French TV

[Brekkie]

BFM Alsace is launching today. It's the 9th local BFM Regions channel. A tenth, BFM Normandie, will be launching this autumn.
https://www.bfmtv.com/bfmtv-et-vous/maki...70375.html

Proof that local TV done well clearly can be viable.  To be on their 9th and 10th regions presumably these are profitable and are watched in sufficient enough numbers to be appreciated.   Meanwhile here in the UK we get 10 minutes of poor quality local news in amongst an 70s music channel or CBS Reality combined with news read from the middle of a random street.

[London Lite]

Strike output on France Télévisions.

France 2: No weather forecast. Lunchtime bulletin came from a green screen with a shortened intro and no lower thirds. TéléMatin was pre-recorded highlights with no news or clock.

France 3: Lunchtime bulletin from the main studio with a fixed camera on the presenter. No use of music bed during the intro headlines.

Franceinfo: Pre-recorded programming through the day.

[London Lite]

Someone has been able to update the top of the hour segment on Franceinfo as it showed a brief clip of the January 6th Hearings testimony from Cassidy Hutchinson.

[London Lite]

Going back to the BFM Alsace launch, the two presenters of the morning and evening bulletins are Lucie Jong who worked for BFM Lyon on the Bonsoir Lyon bulletin, while Olivia Chandioux previously worked as a newsreader for Franceinfo radio. She was sometimes on the tv channel as well.

[Medianext.MX]

With the summer season underway, and the jokers starting to appear on screen, the French TV new season starts to surprise:

• Canal+ has renewed its exclusive contract with Cyril Hanouna and his company H2O Productions until 2025. This means Touche pas à mon poste ! will remain on C8 until at least 2025, as well as producing new shows and specials for the group's TNT channel; the first one, Objectif Top 100, will involve him on taking new challenges; the first shows involving him playing paddle are being recorded; additionally, the debate show, Face à Baba, originally created for the presidential election, has been renewed for a second, longer season, replacing Balance ton post !; the show will retain the same format, but now will feature interviews with the gamut of public French personalities instead of only politicians.
  
• François Busnel is leaving France 5's La grande librairie, citing a need to focus on his new producing career, which included his first documentary film on Jim Harrison; he will remain with France Télévisions to host the La p'tite librairie mini-show, as well as the oral contest Si on lisait à voix haute. His successor is being TBA, but Busnel has asked FTV to select a personality who can continue on the line of his presentation style.
  
• Patricia Loison is leaving franceinfo TV's Le 23h to focus on her family and philanthropy projects; her slot will be taken over by Alexandra Uzan; additionally, the long-form news programme (which replaced Soir 3 under heavy controversy in 2019) will be extended to two hours and begin at 22h.
  
• After the controversy surrounding France Télévisions to send C à vous' Mohammed Bouafsi to cover the Macron trip to Ukraine, as well as the imminent abolition of the license fee, France Télévisions' newsroom has signed a motion of no confidence against VP of News and Current Affairs Laurent Guimier, and, after an internal vote, this motion was confirmed; however, FTV Director General Delphine Ernotte has decided against sacking the Europe 1 veteran from his post.
  
• As told in The Sport Thread, Canal+ has won the exclusive rights to UEFA Champions League fixtures, as well as those from the Europa and Europa Conference Leagues, both on linear pay-TV and streaming. The record 480 million euro deal also allows for sublicensing deal; however, Canal+ won't air the Final on an FTA basis, being beaten by M6, who offered 12 million euros for the 2025, 2026 and 2027 finals. The RTL channel, soon to be merged with TF1, will complete its exclusive coverage of European football, already composed of France team matches and two UEFA Euro editions.
  
• In other news related to the TF1/M6 merger, the Bouygues division has sold its pure player website division Unify to the Reworld Media group. Many of their journalists have condemned the transaction, given Reworld Media's poor record on content, prioritising commercial and clickbait-leaning journalism, including a focus on branded content; this situation led to the walkout of over 100 journalists of the Science & Vie magazine to establish their own magazine.
  
