The BBC Academy Podcast

We hear from producers Andy Brereton, Jamie Ormerod and Tilusha Ghelani, on how the project grew from a one off special as part of Comic Relief to a ten part daytime commission.The team talk us through the process of transforming an already popular show to TV while striving to stay true to the original format.

Hazel Marshall and guests discuss how to write sitcoms. With John Finnemore, Jon Plowman and Tira Shubart. John Finnemore writes and stars in the award winning Cabin Pressure on Radio 4. Tira Shubart wrote the critically acclaimed BBC Two sitcom Taking the Flak. Jon Plowman has an extremely illustrious comedy background, exec producing Absolutely Fabulous, The League of Gentlemen and The Thick of It amongst many more comedy classics.

Joining Simon Smith in the CoP Show studio to discuss immersive documentaries are Louis Theroux - BAFTA award winning, Emmy nominated and famous for his ability to penetrate intriguing worlds in BBC documentaries such as Wierd Weekends, ‘When Louis Met: Jimmy Savile and his more recent Extreme Love series. Lee Phillips - a BAFTA award winning series producer and director of documentaries lead by Dawn Porter and Danny Wallace, such as My Breasts Could Kill Me and How to Start Your Own Country and joining us via phone from Manchester is Nelufar Hedayat - presenter of BBC Three documentaries such as The truth about Child Brides and Riots and Revolutions.

The benefits and difficulties of self shooting - an essential part of the job description of assistant producers, directors and researchers. Our War producer/director Stuart Bernard discusses the future of self shooting with Bang Goes the Theory editor Dermot Caulfield, Panorama producer Ken Kirby and resident CoP Show presenter Simon Smith.

Joining Simon Smith to discuss the art of the interview are Bridget Osborne - Bridget is a BBC radio and TV producer who used to be responsible for HARDtalk, Jeremy Phillips - Jeremy is an exec producer on Piers Morgan’s Life Stories at ITV and David Sillito, a BBC arts correspondent.

Music is an essential part of storytelling on screen and on the radio. Get it right and while you might not be consciously aware of its presence, it will nevertheless be playing a significant part in how you perceive the characters and relate to the story. So it's vital directors and producers understand how to work well with composers so they can weave their musical magic over their stories. Joining Hazel Marshall in the CoP studio to give an insight into their creative processes are two guests whose names you might not recognise but whose music you almost certainly will.

With Gareth Gwynn, Laurence Howarth and John Luke Roberts, writers of Mitchell and Webb, The News Quiz and Armstrong and Miller.

Simon Smith hosts the one year anniversary episode of The CoP Show. And to commemorate that first year, we've put together some of our favourite moments from our favourite guests.

Joining Hazel Marshall to discuss what makes a great adaptation are Stewart Harcourt – Stewart has adapted many Poirots for ITV including Clocks from Christmas 2011 and Treasure Island with Eddie Izzard as Long John Silver for Sky 1 at New Year and Sarah Phelps – Sarah adapted the much discussed Great Expectations with Gillian Anderson as Miss Havisham for the BBC in December 2011 and Oliver Twist for the BBC in 2007.

Andrew Collins hosts this masterclass where eight radio producers get a chance to pitch ideas direct to BBC commissioners. They get two minutes to sell their idea and commissioners have four minutes to give feedback. This is an opportunity to hear what goes on behind the usually closed doors of commissioning rounds. The commissioners are Lewis Carnie from Radio 2 and 6 Music, Tony Phillips from Radio 4, Radio 1 and 1Xtra's Piers Bradford and 5 live's Jonathan Wall.