In May 2001 Cactus TV rocked the industry by directly signing Richard Madeley and Judy Finnigan as part of an initial two-year production deal with Channel 4. This is one of the biggest single commissions by the Channel to an independent production company. Over the next 7 years Richard & Judy generated many exclusive stories, and enjoyed a roster of high profile guests including regular appearances of Hollywood stars, and was nominated for a Royal Television Society Award and an Indie Award. In October 2008 the Richard & Judy show moved to Watch, a brand new digital channel for UKTV. Richard and Judy fronted the phenomenally successful Book Club on the show from 2004 to 2009 which created at least 50 bestsellers, sales of over 31.2 million copies of R&J books and contributed to a £185 million boon to the book trade. Amanda Ross who selects the books was named the most important person in publishing by The Observer, and the show won four special Awards for inspiring wider reading and expanding the book market. In 2007 Cactus won an RTS Educational Television Award for the Channel 4 ‘Lost for Words Season.’

 

In January 2010 Cactus launched the TV Book Club on More 4 and Channel 4 as part of a 3 year deal. The brand new programme, sponsored by Specsavers, continues the legacy of the successful book strand on R & J and features books selected by Amanda Ross and her team, which are reviewed on the show by a celebrity and an exciting line up of new presenters, Jo Brand, Gok Wan, Nathaniel Parker, Dave Spikey and Laila Rouass.

Cactus has produced highly successful cookery series which include Saturday Kitchen Live for BBC1, Hairy Bikers’ Food Tour of Britain for BBC2, Rachel Allen Bake! and Rachel Allen: Home Cooking for RTE, Good Food and BBC1 and most recently a documentary on the late, great Keith Floyd entitled, Farewell to Floyd for BBC2.

 

Saturday Kitchen has been produced by Cactus since June 2006 when they installed James Martin as the new host. The 90 minute live show is made and transmitted at Cactus Studios every Saturday morning. The show regularly gets over 2 million viewers with peaks of 2.4 million, and a 33% share. The omelette challenge within the show has become a cult hit, and the show attracts the world's top chefs. The show is commissioned until March 2012. Hairy Bikers Food Tour of Britain was a 30 part series in 2009 following Dave Myers and Si King touring around the UK’s counties discovering the best of British produce, recipes and chefs. The show regularly won the slot on BBC2.  Rachel Allen: Bake! a 17 part series featured the crème de la crème of today’s successful modern bakers such as Eric Lanlard and Mich Turner. Bake! was the highest ever rated show on UKTV’s Good Food. 

 

Cactus have enjoyed success producing large scale TV events and musical spectaculars including most recently, the brand new event created for ITV 3- The Specsavers Crime Thriller Awards, which is part of the Specsavers Crime Thriller Season and includes 6 Cactus documentaries per season and has a 3 year deal on ITV3. The awards show brings together stars and authors from the worlds of Film, TV and Books at a glittering ceremony attended by stars like Dame Helen Mirren, Ricky Gervais, Rupert Penry Jones and Emilia Fox. Cactus produced The Galaxy British Book Awards for Channel 4, for the last 5 years, which achieved widespread critical acclaim and pick of the day in all TV listings. Music events include Sir Cliff Richard- The Hits I Missed and Songs of Bond, both for ITV1. Cactus TV's third annual production of The British Soap Awards was the highest rated entertainment show of 2001 on any TV channel, with a massive 53% share. It's also the highest rated independent production ever for Entertainment on ITV1. Cactus created the event, and produced the TV coverage for four years until 2002.

 

Cactus quiz and game shows include, Incognito (BBC1 2 series 87 shows - Channel 2 Netherlands, 4 series); King of the Castle (19 shows on ITV and sold to NBC in the US); It's Anybody's Guess, (40 shows); Sports Anorak of the Year (2 series 64 shows), Intuition (ITV); Upshot (Anglia) and Morphit (BBC1).

 

 

For the youth market Cactus produced the funky current affairs discussion programme Mad For It, nominated for three RTS awards, and Off the Wall (Anglia). Other youth series produced include Pop-elganger; For Your Ears Only, and The TV Set. Comedy features include, In Search of Fame (BBC1); a consumer problem solving series How to Deal With (BBC1), and an info-tainment graphic animation series The Incredible Journey (BBC1). Cactus made lifestyle strands for BBC Daytime, and two travel series The Real America (BBC1) and Britain into Europe (BBC1).  Cactus produced prime time chat shows include, The Last Resort (Channel 4) with Jonathan Ross, and Rowland Rivron Bites The Bullet. Cactus produced a controversial debate show, The Spirit of Diana: The Debate, for Living TV, the show doubled the channel's normal ratings for its slot. In 2005 Cactus made a ten part wine series for More4 as a spin off from the Richard & Judy Wine Club. Cactus TV's strong reputation for delivering high quality programmes with low budgets helped win long running contracts with FilmFour and Channel 4 for interstitial programming. Foursite, our pop ups for film buffs, aired on Channel 4 for over two years.

 

With our state of the art studio facilities in Kennington we are extremely well placed in today's competitive market, to build on our reputation for making high quality programmes, on budget and on time. Cactus is part of the All3Media group.

 

 

Cactus has produced a number of books in relations to their programmes which include: The Richard & Judy Wine Guide, November 2005; The Saturday Kitchen Cookbook, July 2007; Saturday Kitchen Best Bites, April 2008; Hairy Bikers Food Tour of Britain, September 2009. Saturday Kitchen at home is due to be published in 2010.