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Annual Report
Norma Percy and Iran & The West win Grierson Awards
23rd December 2009
Norma Percy has won the Grierson Trust’s highest accolade - The Trustee’s Award - in recognition of her outstanding achievement and contribution to the art of documentary filmmaking during a career spanning more than 30 years.
She then went on to win the 2009 Envy Best Documentary Series prize - along with her Brook Lapping colleagues Brian Lapping, Dai Richards, Delphine Jaudeau and Paul Mitchell. The judges described the series saying: “With its extraordinary access, Iran and the West told a gripping story with a consistent and clear narrative, often revealing new material and throwing a timely light on events today. An important historical record, which never faltered.”
Norma Percy’s work with Brook Lapping Productions is internationally recognised as consistently delivering the highest quality documentary analysis and insight to world events. Meticulous recording and assemblage of primary source content, and intimate personal testimony from leading players combined with excellent writing, are the key components behind this success. Her productions, which always demonstrate accuracy, balance and fairness, are regarded by many as works of scholarship that will stand analysis long term, affecting opinion and influencing political processes.
Murray Weston, Chairman of the Grierson Trust, said: “Norma Percy’s work demonstrates the ethos of public service broadcasting and is a beacon of excellence in British documentary television as we strive to encourage and sustain the highest production values for the future. It is a privilege for us to have the opportunity to honour Norma through this award.”
The Rt Hon Jack Straw MP, Secretary of State for Justice and Lord Chancellor: “Norma’s programmes are extraordinary because of her talent, her imagination, her insight. Because of her assiduity, she works and works at these programmes. But also because she is so trusted by everybody, so she gets brilliant access.”
BBC Director-General Mark Thompson said he had “never met anyone as tenacious as Norma” and that “she is a benchmark and a role model”.
Angus Macqueen, former Head of Documentaries at Channel 4 added: “What Norma tries to do is identify what are the critical moments that the public never see and politicians never tell you about.”
Click on Play above to watch the citations.
Norma joins a select group of filmmakers who have been presented with special Grierson Awards in the past. They include Michael Apted, Desmond Wilcox, Alan Whicker, Sir David Attenborough, Molly Dineen, Jonathan Gili, Nick Fraser, Mike Salisbury and Paul Watson.
The Grierson Awards, the ultimate accolade for documentary filmmakers, are also known as the British Documentary Awards. The ceremony at the BFI on Tuesday 3 November was hosted by Andrew Marr.
Read Norma's acceptance speech:-
"Wow! None of us have ever won a Grierson. And to win for Iran! It was so nearly a disaster - eighteen months into production we had no top people interviews. 18 months! We started fine. We went off to Tehran, Dai Richards –Delphine Jaudeau and I in our new headscarves – to persuade Iran’s leaders that we offered the best platform to tell their story to the West. That line went down well with the family of the key witness – former President Rafsanjani. So on the promise of Rafsanjani, the then Head of BBC Current Affairs, George Entwistle, commissioned the series. But when we tried to return to film – no one said ‘no’ – but the visa just didn’t arrive. Brian Lapping called a crisis meeting – and Paul Mitchell actually uttered the words ‘dramatised reconstruction’ – with actors. This fate was avoided thanks to a few wonderful Iranians. They believed the series would be good for Iran – and they had the credentials to make the top people listen. But it took another year - it wasn’t until after we had actually delivered one programme to the BBC, that we filmed Rafsanjani. A Grierson is a fabulous reward for all of us – including Emma Whitehead and Golnoosh Golshani and Declan Smith and Sally Hilton and Toby Marter and Andrew McKerlie and particularly Hamid Shakibania, Hosein Sharif and Nasser Hadian , all the people Grierson rules say I’m not supposed to thank."
PRESS
