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Alan Yentob
Alan Yentob (11 March 1947 – 24 May 2025) was a British television executive and presenter. He held senior roles at the BBC, including head of music and arts, controller of BBC1 and BBC2, and was the corporation's creative director from 2004 until 2015. He was also chairman of the board of trustees of the charity Kids Company from 2003 until its collapse in 2015.
Yentob was born into an Iraqi Jewish family in Stepney, London, the son of Flora Esther (née Khazam) and Isaac Reuben Yentob. Soon after he was born, his family moved to Manchester where his father was in business with his wife's family, the Khazams. One example of this collaboration were sales of shares in Haighton Holdings in 1951 involving his mother, father and uncle Nadji Khazam. Together they were involved in the UK with various other textile manufacturers plus wholesalers such as Spencer, Turner & Boldero and Jeremiah Rotherham & Co. The families also had dealings in South Africa with their holding company Anglo-African Investments. The public companies were eventually shed and a few consolidated into Dewhurst Dent, in which Alan Yentob still owned a 10% share.
Yentob grew up in Didsbury, a suburb of Manchester and returned to London with his family when he was 12 to live in a flat on Park Lane. He was a boarder at the independent school King's Ely in Cambridgeshire. He passed his A-levels in French, English and History, getting Bs, studied at the Sorbonne in Paris, and spent a year at the University of Grenoble. He went on to study Law at the University of Leeds, where he became involved in student drama. He graduated with a lower second class degree (2:2) in 1968.
Yentob joined the BBC as a trainee in the BBC World Service in 1968 as its only non-Oxbridge graduate of that year. Nine months later he moved into BBC Television to become an assistant director on arts programmes.
In 1973, Yentob became a producer and director, working on the high-profile documentary series Omnibus, for which, in 1975, he made a film called Cracked Actor about the musician David Bowie. In 1975, he helped initiate another BBC documentary series, Arena, of which he was editor from 1978 until 1985. The series returned, for semi-regular editions, until the present day.
Yentob left Arena to become the BBC's head of music and arts, a position he occupied until 1987, when he was promoted to controller of BBC2, one of the youngest channel controllers in the BBC's history. Under Yentob's six-year stewardship he introduced programmes such as The Late Show, Have I Got News for You and Absolutely Fabulous.
In 1993, Yentob was promoted to controller of BBC1, responsible for the output of the BBC's premier channel. During his tenure he commissioned the dramas Middlemarch, Pride and Prejudice and Ballykissangel, and cancelled the soap opera Eldorado. He remained in the post until 1996, when he was promoted again to become BBC Television's overall director of programmes. This appointment was only a brief one, before a re-organisation of the BBC's executive committee led to the creation of a new post, filled by Yentob, of director of drama, entertainment and children's. This placed Yentob in overall supervision of the BBC's output in these three genres across all media – radio, television and Internet. He occupied this post until June 2004, when new BBC director-general Mark Thompson re-organised the BBC's executive committee and promoted Yentob to the new post of BBC creative director, responsible for overseeing BBC creative output across television, radio and interactive services.
Yentob also began to present BBC programmes, which included a series on the life of Leonardo da Vinci and, from 2003, a new regular arts series, Imagine. One episode of Imagine had Yentob explore the World Wide Web, blogging, user-created content, and even the use of English Wikipedia, exploring people's motives and satisfaction that can be had from sharing information on such a large scale. In 2007, Yentob appeared as the 'host' of the satirical Imagine a Mildly Amusing Panel Show, a spoof Imagine... episode focused on the comedy panel game show Never Mind the Buzzcocks.
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Alan Yentob
Alan Yentob (11 March 1947 – 24 May 2025) was a British television executive and presenter. He held senior roles at the BBC, including head of music and arts, controller of BBC1 and BBC2, and was the corporation's creative director from 2004 until 2015. He was also chairman of the board of trustees of the charity Kids Company from 2003 until its collapse in 2015.
Yentob was born into an Iraqi Jewish family in Stepney, London, the son of Flora Esther (née Khazam) and Isaac Reuben Yentob. Soon after he was born, his family moved to Manchester where his father was in business with his wife's family, the Khazams. One example of this collaboration were sales of shares in Haighton Holdings in 1951 involving his mother, father and uncle Nadji Khazam. Together they were involved in the UK with various other textile manufacturers plus wholesalers such as Spencer, Turner & Boldero and Jeremiah Rotherham & Co. The families also had dealings in South Africa with their holding company Anglo-African Investments. The public companies were eventually shed and a few consolidated into Dewhurst Dent, in which Alan Yentob still owned a 10% share.
Yentob grew up in Didsbury, a suburb of Manchester and returned to London with his family when he was 12 to live in a flat on Park Lane. He was a boarder at the independent school King's Ely in Cambridgeshire. He passed his A-levels in French, English and History, getting Bs, studied at the Sorbonne in Paris, and spent a year at the University of Grenoble. He went on to study Law at the University of Leeds, where he became involved in student drama. He graduated with a lower second class degree (2:2) in 1968.
Yentob joined the BBC as a trainee in the BBC World Service in 1968 as its only non-Oxbridge graduate of that year. Nine months later he moved into BBC Television to become an assistant director on arts programmes.
In 1973, Yentob became a producer and director, working on the high-profile documentary series Omnibus, for which, in 1975, he made a film called Cracked Actor about the musician David Bowie. In 1975, he helped initiate another BBC documentary series, Arena, of which he was editor from 1978 until 1985. The series returned, for semi-regular editions, until the present day.
Yentob left Arena to become the BBC's head of music and arts, a position he occupied until 1987, when he was promoted to controller of BBC2, one of the youngest channel controllers in the BBC's history. Under Yentob's six-year stewardship he introduced programmes such as The Late Show, Have I Got News for You and Absolutely Fabulous.
In 1993, Yentob was promoted to controller of BBC1, responsible for the output of the BBC's premier channel. During his tenure he commissioned the dramas Middlemarch, Pride and Prejudice and Ballykissangel, and cancelled the soap opera Eldorado. He remained in the post until 1996, when he was promoted again to become BBC Television's overall director of programmes. This appointment was only a brief one, before a re-organisation of the BBC's executive committee led to the creation of a new post, filled by Yentob, of director of drama, entertainment and children's. This placed Yentob in overall supervision of the BBC's output in these three genres across all media – radio, television and Internet. He occupied this post until June 2004, when new BBC director-general Mark Thompson re-organised the BBC's executive committee and promoted Yentob to the new post of BBC creative director, responsible for overseeing BBC creative output across television, radio and interactive services.
Yentob also began to present BBC programmes, which included a series on the life of Leonardo da Vinci and, from 2003, a new regular arts series, Imagine. One episode of Imagine had Yentob explore the World Wide Web, blogging, user-created content, and even the use of English Wikipedia, exploring people's motives and satisfaction that can be had from sharing information on such a large scale. In 2007, Yentob appeared as the 'host' of the satirical Imagine a Mildly Amusing Panel Show, a spoof Imagine... episode focused on the comedy panel game show Never Mind the Buzzcocks.
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