• As part of Natacha Polony's sacking from BFM TV, the big winners are Yves Calvi and Aurélie Casse. The Calvi 3D slot is being extended to 20h30, with Aurélie Casse's BFM News also extending to 90 minutes and beginning immediately after. Otherwise, the rest of the schedule will remain as is for the rentrée.
  
• Libération editor and publisher Denis Olivennes has been hired by Public Sénat to front the third incarnation of its books and literary programme. A slot installed by need of Public Sénat's founder Jean-Pierre Elkabbach, who presented it as Bibliothèque Médicis during the first 19 years, the show was relaunched for the first time in 2018 (as part of their massive channel relaunch), as Livres & vous, first presented by Adèle Van Reeth (who, coincidentally, has been named France Inter's content director starting next season) and later by Guillaume Erner.
  
• More dramatic changes coming to LCI: BFM TV veteran Thomas Misrachi and LCI veteran Marie-Aline Meliyi are out, replaced by political commentator Elizabeth Martichoux, who moves to the 9h/12h, in an attempt to offer a more political focus to the slot. Additionally, LCI has announced their new morning line-up, with Stefan Etcheverry anchoring solo and Adrien Gindre filling Martichoux's spot. Additionally, given his popularity after filling in on legislative election Sunday on TF1, Ange Noiret has been promoted as weekday weather presenter at LCN 26 and stand-in presenter over at the main channel, replacing Karine Fauvet.
  

More information to come...

[London Lite]

Congratulations to Alexandra Uzan for getting the extended late night weekday bulletin on Franceinfo.

Incidentally Camille Grenu returned to Franceinfo on Friday after a two month break for health reasons.

[matthieu1221]

• More dramatic changes coming to LCI: BFM TV veteran Thomas Misrachi and LCI veteran Marie-Aline Meliyi are out, replaced by political commentator Elizabeth Martichoux, who moves to the 9h/12h, in an attempt to offer a more political focus to the slot. Additionally, LCI has announced their new morning line-up, with Stefan Etcheverry anchoring solo and Adrien Gindre filling Martichoux's spot. Additionally, given his popularity after filling in on legislative election Sunday on TF1, Ange Noiret has been promoted as weekday weather presenter at LCN 26 and stand-in presenter over at the main channel, replacing Karine Fauvet.
  

More information to come...

Ruth Elkrief's slot will be cut back to the 20h/21h according to her in an interview, she said it was always supposed to be the case but was exceptionally extended due to the presidential (and legislative) elections this season. Yet to be confirmed but Julien Arnaud will take over her second hour. This also means that it is very likely that Christophe Moulin becomes the official co-host of LCI Midi alongside Claire Fournier. The two have already been hosting the slot for several months now as Julien Arnaud has been off for extended periods of time covering for MSL on TF1.

[Medianext.MX]

BFM TV's ticker was replaced this morning by a special information bar showing the movements made by Macron after altering the Borne cabinet (a consequence of Macron's supporting parties losing the majority in the legislative election).




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Staying with BFM TV, the channel's director-general Marc-Olivier Fogiel has announced a boost to its documentary-style reporting programme Ligne rouge, after announcing to newspaper L'Opinion an increase of 60% to the show's annual budget from next year, and reassigning 20 of the channel's reporters to focus exclusively on the show. The channel also plans to develop further the show and increase the frequency of special 52 minute episodes and docuseries, plus docudrama series intermixing interviews with personalities and re-enactments of real events.

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In other news channel news (sic), in an interview with Le Parisien, CNEWS director Serge Nedjar announced the near-complete renewal of the channel's schedule for next year, confirming the channel's dramatic transformation into a Fox News-like punditry channel; however, after leaving NRJ 12, Jean-Marc Morandini will benefit from an extension of 30 minutes to his existing slot, plus a weekend edition, he will also stay on the air even if he's being formally indicted for his sexual harassment and dissimulated work claims, and has to testify against the Paris correctional court. One thing is for sure: Éric Zemmour won't return to Face à l'info, due to Arcom rules on political parties and their leaders.

