Holby City
Holby City (stylised on-screen as HOLBY CI+Y) is a British medical drama television series that aired weekly on BBC One. It was created by Tony McHale and Mal Young as a spin-off from the established BBC medical drama Casualty, and premiered on 12 January 1999; the show ran until 29 March 2022. It follows the lives of medical and ancillary staff at the fictional Holby City Hospital, the same hospital as Casualty, in the fictional city of Holby, and features occasional crossovers of characters and plots with both Casualty (which include dedicated episodes broadcast as Casualty@Holby City) and the show's 2007 police procedural spin-off HolbyBlue. It began with eleven main characters in its first series, all of whom subsequently left the show. New main characters were then periodically written in and out, with a core of around fifteen main actors employed at any given time. In casting the first series, Young sought actors who were already well known in the television industry, something which has continued throughout its history, with cast members including Patsy Kensit, Jane Asher, Robert Powell, Ade Edmondson and John Michie.
This article is about the British television series. For the fictional city in which the series is set, see Holby.Holby City
United Kingdom
English
23
1,102 (list of episodes)
- Mal Young (1999–2004)
- Johnathan Young (1999, 2011–2013)
- Kathleen Hutchison (2002–2004)
- Richard Stokes (2004–2006)
- Tony McHale (2006–2010)
- Belinda Campbell (2010–2011)
- Oliver Kent (2013–2017)
- Simon Harper (2017–2021)
- 50 minutes (1999)
- 60 minutes (1999–2020)
- 38–45 minutes (2020–2022)
12 January 1999 –
29 March 2022
McHale was the show's lead writer for several years, and was the first British writer ever to become the showrunner of a major prime-time drama. Under his tenure as executive producer, attempts were made at modernising the programme and appealing to a younger audience by taking on the filmizing technique and introducing musical montage segments into each episode. Twenty-three series of Holby City aired, with the final series concluding on 29 March 2022. The show ran for over 1000 hour-long episodes. It was filmed at the BBC Elstree Centre in Hertfordshire, and has featured special episodes filmed on location abroad. From October 2010, Holby City moved to high definition broadcasting. Its first executive producers were Young and Johnathan Young, who were succeeded by Kathleen Hutchison from 2002 to 2004, Richard Stokes from 2004 to 2006, McHale from 2006 to 2010, Belinda Campbell from 2010 to 2011, Johnathan Young from 2011 to 2013, Oliver Kent from 2013 to 2017 and Simon Harper from 2017 to 2021. Holby City aired once a week, all year round, and each series contained 52 episodes.
Holby City has attracted comparisons to other medical dramas, often unfavourable, and figures within the television and entertainment industry, including Broadcasting Standards Commission director Paul Bolt, have accused the BBC of squandering the television licence fee on the programme. The series employs a team of researchers to ensure medical accuracy, and utilises surgeons from different disciplines to check scripts. Cast members are taught to perform basic medical procedures, and given the opportunity to spend time on real hospital wards for research. Holby City has, however, been criticised for its lack of realism, with the British Medical Association denouncing its portrayal of organ donation and unrealistic impression of resuscitation, and an accident and emergency nurse at the 2008 Royal College of Nursing conference accusing the show of fostering unrealistic expectations of the NHS and fuelling compensation culture.
Holby City has been nominated for over 100 television awards, of which it has won ten: the 2008 British Academy Television Award for Best Continuing Drama, one BEFFTA Award, two Ethnic Multicultural Media Awards, two Music Video and Screen Awards, and four Screen Nation Awards. The show's first series averaged 9.27 million viewers, but apart from a rise in its fifth series, ratings declined year-on-year until 2009, with the eleventh series averaging 5.44 million viewers. The twelfth series saw a small rise to 5.62 million. Later series consistently drew over 4 million viewers per week.
