Othello Wins $50,000 Global Television Grand Prize
$25,000 NHK President's Prize to Band of Brothers

Complete List of Winners

Othello, a brilliantly original and stylish new version of Shakespeare's great tragedy, has won the $50,000 Global Television Grand Prize at the 23rd Banff Rockie Awards. It was one of several prize-winning British productions and co-productions in a field that also included winners from Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Japan, Israel, Mozambique, South Africa, and the United States.

Produced by London Weekend Television and WGBH Boston, in association with the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, Othello follows the basic outlines of Shakespeare's plot, but the story has been completely rewritten and modernized, set in a seething contemporary world of police corruption and institutional racism. The script, with police inspector John Othello and his colleague Ben Jago at its centre, is by Andrew Davies, who collected the Grand Prize in 1996 at Banff for his adaptation of Pride and Prejudice. Othello was also named best in its category, taking home the Rockie for Best Made-for-TV Movie.

The $25,000 NHK President's Prize for the best entry produced or post-produced in high definition television went to Band of Brothers, the celebrated HBO Mini-Series that dramatizes the trials, triumphs and tragedies of the men of Easy Company, who parachuted into France on D-Day, 1944.

I Was a Rat, a British-Canadian co-production worked its fairy-tale magic on the international jury, winning the Banff Rockie for Best Children's Program. I Was a Rat was the start of a hat trick for the BBC, which picked up prizes for Best Mini-Series, for Perfect Strangers, a hugely compelling dramatization of family stories; and The Office, an offbeat, mock "vérité" comedy.

The Rockie for Best Information Program went to Beneath the Veil, Saira Shah's daring undercover look at life under the Taliban in Afghanistan. Beneath the Veil, which became grimly familiar to television viewers after September 11, was produced in association with Channel 4 and CNN.

Besides its share of the Grand Prize, the U.S. was feted for HBO's brilliantly innovative comedy/drama Six Feet Under ­ about a family of undertakers ­ which was named Best Continuing Series. The stunning television adaptation of A Huey P. Newton Story, was named Best Performance Program. And Legacy, a moving chronicle of the struggles of three generations of disadvantaged African American women, won Best Social & Political Documentary.

While Canada was associated with Othello, and was a co-production partner on I Was a Rat, the NFB's Shinny ­ The Hockey in All of Us was the all-Canadian winner of the Best Sports Program award ­ presented, fittingly, by the captain of Canada's Olympic Gold Medal Women's Hockey Squad, Cassie Campbell.

Leunig, a rich selection of one-minute animation productions from Australia, based on the artwork and cartoons of Michael Leunig, won the Rockie for Best Animation Program. A French documentary about the great Italian film director Federico Fellini, Fellini, je suis un grand menteur, was named Best Arts Documentary.

The Best History and Biography Program was Dear Fidel ­ Marita's Story, a German documentary of the life and times of Marita Lorenz, whose alleged affair with Fidel Castro is but one of many incredible aspects of her life. In Poker Face, the Israeli winner of the Best Short Drama prize, a game of chance is a metaphor for life for an aging poker player. A Certain Death, from Japan, took an unblinking look at the treatment of radiation victims in the nuclear age, and won the prize for Best Popular Science and Natural History Program.

In exercising its option to award two Special Jury Prizes, the equivalent of category winners, the jury singled out two productions from Africa. The honors went to The Ball, a Mozambique/South Africa co-production under the "Steps for the Future" umbrella; and Ochre and Water, a strong contender in the Social and Political Documentary category.

The Ball is a short, funny, and poignant program about a soccer ball made of condoms! The South African documentary Ochre and Water is, visually and aurally, a striking depiction of the Himba people of Namibia and their resistance to a hydroelectric project that threatens their traditional pasture and ancestral graves. The Telefilm Canada Prize for Best Independent Canadian Production in English went to I Was a Rat, the winner in the Children's category. The Telefilm Canada Prize for Best Independent Canadian Production in French went to the charming and educational Children's program Hugo et le dragon.

The International Student Jury chose The Ball as the winner in the Children's category. The International Student Jury animation prize went to War Game, a profound and captivating analysis of games, war and the game of war.

The Banff Rockie Awards were decided by an international jury of seven television professionals from seven countries: Fil Fraser, President of the Jury, Canada; Anne Georget, France; Glenda Hambly, Australia; Russell Honeyman, Zimbabwe/Netherlands; Masaru Ikeo, Japan; Philip Jones, U.K.; and Deborah Stewart, U.S. Close to 1,000 programs were entered from countries and territories around the world; 82 programs were nominated for the awards.