1 week Ago By Anita Markoff
Fiona Bruce has lifted the lid on her secret method for keeping the heated Question Time audiences in check, revealing that meticulous preperation for the BBC programme is her best weapon. In a piece Bruce wrote for The Spectator last year, the presenter spoke about a trip she went on to Philadelphia where she filmed a special US episode of the British show. This was the first time the programme had been filmed across the Atlantic since 2008.
At the time, she admitted to being a bit nervous about how an American audience would handle the show's format. Her biggest concern as she prepared to film against the backdrop of a bitterly divisive presidential election was that every audience member was going to be frisked for guns. She jokingly told readers: "Blimey.
The most I normally have to worry about is people getting overexcited and shouting." Bruce has been in charge of the BBC political debate show since 2019, and went on to share that her technique for managing passionate crowds of people is just preparation. The presenter spends the day before each broadcast combing through a mountain of briefing notes, and condensing them down into one single A4 page.
She described this process as essential to staying on top of the discussions that often unfold very rapidly live on air. However, despite this, the unpredictability of the audience is always a wildcard. Bruce gave an example of one time an audience member nearly took the BBC programme off the rails in her early Question Time days when a woman ditched her pre-approved question in favour of an impassioned plea about the closure of her local cattery.
Even with years of experience in hosting the show under her belt now, Bruce has acknowledged there is a lot that is out of her hands. Audience members only submit their final questions 90 minutes before filming begins, which means the panel have to face them without any prior knowledge. She admitted: "This can make for a very nervous green room.
" During her time in Philadelphia, Bruce says she went on a daily morning jog to the famous Rocky steps with her team before they went on to make final adjustments to their briefs. She remained focused on the one thing she could control - "facts, facts, facts" - during an election cycle where the truth seemed increasingly flexible. It seems that Bruce has an easier time keeping UK audiences under control than their US counterparts, as she joked that the next Question Time she hosted in Rotherham after her stint overseas would "feel like a meeting of the local Women's Institute".
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