Emma Saunders
Culture reporter
Presenter and journalist Kirsty Wark is to receive the Bafta fellowship, the British Academy’s highest honour.
The award recognises industry figures who have made an outstanding contribution to film, television or games.
Wark, who presented BBC’s Newsnight programme for 30 years until leaving last July, said: “This is a wonderful surprise and a great honour. Television has been my home for 40 years… I continue to learn every day from people with awe-inspiring skills who have become treasured colleagues and dear friends.”
The news comes after it was revealed that EastEnders has been named recipient of the 2025 Bafta TV craft special award for its commitment to taking on and nurturing new talent off-screen.
The BBC One soap was praised for its work on nurturing upcoming directors from under-represented groups, and offering writing and acting opportunities on its spin-off show, E20, which ran for three series.
Scottish broadcaster Wark finds herself in good company among previous fellowship recipients, including Alfred Hitchcock, Steven Spielberg, Dame Judi Dench, Dame Vanessa Redgrave, Martin Scorsese, Sidney Poitier and Dame Helen Mirren.
The most recent winners are actor and presenter Warwick Davis and composer Yoko Shimomura.
Jane Millichip, CEO of Bafta, said: “Kirsty’s dedication is unwavering when it comes to telling the stories that really matter.”
She praised Wark’s legacy, adding it is “unmatched in the world of news and current affairs broadcasting”, along with her “ability to inform and engage her readers, listeners and viewers”.
“She does all this with enormous charm and wit,” she added.
Wark was described as a “legend of British journalism” by former British Prime Minister Tony Blair during her final Newsnight show in July 2024, while former Scottish First Minister Nicola Sturgeon told her: “To say you are a broadcasting titan… would be an understatement. It’s hard to imagine that landscape without you.”
Wark spent more than 30 years presenting the long-running politics show but has remained working at the BBC, continuing to present Radio 4’s The Reunion, Start the Week and Front Row on Radio 4.
In September, she presented a Panorama special on the menopause industry, while last month, she fronted a two-part documentary on Scottish fashion called Icons of Style.
She’s also been working on her third novel.
Wark joined the BBC as a graduate researcher in 1976 for BBC Radio Scotland, going on to become a producer in radio current affairs.
After a spell on Radio 4’s The World At One, she moved to television in 1983. She worked as a producer on Reporting Scotland.
She was one of the first television journalists to arrive on the scene when Pan Am Flight 103 was blown up above Lockerbie in 1988.
Two years later, she famously locked horns with Margaret Thatcher in a headline-making interview which propelled her into the national spotlight.
She joined BBC Two’s arts strand The Late Show as a presenter and then moved on to Newsnight in 1993.
Her many famous interviewees over the years include George Clooney, ex-US president Bill Clinton, Damien Hirst, Madonna and Harold Pinter.
Wark will collect the award at this year’s Bafta TV Awards in London on 11 May.
