The National Lottery On Television
The majority of National Lottery draws take place on live television. The first National Lottery show (entitled The National Lottery Live: The First Draw) was at 19:00 on Saturday 19 November 1994. Presented by Noel Edmonds, this was an hour long special, in which 49 contestants competed to become the first person to start the draw, the first person being 18-year-old Deborah Walsh. The first number ever to be drawn was 30. For its first few years, the TV show took the title The National Lottery Live, and was presented mainly by Anthea Turner or Bob Monkhouse. Other notable presenters during this period included Carol Smillie, Terry Wogan and Ulrika Jonsson. On 30 November 1996, live on BBC One, the draw machine failed to start.
On 20 May 2006, during the draw on The National Lottery Jet Set that took place minutes before the Eurovision Song Contest 2006, several members of the group Fathers 4 Justice protested on the set causing the show to be taken off air for several minutes while the protesters were removed from the studio.
Traditionally, the draws would take place in the BBC studio during the game show on a Saturday. However, in more recent years, the channel airing the lottery draw has prerecorded the non-draw parts of the show and then switched to 'National Lottery HQ', a designated studio for the live draws.
Wednesday draws have their own 10-minute slot on BBC One, which is hosted by various presenters in the National Lottery HQ Studio, such as Gethin Jones, Christopher Biggins and Scott Mills, with Alan Dedicoat providing the commentary. As of 7 January 2012 there have been a total of 1678 draws which consist of 784 Wednesday draws and 894 Saturday draws. In a plan to spread BBC productions across the United Kingdom, all lottery shows will be relocating to BBC Scotland. UKTV Gold additionally hosted the Euromillions: Boom Bang show, which was broadcast every Friday.
Read more about this topic: National Lottery (United Kingdom)
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