Reception[edit]
Critical response[edit]
Holby City has attracted comparisons to other medical dramas, often unfavourable. In November 2002, John Whiston, then head of drama at Granada Television, accused the BBC of producing "ersatz parodies" of ITV drama, commenting that: "With Holby City cloned out of Casualty, the BBC has even ended up copying itself."[149] Paul Hoggart of The Times has written that the differences between the two shows are "mild", calling Holby City: "Casualty's cute little sister".[150] Kevin Lygo, director of television at Channel 4, referred to Holby City as "sudsy drama", deeming it, Casualty and HolbyBlue "all decent programmes, but strikingly similar in many aspects of their tone and construction."[151] Holby City has also been unfavourably compared with the American medical drama ER. Television producer Paul Abbott has commented that although he watches ER, he does not watch Holby City as: "it looks like you've crammed one hour's drama into 26 episodes."[152] In October 2009, former Holby City writer Peter Jukes wrote a critical piece for Prospect magazine, contrasting the show negatively with the standard of American television dramas.[153] Jukes wrote that Holby City has become a soap opera, rather than a drama, and deemed the episodes he worked on "the most dispiriting experiences in [his] 25 years as a dramatist."[154]
On several occasions, people within the television and entertainment industry have suggested that Holby City is a waste of the television licence fee, with some suggesting that it ought to be cancelled. In August 2002, Paul Bolt, director of the Broadcasting Standards Commission criticised BBC programming as being "humdrum" and "formulaic", saying of Holby City and the police procedural Mersey Beat: "One begins to wonder what really is the point of the BBC bringing this to us. Let's have something a bit different."[155] Then head of BBC drama Jane Tranter responded that Bolt's examples were "highly selective" as well as "hugely patronising to the millions of viewers who enjoy popular dramas like Holby City – week in, week out".[156] Young, who at the time held the position of head of drama serials, told The Guardian: "Popular drama has always been singled out for criticism, but people are increasingly voting with their on-buttons."[157] Also in 2002, David Cox of the New Statesman criticised BBC One's 2001 Christmas schedule, for airing Holby City against a contemporary version of Othello. On this basis, Cox advocated the abolition of the licence fee, explaining: "The BBC was invented in a period when the elite decided what the population should know. If that has gone, then the licence fee should go too."[158] At the 2003 Edinburgh International Television Festival, BSkyB chief executive Tony Ball called for stricter restrictions on how the BBC spent licence payers' money, suggesting that Holby City be sold to the channel's commercial rivals, with the proceeds used to develop more original programming.[159][160] The BBC refused Ball's suggestion, responding in a statement: "This speech clearly reflects BSkyB's view that programmes are merely a commodity to be bought and sold."[161] In June 2004, Charles Allen, chief executive of ITV plc questioned the amount of funding spent on lengthened episodes of Holby City,[162] and in January 2010, Janet Street-Porter of The Independent argued that Holby City was one of several series which had "come to the end of their natural life" and "should be put out of its misery."[163]
Holby City was praised by campaigners for the Royal National Institute for Deaf People (RNID) in October 2003, when an episode which coincided with "Learn To Sign Week" used deaf actors, and featured characters communicating through British Sign Language. RNID chief executive John Low stated: "Too often individuals have to rely on family members or friends to communicate complicated personal information to professionals. This is the reason the RNID is calling on the government to channel funding into the training of British Sign Language interpreters who could then be available to NHS staff treating deaf patients." Stokes commented: "The writer had a great story he wanted to tell – for us, that's what matters first and foremost."[164] A 2008 report into ethnic diversity on television, commissioned by Channel 4, cited Holby City as a positive example of "diverse British programm[ing]".[165] Five years previously in 2003, former BBC host Sir Ludovic Kennedy complained that ethnic minorities were over-represented on television, prompting a BBC spokeswoman to explain that Holby City has more ethnic characters as it is set in an area where minorities account for up to 30% of the population.[166] According to the 2001 census, the population of Bristol – which the city of Holby is loosely based upon – is 88% white and 12% ethnic minorities.
