Video: Channel Snore to the Fore

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Even in a country where "highbrow" and "television" are not mutually exclusive terms, Britain's Channel 4 seemed to be courting disaster. Created in November 1982 as an experimental alternative to the existing networks, its programming -- heavy on arts and politics -- caused it to be dubbed "Channel Snore" and "Channel Bore" by early critics. Conservatives railed against its alleged left-wing bias, but no one seemed to be paying enough attention to care. The audience for Channel 4's nightly newscast was so tiny that its anchorman, Peter Sissons, quipped that it would have been cheaper to call viewers individually and read them the news over the phone.

All that has changed. Less than four years later, Channel 4 is British TV's most heartening success story and a growing presence in the U.S. as well. A stream of movies reaching these shores, including The Draughtsman's Contract, Wetherby, My Beautiful Laundrette and Letter to Brezhnev, are products of Channel 4's innovative Film on 4 series. Max Headroom, the channel's computer- generated talk-show host, has become a regular on Cinemax, a darling of hip media critics and even a pitchman for Coca-Cola. Although PBS has picked up only a few Channel 4 offerings thus far (including some segments of the video- art series Alive from Off-Center), individual public-TV stations have aired several others, including The Price, a gripping six-hour mini-series about the kidnaping of a wealthy businessman's wife by Irish terrorists.

Channel 4 has a daunting mandate, set forth in the Broadcast Act of 1980: to serve tastes and interests not being satisfied elsewhere on the TV dial, either by the publicly funded BBC-1 and BBC-2 or by the advertiser-supported ITV. The network is financed by a fixed portion of ITV's advertising revenues; in return, ITV can sell commercial time on the new channel. Thus, while Channel 4 is indirectly supported by advertising revenues, it is insulated from the pressure for any particular show to win high ratings. Not that many of them are intended to. "If we get more than 10% of the viewers, I know we are not doing our job," says Jeremy Isaacs, Channel 4's program director and chief executive. The channel's frequently esoteric programming ranges from Symphonetta, a critically acclaimed series on 20th century music, and The Bandung File, a weekly look at issues facing Britain's growing Afro- Caribbean and Asian communities, to cultural specials like Critic Susan Sontag's introducing the works of the West German avant-garde choreographer Pina Bausch.

Yet Channel 4's audience has surpassed expectations, partly because the network has cannily mixed popular fare with the highbrow material. Its top- rated show is Brookside, a gritty, contemporary soap opera set in a Liverpool housing project. Its schedule also includes such U.S. imports as Hill Street Blues, St. Elsewhere and Cheers. The channel's weekly highlights of N.F.L. football games helped inspire Britain's current craze for the American sport. "We are not just an up-market cultural station," says Isaacs. "If we were so high-minded, we'd be dead by now."