Winners announced at The Venice TV Award 2021

The Venice TV Award recognises the year's best television and has announced the 2021 winners.

The event, which is supported by the International Music + Media Centre [IMZ], the European Group of Television Advertising [egta], and the Association of Commercial TV[ACT], highlights the fact that television is a $260 billion global industry which operates more than 38,500 television channels, reaching 1.6 billion homes worldwide.

Presided over by a jury of leading international TV experts, the Venice TV Award saw trophies handed out to international TV shows across 16 separate categories; TV Series, TV Movie, Performing Arts, Documentary, Light Entertainment, News, Program Promotion, Branded Entertainment, Sports, Children/Youth, Comedy, Reality TV, Technical Quality, Cross-Platform, Telenovela and New Talent.

It is a great time to be a viewer today, for the quality and amazing variety of work that viewers can choose from.

In 2021, works from the United Kingdom were the most successful, winning five Golden Trophies, with It’s a Sin, the Channel 4 drama about the lives of three young men who endure the horror of the HIV/AIDS epidemic of the 1980s, as well as the prejudice faced by gay men during that decade, winning in the TV Series category. Another Channel 4 production, The School That Tried To End Racism, triumphed in the Documentary category, while Best TV Film was awarded to BBC1’s Anthony, a film about how the life of a talented young man could have turned out had he not been murdered in an unprovoked racist attack.

Above: Channel 4's It's a Sin won Best TV Series.

Globo TV in Brazil also won big, with three Gold Medals in Soap Opera, Cross Promotion and Branded Entertainment. The Comedy category, meanwhile, was won by Sky One’s series, Two Weeks To Live, which stars Maisie Williams in a comedic tale of love and revenge that sees a seemingly harmless prank go horribly wrong. Sky also won in Light Entertainment, for Rob & Romesh Vs., which features best friends and comedians, Rob Beckett and Romesh Ranganathan, stepping outside their comfort zones to take on a new challenge every episode. Proving that great television knows no borders, awards for excellence went to a spread of 29 different countries, with outstanding work rewarded this year from United Kingdom, Germany, Brazil, India, France, USA, Japan, Sweden, Italy, Canada, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Iceland, Spain, Austria, Australia, Belgium, The Netherlands, South Africa, Turkey, Philippines, Poland, Portugal, Qatar, Russia, Israel and Singapore.

The promising future of television must be encouraged.

TV programming has always kept us informed, entertained, comforted and connected, but that fact has been even more pronounced over the last two, turbulent years. TV output, in terms of both the channels themselves and the programmes they deliver, have continued to grow in confidence and quality, and the boundaries between television and cinema have continued to blur. The migration of high-end talent into TV programming, both in front of and behind the camera, has fuelled the growth and popularity of a medium that is experiencing a renaissance. "It is a great time to be a viewer today, for the quality and amazing variety of work that viewers can choose from,” said Karim Bartoletti, Executive Board Member, Italian Association of Production Companies, Partner at Indiana Production and one of this year’s jurors. "It is a great time to watch TV. An award show like the Venice TV Awards, that recognizes and values such entertainment media, is relevant and necessary."

“The promising future of television must be encouraged,” added egta’s Malin Häger.