The TV-am footage collection 1983-1992 is preserved by the BFI National Archive, with its many diverse celebrity studio interviews and entertainment segments now available for licensing from BFI Archive Sales. For clip licensing enquiries, please contact the team here.
TV-am Archive
From 1st February 1983 to 31st December 1992 TV-am was on the air with three and a half hours of news and entertainment. Everyone from Prime Ministers to Hollywood stars appeared on Good Morning Britain.
TV-am captured a dramatic decade of British life reflecting tragedies such as the Lockerbie Air Disaster, Hillsborough and Piper Alpha. Big moments in politics such as The Miners’ Strike and the resignation of Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher. Plus big national celebrations such as the wedding of Prince Andrew to Sarah Ferguson.
Boy band Take That made one of their very first TV appearances dancing with Mad Lizzie, and stars like Joan Collins, Elton John and Bette Davis sat on the famous sofa to give exclusive interviews to TV-am.
Digitising the TV-am Archive
A huge project is underway at the BFI to digitise every TV-am programme, spanning ten years. With each day consisting of around three and a half hours of programming this is a massive undertaking, and in some cases a race against time to preserve the recordings as tapes can deteriorate as the years go on. The latter years output was recorded on Panasonic MII, a format used only by TV-am, Anglia TV and Thames TV. The MII recorders are extremely rare and spare parts are almost impossible to find. The whole of 1983 and 1984 have already been successfully digitised with work continuing daily to copy tapes and log the content of every programme.
Above: A Panasonic MII player/recorder used by TV-am between 1988 and 1992
Below: Watch the BFI’s trailer showing some examples of the content shown on TV-am and held in their library