Adolescence makes history at Bafta TV Awards
Netflix drama Adolescence was the big winner at the Bafta Television Awards on Sunday, while The Celebrity Traitors and Last One Laughing also scooped a share of the glory.
The Celebrity Traitors and Last One Laughing won two prizes each, while Adolescence took four – the most wins at the main Bafta TV Awards ceremony in a single year.
The hard-hitting drama, which became a national talking point when it was released in March 2025, was named best limited series, and there were acting honours for its stars Stephen Graham, Owen Cooper and Christine Tremarco.
At 16, Cooper became the youngest ever winner of the award for best supporting actor.
With a little help from their friends
Cooper’s Bafta can go alongside the Emmy, Golden Globe, National Television, Royal Television Society and Actor Awards he has already won for playing a boy accused of murdering a female classmate.
In his acceptance speech, the rising star paid tribute to the Beatles.
“In the words of John Lennon, you won’t get anything unless you have the vision to imagine it,” he said.
“So in my eyes I think you only need three things to succeed: one, you need an obsession; two, you need a dream; and, three, you need the Beatles.”
Graham was named best leading actor for playing Cooper’s on-screen dad, and Tremarco won best supporting actress for playing his mum.
It was Graham’s first Bafta win after seven previous nominations.
In his speech, he encouraged young viewers to believe they could follow a similar path in acting.
“We’re not digging holes, we’re not digging ditches, we’re not saving lives, but we have the opportunity to tell the human condition, and we have the obligation to tell beautiful stories and we need to keep that going,” he said.
He also ending his speech with a Beatles reference, telling the ceremony: “The kid’s already said it, but in the words of the Beatles, all we need is love.”
Actress wins for Zaghari-Ratcliffe role
Meanwhile, Narges Rashidi, who was born in Iran, won best leading actress for playing Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe in BBC One’s real-life drama Prisoner 951.
Rashidi dedicated the award to the British-Iranian woman who was imprisoned in Tehran for six years, and her family, telling the ceremony: “Your resilience, your dignity, your love through impossible circumstances have moved us all.
“Your courage will stay with me for the rest of my life. This is for you.”
Elsewhere, the award for best drama went to ITV’s Code of Silence, which starred Rose Ayling-Ellis as a deaf woman who helps police with her lip reading skills.
Alan Carr wins again
The Celebrity Traitors, the most-watched programme of last year with more than 15 million viewers, won best reality programme.
Accepting the award, host Claudia Winkleman dedicated it to the show’s “extraordinary cast who played with dignity, gusto and their entire hearts and we love them”.
Alan Carr’s victory on the programme was named the year’s most memorable TV moment – the only award of the night to be voted for by the public.
In his acceptance speech, he joked: “Was I good? Was I really – or were the other celebrities just thick?!”, referencing their inability to spot him as a Traitor.
Prime Video’s hit Last One Laughing was named best entertainment programme, beating BBC One heavyweights The Graham Norton Show, Michael McIntyre’s Big Show and Would I Lie To You.
Bob Mortimer’s efforts to make his rival comedians crack a smile while he kept a straight face in Last One Laughing earned him the Bafta for best entertainment performance.
Coogan will play Alan Partridge ‘until I die’
Steve Coogan won best actor in a comedy for How Are You? It’s Alan (Partridge).
He said: “Doing comedy in these troubled times is so important. It’s a privilege to make people laugh after all these years.”
He continued: “I will keep on doing it. If anyone wants to know when Alan Partridge is going to die, it’s about the same time that I am going to die.”
Katherine Parkinson was named best comedy actress for her role as mum Rachel in family sitcom Here We Go.
Her competition in the category included a trio of stars from Amandaland (Lucy Punch, Philippa Dunne and Jennifer Saunders) as well as Diane Morgan and Rosie Jones.
Amandaland did have success in the category for best scripted comedy, four years after Motherland – in which the title character first appeared – won the same award.
Creator Holly Walsh said: “This is for everyone who is going through a process of reinvention, whatever that is, because it takes a lot to start again.”
Win for Gaza doctors film dropped by BBC
The current affairs prize went to Gaza: Doctors Under Attack after it was pulled by the BBC last year, which the broadcaster said was because of impartiality concerns. It was later shown by Channel 4 instead.
The documentary’s reporter and producer, Ramita Navai, told the audience: “This award means so much to us,” then spoke about the numbers of women, children and healthcare workers who have been killed in Gaza.
“These are the findings of our organisation that the BBC failed to show but we refused to be silenced and censored and we thank Channel 4.”
Ben de Pear, the founder of Basement Films behind Gaza: Doctors Under Attack, added he had a question for the BBC: “Given you dropped our film, will you drop us from the Bafta screening later tonight?” He also thanked the journalists on the ground in Gaza.
When the BBC shelved the documentary, it said in a statement “it was determined to report all aspects of the conflict in the Middle East impartially and fairly.”
De Pear’s comments during the ceremony were later included in BBC One’s broadcast of the awards, as part of a round-up of some of the winners.
Netflix’s Grenfell: Uncovered, about the 2017 Grenfell Tower fire, which killed 72 people, won best single documentary.
In other categories, EastEnders was named best soap, Scam Interceptors won best daytime show, and Go Back To Where You Came From picked up the factual entertainment prize.
Poignant speeches by Mary Berry and Martin Lewis
Former Great British Bake Off judge Dame Mary Berry received the top lifetime achievement honour, the Bafta Fellowship, at the age of 91.
“I’m really bowled over by this accolade. I’m a cook, I’m a teacher, so I feel very honoured to be given Bafta’s highest award,” she said.
She finished her speech offering thanks to her three children, including her late son William, who died in a car accident in 1989 at the age of 19. She said: “William is in heaven, but I thank him.”
Financial expert Martin Lewis was also given an honorary prize, the Special Award.
An emotional Lewis said he wrote the speech on Thursday, 42 years after the death of his mother when he was 11.
“For six years, barring school, I barely left the house. Now I’m picking up a Bafta,” he told the audience.
“Life can be transformed, it can get better. If you had told that broken, scared boy that I’d proudly be a campaigning journalist, his jaw would have dropped.
“So I dedicate this to consumer journalism, where I found my voice.”