[matthieu1221]

In other news channel news (sic), in an interview with Le Parisien, CNEWS director Serge Nedjar announced the near-complete renewal of the channel's schedule for next year, confirming the channel's dramatic transformation into a Fox News-like punditry channel; however, after leaving NRJ 12, Jean-Marc Morandini will benefit from an extension of 30 minutes to his existing slot, plus a weekend edition, he will also stay on the air even if he's being formally indicted for his sexual harassment and dissimulated work claims, and has to testify against the Paris correctional court. One thing is for sure: Éric Zemmour won't return to Face à l'info, due to Arcom rules on political parties and their leaders.

He also said that Bourdin wouldn't be joining CNEWS because he wasn't the right 'fit'. This comes after TF1 news director said the same about him regarding Bourdin potentially wanting to join LCI.

Separately, according to BFMTV's director Marc-Olivier Fogiel, the channel's morning show 'Premiere Edition' will be getting a new studio in September.

[DamC]

Big news coming from France TV's new season press conference this morning. President Delphine Ernotte announced France 3 will scrap its national news bulletins from September 2023. The 12/13 and 19/20 brands will be replaced by "Ici Midi" and "Ici Soir", two new news programs which will be entirely made in the 24 regions and incorporate national and international news from Franceinfo:, in a sort of syndication model.

I won't list everything that's been announced at today's press conference. The most significant stuff being 57 year-old game show "Des chiffres et des lettres" on France 3 moving from weekdays to weekends only, and a news daily magazine about the 2024 Olympics replacing daily soap "Plus Belle la Vie" every weeknight at 8pm.

Also France 5 is launching a Sunday lunchtime magazine about the media industry. Really looking forward to it as it's been a while since French TV hasn't had a proper programme on that subject.

[Roger Darthwell]

Big news coming from France TV's new season press conference this morning. President Delphine Ernotte announced France 3 will scrap its national news bulletins from September 2023. The 12/13 and 19/20 brands will be replaced by "Ici Midi" and "Ici Soir", two new news programs which will be entirely made in the 24 regions and incorporate national and international news from Franceinfo:, in a sort of syndication model.

I won't list everything that's been announced at today's press conference. The most significant stuff being 57 year-old game show "Des chiffres et des lettres" on France 3 moving from weekdays to weekends only, and a news daily magazine about the 2024 Olympics replacing daily soap "Plus Belle la Vie" every weeknight at 8pm.

Also France 5 is launching a Sunday lunchtime magazine about the media industry. Really looking forward to it as it's been a while since French TV hasn't had a proper programme on that subject.

Damn.......it's sad that France 3 is getting rid of so many long running programmes, first Soir 3, now even 12/13 and 19/20. This has got me thinking, what is going to happen to France 3's national feed in regards of ''Ici Midi'' and ''Ici Soir''? Are they going to make national versions of them for the national feed?

[Brekkie]

Interesting changes - are they basically following the Aussie model of an all in one local programme with national and international news included? Sounds like the sort of change which will effectively be reversed down the track.

I've often thought if Countdown was ever axed from daytime it could probably survive a bit longer in a weekly late Sunday afternoon slot, but a shame to see it's forerunner suffer that fate. Not sure how much mileage there is in a daily Olympic show this far out - weekly perhaps would work but daily is a lot of hours to fill.

[London Lite]

Well that's some considerable money saved by axing the remaining two national news bulletins from France 3 which will be a driver for viewers to either watch France 2 or Franceinfo.

It could be argued that with France 3 becoming more regional than before, it makes sense to have two new bulletins which focus on content from the France 3 regions rather than duplicating what France 2 and info provide already.

Des chiffres et des lettres really is a slog to watch compared to Countdown, so I'm not surprised after all these years that it's being reduced to 2 episodes per week.

[matthieu1221]

Big news coming from France TV's new season press conference this morning. President Delphine Ernotte announced France 3 will scrap its national news bulletins from September 2023. The 12/13 and 19/20 brands will be replaced by "Ici Midi" and "Ici Soir", two new news programs which will be entirely made in the 24 regions and incorporate national and international news from Franceinfo:, in a sort of syndication model.

Worth noting that the 24 regions are a legacy from before France's administrative regions were merged together. I wouldn't put it past them that we'll only be left with 13 regional editions left in a few years following more cuts...

[Charles]

Wow! They're getting rid of Plus Belle La Vie? I know of some older Provençal women who will not be pleased!