Realism[edit]
The show has been criticised for its lack of realism. Former nurse Vici Hoban commented in February 2004 that there existed three stereotypes of nurses exist: "sex object, doctor's handmaiden, or angel". She felt that media portrayal had amplified these misconceived views, observing that with "the syringe-toting serial killer Kelly in Holby City, realism has never been top of TV's agenda." However, Hoban felt that the worst offender at the time was the Channel 4 medical drama No Angels, which she described as: "so inaccurate that it makes Holby City look like a factual documentary."[167] No Angels creator Toby Whithouse defended his series, stating that Holby City presents an unfair representation of nursing, deceiving viewers into believing that nursing "is a nice, clean job full of handsome doctors." Whithouse observed that the content of Holby City is defined by the watershed, describing real nursing work in contrast as "very post-watershed".[168] In November 2009, Antony Sumara, CEO of the Mid Staffordshire NHS Foundation Hospital Trust, wrote a column criticising Holby City for misrepresenting real hospital life.[169] Tom Sutcliffe of The Independent reviewed a December 2009 episode poorly, finding it "astonishing" that any patients leave Holby General alive, as the staff are "so busy looking stricken or lovelorn at each other".[170]
In December 2003, Libby Purves wrote a critical opinion piece in The Times, observing that Holby City's medical staff are often depicted getting drunk in clubs, but afterwards are able to function properly at work, and that as a result, alcohol "is made to look innocent".[171] In October 2004, Canon Kenyon Wright, chair of Alcohol Focus Scotland, criticised an episode of Holby City which saw doctors downing tequila slammers, stating that it glamorised irresponsible drinking.[172] Similarly, in October 2007, drinks' industry body the Portman Group made an official complaint to communications regulator Ofcom about a scene in Holby City which depicted two medics drinking five shots of tequila following a stressful day at work. The body's chief executive David Poley claimed that in failing to show the negative consequences of this action, the series was presenting a "highly irresponsible portrayal of excessive and rapid drinking".[173] Ofcom received a total of eight complaints about the incident.[174]
Holby City has also been accused of medical inaccuracies. The British Medical Association denounced a January 2004 episode of the serial which portrayed organ donation being carried out despite withdrawal of consent by the patient's relatives. Dr Michael Wilks, chairman of the Medical Ethics Committee stated: "This simply would not happen, but its portrayal, even in a drama, is totally irresponsible and risks causing huge damage to the already struggling transplant programme."[175] The British Medical Association later opined that the show was giving viewers an unrealistic impression of resuscitation by typically presenting only two outcomes, death or total recovery. Andrew Thomson, a Dundee GP, deemed this "a terrible distortion of the truth."[176] In a follow-up story for The Times, Vivienne Parry highlighted the fact that in reality, less than half of patients who require resuscitation survive the initial catastrophe and only a third of those live to leave hospital.[177] At the Royal College of Nursing (RCN) conference in Bournemouth in April 2010, Holby City was accused of fostering unrealistic expectations of the NHS, encouraging patients to believe in miracles and fuelling compensation culture. Accident and Emergency nurse John Hill stated: "In A&E it is sometimes a fact that sadly we cannot get people through the trauma they have received. Unfortunately, unlike in Holby City, I am a mere mortal and cannot perform miracles. But many relatives believe because of that, you can. And the injury lawyers assure them that if you don't they will get recompense for it."[178][179]
Impact[edit]
In October 2000, Dr John Ryan, an Accident & Emergency consultant at the Royal Sussex County Hospital in Brighton criticised the number of patients visiting the department for minor ailments without first contacting their GP. Ryan attributed this phenomenon to patients viewing Holby City and American medical drama ER, and coming to regard hospitals as glamorous.[180] A three-year Belgian research project, presented at a British Psychological Society meeting in September 2008, claimed that watching Holby City and similar medical dramas such as Casualty and ER had a subliminal influence on fear of illness. 1,300 teenagers were questioned on their viewing habits, and those who watched more medical dramas were found to be up to 10% more fearful about their health, with females more affected than males. Dr Jan Van Mierlo of Hasselt University stated that further research was needed into the long-term impact of television.[181]
In 2008, Conservative Party strategists identified four archetypes based on TV programmes to help the party target swing voters. Alongside "Top Gear man", "Apprentice generation" and "Grand Designs couple", they identified "Holby City worker", a middle-ranking health service employee.[182] The following year, strategists identified "Holby City woman" as a key voter demographic who may help the party win the 2010 General Election. The "Holby City woman" is a female voter in her 30s or 40s, employed in a clinical or clerical position or some other public sector job.[183] She is a swing voter in General Elections,[184] who has voted for the Labour Party in previous elections, though her identification with the Labour Party is not strong.[185] The "Holby City woman" archetype is modelled on the character of Faye Morton.[184]
In January 2009, Jill Berry, president of the Girls' Schools Association and head teacher at the Dame Alice Harpur School in Bedford, cited medical dramas such as Holby City as an inspiring force in increasing numbers of female students deciding to pursue careers in medicine. Berry said: "The girls see that as an exciting and dynamic way of life. They see it as making a difference to people's lives. It gives them a sense sometimes of the pressures, responsibility and adrenaline. Such TV programmes can be good, as long as they give a realistic impression."[186] Similarly, consultant surgeon Andrew Raftery uses clips from Holby City as part of the University of Sheffield Outreach and Access to Medicine Scheme, to inspire pupils from under-represented social and educational backgrounds to pursue careers in medicine.[187]