Jayne was born in Yorkshire. She has an acting diploma from the Royal Academy of Music and a modern languages degree from Cambridge. She studied journalism at the LCP and has written for publications including Condé Nast Traveller and Good Housekeeping.
Jayne’s melodious, distinctive voice was regularly to be heard on network BBC One and BBC Two, where she was an announcer from 1989 until April 1996. She signed off on her final BBC continuity shift in the early hours of Tuesday 9th April 1996: “Well that’s about it for BBC One for tonight. We’ve come to the end of our bank holiday offerings – and I’ve come to the end of my service to BBC One. Thanks for your company and don’t forget that BBC Radio is still going strong: Steve Madden’s on Radio 2 and Radio 4 takes the World Service throughout the night. Give them a whirl if you’re staying around. On behalf of tonight’s team on BBC One though, it just remains for me, Jayne Constantinis, for the last time, to wish you a very goodnight and a good start to the new week. Goodbye.”
Jayne was also an announcer on UK Horizons.
Here’s an article that Jane wrote for the Network newsletter, published by BBC Publicity in late-1991: “On Christmas Day I’ll be working the evening shift on BBC One, so I’ll have my Christmas dinner before I come in. It’s quite a long day – on a typical evening shift I get in before the editorial meeting at 2.15pm and spend the afternoon writing the script. There’s another meeting at 5pm, and I’ll go into Continuity at 6.15pm and stay till closedown – that’s 1.30am on Christmas Night. I worked last Christmas too, and I enjoyed that. There’s a good team spirit, and they lay on a spread of food. It’s such an important day for BBC Television that a lot of extra time and effort goes into preparing for it.
“Though Christmas Day is special, I’d say a typical day in Continuity only comes around every five weeks. We work a complicated shift pattern covering three 12-hour shifts on two channels. I enjoy doing shifts, I don’t like a nine-to-five working day, but I do like the predictability of the hours worked, because, though they can be anti-social, you can plan ahead. People often ask me what I do in between programmes? The answer is: prepare for the next junction. Every announcer’s main worry is coming up to a programme junction, especially the Nine o’Clock News. It’s peak viewing – you simply cannot have not finished what you are saying. We make contingency plans, but if a programme drops out early, you’ve got to fill. My job is to convey information in a pleasant, lively and articulate way. Your voice needs to be clear and authoritative – but never stuffy.”
Jayne was a business news reporter/newsreader on BBC World (1996) and since leaving the continuity studio has broadened her expertise in the broadcast and corporate worlds, working on corporate films (AXA, PWC, Sony, Sainsbury’s), digital/online (Channel 4, Sky, What Car?), Talking Books (RNIB), BBC Radio 4, Classic FM, the BAFTA-nominated series Mexico (BBC Two educational programme for seven-11 year-olds looking at Mexico and its people), History with Hart Davis, and she appeared as a newsreader in Daylight Robbery (1999).
Correspondence
Paul R. Jackson corresponded with Jayne in August 2017.
How Did You Get Started in Broadcasting and What Were You Doing Prior to Joining BBC TV Presentation?
“I worked in advertising and PR branding and answered an advert in The Guardian to get the announcing job.”
There Was a Noticeable Increase in the Number of Female Announcers in the Late-1980s – Was This a Conscious Decision by the Head of Presentation?
“I don’t know if it was a deliberate decision. I joined in 1989. I was doing BBC World while still announcing, in the last year. I’ve been freelance ever since doing all the other things.”
Personal information
Clips of Jayne on The TV Room
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