Mayo: making shows with BBC is ‘soul-destroying’

Getting shows made by the BBC is “soul-destroying”, Simon Mayo has said after ending his 40-year career with the broadcaster.

The presenter, who began his career on BBC radio in the early 1980s, left the corporation last month along with co-presenter Mark Kermode to take their film review show to Sony as a podcast. He said attempts to develop Kermode and Mayo’s Film Review on the BBC had been met with “hoops to jump through”, and they were hoping to be allowed more scope with their new show Kermode and Mayo’s Take.

He told an interview with Radio Times: “But there are so many BBC hoops to jump through … after a while people stop trying, because it’s soul-destroying.”