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BBC Removes Room on the Broom From iPlayer Amid David Walliams Allegations
Room on the Broom, a 2012 animated film featuring David Walliams, was removed from BBC iPlayer following serious sex offense allegations against him.
The 30-minute animated adaptation of Julia Donaldson’s children’s book no longer appears on the BBC streaming platform. Walliams voiced a frog in the production, acting alongside Gillian Anderson as the witch and Simon Pegg as the narrator. His character performs three lines of dialogue alongside several sound effects in the film.
The action follows allegations published on Tuesday by The Guardian and ITV News. Multiple women accused Walliams of grooming them when they were teenagers, while one woman described an encounter with him when she was 15 as sexual assault. Walliams denies any wrongdoing.
On Friday, the Metropolitan Police stated they received a number of non-recent serious sex offense allegations against him in recent days. Earlier in the week, the BBC announced it was reviewing all material featuring and written by Walliams across its platforms.
“These are serious allegations,” a BBC spokesperson said, noting the corporation is looking carefully at all material featuring and written by Walliams and removing certain programs while the review is underway.
Other titles removed from BBC iPlayer include the sketch comedy series Little Britain, which ran from 2003 until 2006, and Come Fly With Me, which aired for one season in 2010. A 2020 episode of Who Do You Think You Are? featuring Walliams is also unavailable, alongside adaptations of his children’s books Gangsta Granny and Billionaire Boy. Many of his published books have likewise been removed from shops, libraries, and schools.
Other broadcasters have removed programming featuring Walliams from their services. Episodes of 8 Out Of 10 Cats Does Countdown along with the 2021 special Chitty Flies Again with Walliams were pulled by Channel 4. Sky removed his work from its platform and dropped distribution of the upcoming film Fing!, based on his 2019 children’s book.
“The allegations made against David Walliams are extremely serious,” a Sky spokesperson said, adding that the network notified producers of its intention to exit its position as the UK and Ireland licensee of Fing! and removed existing content featuring him.
Angel Studios confirmed it will still release Fing! in the US, though a cameo featuring Walliams will be removed and he will not participate in promotion.
Walliams has not responded directly to the reports published by The Guardian and ITV News. In a letter sent several months ago to journalists working on those investigations, he denied being a sexual predator. He admitted that his conduct was sometimes inconsiderate and expressed regret for failing to properly weigh other people’s feelings, though he maintained that he did not violate the law.
Several sources alleged inappropriate behavior towards women at the prime-time show Britain’s Got Talent, where Walliams served as a judge from 2012 to 2022. His publisher, HarperCollins, dropped him last year, and he was also dropped by his literary agency, Independent Talent Group.
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