ANNA FORD. Born in Tewkesbury, Gloucestershire, England. 2 October 1943. Attended Wigton Grammar School, Cumbria; Manchester University. Married 1) Alan Brittles in 1970 (divorced 1976); 2) Mark Boxer in 1981 (died 1988), children: Claire and Kate. Taught at Open University in Belfast for two years before joining Granada Television as researcher, 1974; moved to BBC, 1976; newscaster, ITN, 1978-82; also worked as researcher and presenter of school programmes; founder-member of TV-AM, 1982-83; newscaster, BBC, 1989. Recipient: TV Times Most Populr TV Personality (Female), 1978. Address: JGPM, 2 New Kings Road, London SW6 4SA, U.K.

TELEVISION SERIES

1974      Reports Action
1977     Man Alive
1977     Tomorrow's World
1978-81 News at Ten
1983     Good Morning Britain
1984     Did You See...?
1986     Understanding Adolescents
1987-89 Network
1987     Understanding Families
1987     On Course
1989-    Six O'Clock News

TELEVISION SPECIALS

1984 West End Stage Awards
1985 Starting Infant School
1985 Communication
1985 Handicapped Children
1985 Children's Feelings
1985 Starting Secondary School
1985 Approaching Adolescence
1985 Warnings from the Future?
1985 Have We Lived Before?
1986 London Standard Film Awards
1986 Television on Trial
1986 Puberty
1987 Richard Burton Drama Award
1987 The Search for Realism
1987 The Struggle for Land
1987 The Price of Marriage
1987 Veiled Revolution
1987 ITV Schools: Thirty Years On
1987 Kimberley Carlile--Falling Through the Net
1988 Harold Pinter
1988 Wildscreen 88
1988 Fight to Survive?
1988 Network in Ireland
1989 British Academy Awards
1989 Mary Stott
1992 Edvard Munch: The Frieze of Life
1992 Family Planning Association
1994 Against All Odds
1994 Evening Standard British Film Awards 1993
1994 Understanding the Under-12s

PUBLICATION

Men: A Documentary. London: Weidenfeld and Nicholson, 1984.

 

 

   

Anna Ford was independent television's first female newsreader and in time became one of the most popular and experienced of female news presenters in British television. Critics ascribed her early success as a newsreader primarily to her attractive looks, but she subsequently demonstrated even to her detractors that she was more than competent as a presenter and furthermore ready to brave controversy (something she was well used to even as a student, due to her committed Socialist views).

Before her recruitment as ITN's (Independent Television Network) answer to the BBC's popular, though less vivacious, newsreader Angela Rippon in the late 1970s, Ford had already amassed some experience as a television presenter through her work as a reporter for Reports Action, Man Alive and other programmes. Reflecting her early training in education (she taught social studies to IRA internees in Belfast's Long Kesh prison, among others), she had also worked on broadcasts for the Open University and had then presented Tomorrow's World for a time before resigning because, she explained, she had no wish to become "a public figure". Ironically, this is exactly what she shortly afterwards fated to become as a high-profile newsreader for News at Ten.

The most controversial stage in Ford's career opened in the early 1980s when she was one of the "Famous Five" celebrities behind the launching of the ill-starred TV-AM company, for which she presented the breakfast programme Good Morning Britain. When the new enterprise failed to attract the required audiences, Ford (and Rippon) were unceremoniously sacked and it was speculated that her career in television was over. Ford's response to this was to pour a glass of wine over her former employer, M.P. Jonathan Aitken--an incident that hit the headlines and only confirmed Ford's reputation for belligerence.

Similarly controversial was Ford's widely reported refusal to wear flattering make-up on television to disguise the effects of aging, in protest, she said, at the "body fascism" of television bosses who insisted that female newscasters were only there to provide glamour. Critics of her stand attacked her for being aggressive and overtly feminist (they also expressed shock that she sometimes read the news while not wearing a bra), but many more admired her for her forthrightness. Those who had automatically written her off as "just a pretty face" were obliged to think again. It was a mark of her success in the argument that, some six years after the TV-AM debacle, Ford--now aged 45--was readmitted to the fold as a newsreader for the BBC's prime-time Six O'Clock News. She has also continued to present occasional programmes on a wide range of educational and other issues.

-David Pickering