BBC plans blanket coverage as first Fame Game kicks off. (News).

The long-awaited Fame Academy launches this week, centring on more than nine hours of broadcasts every week for the next three months across the BBC's online, TV and radio services.

The series, which is produced for BBC by Endemol UK-owned Initial, begins this Friday at 8.30pm on BBC1. Although many details currently remain under wraps, BBC TV has confirmed that the show will be screened in three regular BBC1 slots, for a half hour at 7pm on Tuesdays and Thursdays and culminating in an hour-long Live Showdown at 8.30pm every Friday.

BBC Choice coverage will run daily throughout the week, while a 6 am to midnight stream is being offered through BBCi, both online and through digital TV. Radio One will cover the show with news and gossip and through a regular slot in Chris Moyles' afternoon show.

Executive producer Richard Hopkins--who was also live series producer on Big Brother 1--says, "It is a very exciting show--it has a unique flavour to it. We have auditioned 18-to 35-year-olds from all different musical backgrounds. One of the people in the house has never even sung any popular music before, only choral music."

Initial chairman Malcolm Gerrie adds, "We know that the scale of this has to be pretty big. And it is about the stories between the protagonists in the house, the characters and the relationships. In that way, it is closer to the original Fame than Pop Idol."