Building a Live Show Rundown That Holds to Time

Every live programme I have directed began as a list of items with durations, and the shows that ran smoothly had that list settled before anyone talked about cameras or lighting. Write down each segment in order: opening titles, presenter link, interview, package, weather or travel, close. Beside each, put the planned length in minutes and seconds, the source it comes from (studio camera, playback, remote guest) and the person responsible for it.

Add the totals as you go. A rundown that adds up to fifty-eight minutes for a fifty-five minute slot is a problem you want to meet on paper, a week before transmission, rather than in the last ten minutes of air. Be honest about durations: a three-minute interview is rarely three minutes, so note whether each item is fixed or can stretch.

Keep the first version plain. One page, one line per item, readable at arm's length from a gallery desk. You can add detail later, but a rundown that needs explaining before it can be read will not survive a live day.

• One line per item with duration and source
• Mark fixed items separately from flexible ones
• Add up the total before anything else is planned

Live television runs to the clock, and the clock does not care that a guest has more to say. The simplest protection is to decide in advance which items are fixed and which can give. Fixed items are those tied to a hard time: a news bulletin start, a handover to another programme, a pre-booked remote link. Elastic items are conversations, panel discussions and anything where a presenter can tighten or extend.

Tell the whole gallery which is which. When the producer says the interview is running long, the director, vision mixer and floor manager should already know what is being cut and what is being protected. A short list of pre-agreed cuts, ranked in the order you would drop them, saves a great deal of shouting.

Build in one small buffer item, perhaps a presenter wrap or a repeat of the headlines, that can be dropped or stretched by thirty seconds either way without anyone noticing.

• Rank cuts in the order you would drop them
• Keep one buffer item that can flex either way

The rundown tells you what happens; the cue sheet tells each person what to do and when. Take every item and break it into actions: camera one to presenter wide, lower-third on, roll package, fade up guest microphone, cut to camera two. Number the cues so they can be called by number if the gallery is busy, and write them in the order they happen.

Different people need different views of the same sheet. The vision mixer cares about cuts and sources, the audio operator about microphone opens and playback levels, the floor manager about presenter positions and hand signals. Rather than one dense document, keep one master sheet and let each role highlight their own lines.

Check every cue against the physical set. If the sheet says presenter moves to the interview chairs at the end of item three, make sure there is enough time, enough floor space and a clear cable path for that to happen without a scramble.

• Number each cue so it can be called quickly
• Let each role mark its own lines on a master sheet

Talkback is where a calm gallery becomes a noisy one. Agree a few simple rules and keep to them. The director speaks to the floor and cameras; the producer speaks to the director, not directly to the presenter's earpiece unless it is an emergency; and everyone else keeps their channel quiet unless they have something that affects the next ten seconds.

Use short, fixed phrases. Standby camera two, cue guest, going to package, coming back in five, four, three. Phrases that never change mean nobody has to interpret tone under pressure. Decide in advance how a problem is reported: a camera operator who loses focus says so in a single sentence, then waits for an instruction rather than fixing it silently.

Do a brief talkback check at the start of each rehearsal, with every position answering in turn. It takes two minutes and catches dead earpieces and crossed channels before they matter.

• Fixed phrases, said the same way every time
• Report a problem in one sentence, then wait

A full run-through from top to tail is useful, but it should not be your only rehearsal. Pick out the moments most likely to go wrong: the move from studio to a remote guest, the first playback roll, a presenter walking between two positions, a quick turnaround between lighting states. Rehearse those separately and several times, until they feel dull.

Run the opening and closing at least once at full speed, since these set the tone and carry the hard timings. Stop the run when something fails, fix it, and go back a few lines rather than restarting everything. Crews learn faster from short repeated attempts than from one long, tiring pass.

Take notes during each pass and share them straight afterwards. A simple list of three things to improve before the next run, written on a whiteboard in the gallery, keeps attention on the work and stops the same fault being discovered twice.

• Isolate the riskiest transitions and repeat them
• Stop, fix and go back a few lines instead of restarting

By the morning of the show, there should be a single current version of the rundown and cue sheet, printed and on every desk, with the version time written at the top. Changes made after that go through the producer, are announced over talkback and are written on the master copy so nobody is working from an old page.

Expect the running order to move. A guest arrives late, a story breaks, a package is not ready. Because you have marked what is elastic and ranked your cuts, the change becomes a short decision rather than a debate. The producer calls it, the director repeats it, and the gallery adjusts.

Afterwards, spend ten minutes on a debrief while memories are fresh. Note what ran long, which cues were missed and what the crew would change. Those notes become the starting point for the next rundown, and over a few shows the planning gets noticeably quicker.

• One current version, with its time, on every desk
• Debrief within minutes of coming off air