North One
About Us
NORTH ONE – THREE DECADES OF TV - FROM PAUL GASCOIGNE, TO MICHAEL JORDAN, TO LEWIS HAMILTON; FROM FIFTH GEAR, TO THE GADGET SHOW, TO TRAVEL MAN; FROM PAUL HOLLYWOOD, TO JOE LYCETT, TO GUY MARTIN. AND KEANU REEVES.
For the past three decades, North One has been a globally recognised producer of world class factual entertainment, sports and live event TV programming. North One content is shown in over 100 countries worldwide - and its productions are multiple award winners - three BAFTAs and over twenty RTS awards (so far).
More ground-breaking sports contracts followed, with NBA Basketball for Channel 4, Rugby Union for the BBC, global coverage of the World Rally Championship and ITV’s Formula 1 coverage.
Starting out as the sports television wing of the Chrysalis Media Group, the company was responsible for Channel 4’s seminal coverage of Italian football throughout the 1990s, as well as breaking out into factual entertainment with the gigantically successful Saturday night ‘Top Ten’ franchise, which single-handedly invented the ‘list’ genre and saw the company produce over 100 hours of archive documentaries, again for Channel 4.
The company was the first acquisition of what is, today, a global powerhouse – All3Media - becoming North One Television in 2004.
More recently, North One produced worldwide coverage of the Isle of Man TT and currently provides coverage of global race series MotoGP for TNT SPORTS in the UK. North One is also in a third season of providing worldwide coverage of the revolutionary, eco-friendly all-electric rally series - Extreme E - from locations across the globe - an epic achievement which won the Broadcast Sports Awards' Sports Production of the Year for 2021.
We also have the contract to produce ITV’s NFL coverage – a weekly highlights show throughout the season, plus two UK-based live games and live coverage of the global event that is the season finale’s - the Super Bowl.
In popular factual, two long-running consumer brands - car show Fifth Gear and tech series The Gadget Show – have both been in constant production for over two decades. We have produced hundreds of episodes of each show and both have recently relaunched - Fifth Gear has now completed its second season (with a third to come) as Fifth Gear: Recharged - concentrating on electric and electric hybrid vehicles - on Discovery + and Quest, while a new, more domestic facing iteration of consumer tech - The Good Gadget Guide : Shop Smart, Save Money - on Channel 5 in its new Friday evening slot.
Amongst myriad other programming, North One has scored notable hits on Channel 4 with some sixty hours of programming (so far) with lorry mechanic, motorbike racer and TV daredevil Guy Martin - including his recent, uniquely Guy take on the UK energy crisis – Guy Martin’s Power Trip – and Our Guy in Colombia – an adventure travelogue series that prompted one UK newspaper to ask ‘how did this programme ever get made?’
Also for C4, another long returner is the BAFTA-nominated comedy travel show, Travel Man, originally hosted by Richard Ayoade, now fronted by Joe Lycett – we are currently in production on its thirteenth season.
In the realm of popular history, we recently made an anniversary documentary based around the first conflict of the Falklands War – The Forgotten Battle with Ben Fogle, for ITV, while we also looked forward to the anniversary of D-Day in a co-production with fellow All3media company, BYO Films - Vicky McClure : My Grandad’s War – also for ITV, which saw the hugely popular actor relive one of the most crucial conflicts of WW2 in the company of her 97 year old grandfather, Ralph – who, she only recently discovered, was there.
We have also launched a host of new brands with other big names - as well as partnering with Paul Hollywood for his Easy Bakes online offerings, we recently made a second series of Paul Hollywood Eats... this time in Mexico, for Channel 4. Also for C4, a new series with Alex Brooker looked at some of the nation’s favourite – and more eccentric pasttimes – Hobby Man.
In the realm of access documentary, our new, cutting edge perspective on police access – Sky Coppers - looking at the work of the airborne drone unit of the West Midlands police force – has been a big hit for Channel 4.
For UKTV we have recently had returning brands with Ricky Tomlinson and Ralf Little (Very Northern Road Trip, UKTV Gold) and ex World’s Strongest Man, Eddie Hall (Eddie Eats America and Eddie Eats Christmas, for Dave). We have also revealed Secrets of Your Takeaway and Ready Meals with Alexis Conran for Channel 5, and dropped a new paranormal series with Jack Osbourne for Discovery + – Haunted Homecomings.
Also, coming soon, a show that brings together our expertise in many of the genres in which we are best known – in the same series - for Disney+, we have a four-part documentary series telling the fairy tale story of one of the greatest seasons in Formula 1 history – Brawn : The Impossible Formula One Story - fronted and narrated, by the one and only Keanu Reeves.
