ziggy" Lichman

Zac "Ziggy" Lichman (born January 5 1981) is a male model from North London, and a former member of the boy band Northern Line . He was the first male to enter the house . His entrance was on Day 3 . His entry was also predicted by the press . As part of nomination twist, Ziggy will be the only person to nominate in Week 1 .

Weekly summary

Week 1

On Day 1, eleven female housemates entered the Big Brother house. No male housemates entered the house on launch night for the first time in Big Brother (UK) history. Davina stated at the end of the launch show that one male housemate will enter the house on 1 June 2007, two days after the initial launch. On Day 2 the housemates were given a break-dancing task, they were split into two crews and competed against each other . On Day 3 Shabnam and Carole conducted a Podcast by order of Big Brother. The Podcast will be a weekly task taking part on Fridays and are available for download on the Channel 4 website . The first male housemate, Ziggy, entered the house on Day 3, and was told by Big Brother that he would be the only housemate allowed to nominate for the first eviction vote on Day 6 , the first eviction is expected to take place on Day 10 . In the early hours of Day 4 Charley had an argument with both Carole and Nicky when the housemates ate Charley's food.

Logo

The iconic Big Brother eye has been redesigned to what has been described as a "centrifugal inter-locking RGB rainbow test card" by its designer Daniel Eatock. He has also confirmed that this year's logo "has a very special meaning that will be revealed come launch night" which is blatenlty, the whole female thing, suprised no ones changed this already! .

External links

• Big Brother at Channel4.com
• Big Brother on Reality Central
• Big Brother at Biogs.com