LOS ANGELES — Britain and America share the same language, but does that mean their TV programmes do, too?Yes and no, said Garth Ancier, who’s well-positioned to address the question. After serving as programming chief at three US networks, Ancier is in charge of BBC America, which delivers British Broadcasting Corp. shows and news to 55 million homes via cable and satellite.

According to Ancier, “Hotel Babylon,” a drama beginning August 8 on BBC America, could be a Hollywood native.

“With all due respect to my late friend, Aaron (Spelling), he could have made `Hotel Babylon,”’ Ancier said. “It’s bright, it’s colourful, it’s sexy. It’s set in a hotel with beautiful people doing nasty things to each other. It’s what Aaron specialised in.”

That’s in sharp contrast to “EastEnders,” an enduring soap opera that Ancier calls “peculiar to Britain.”

“It’s not a particularly uplifting or inspirational show. It’s a very dramatic serial but sort of depressing,” he said. “The joke around the office is the lesson from that show is `Life is miserable and then you die.”’

In contrast, American viewers “love escapist, uplifting products,” Ancier said — although he notes that a number of US-born shows, “Ugly Betty” and “House” among them, are popular abroad.

Ancier’s thoroughly American career included executive posts at Fox, NBC and WB and, most recently, the Warner Bros.-AOL broadband venture In2TV.

His latest title is president, BBC Worldwide America, and his portfolio includes expanding the company’s channels and promoting Los Angeles-based BBC Worldwide Productions (“Dancing with the Stars,” the upcoming “Viva Laughlin”) to US networks.

His new job required a new frame of mind.

“The biggest challenge is coming from a culture where you’ve been steeped in everything from `Leave It to Beaver’ to `Gilligan’s Island’ to `The Brady Bunch.’ The history of television goes back in your brain to your childhood,” he said.

Suddenly, Ancier said, he’s in a world where knowledge of “Blue Peter,” a hit British children’s show, is a must.

“You become familiar with the top shows in Britain and have to think about how many of those shows fit in the American psyche,” he said.

One cultural gap he’s intent on narrowing involves numbers. There’s a British propensity for abbreviated series running about a half-dozen episodes, compared to the usual U.S. model of 22 episodes per year.

“They’re moving slowly but surely in the direction of American television and making more episodes per show,” he said. That’s a boon for BBC America which, like any cable channel, wants enough episodes to create a schedule “checkerboard” with multiple airings of a series.

As president of BBC Worldwide America, Ancier is giving his British colleagues a polite push in that direction. After all, it makes sense for the former colonies to have some say in what the BBC is producing.

“We are the largest English-speaking country in the world; we are the biggest buyer of British product in the US by a mile. So if we buy one show and don’t buy another, it does change the economics back in Britain,” Ancier said.

His immediate plan for BBC America includes a swing towards more current fare.

The channel “almost seemed like public television in the costume drama area, like `Masterpiece Theatre.’ To me, they own that territory. So I tried to work with our folks to have the shows they present represent contemporary Britain, not the Britain of 1850.”

One example of how Ancier is positioning the channel as modern is the addition of spy drama “MI5” (which also shows on A&E).

He’s also shaping a more consistent schedule, moving its prime-time start up an hour, to the more common 8 p.m. EDT, and creating theme nights.

There’s the self-explanatory “murder mystery Monday”; “Tuesday nitro,” focused on “MI5” and other espionage dramas; “wicked Wednesday,” with “Footballer$ Wives” and “Hotel Babylon”; a Thursday lineup with talk and reality shows; police procedurals on Friday; supernatural shows on Saturday (“Doctor Who” among them) and adventure shows including the new “Robin Hood” on Sundays.

Ancier also is eager to raise the profile of BBC newscasts, which he considers the company’s “crown jewels.”

“They do terrific storytelling and around-the-world pieces. It’s been underexposed in the US marketplace given how good it is,” he said. He started by moving the nightly news program back from 8 p.m. to 7 p.m. EDT.

Last month, Rome Hartman, former executive producer of Katie Couric’s CBS newscast, was hired to develop and produce an hourlong newscast aimed at US audiences and airing on BBC America and on the 24-hour international BBC World News channel (which is seeking to expand its limited US distribution).

One priority for Ancier is launching a high-definition channel to take advantage of the fact that the bulk of BBC-produced programming is in or close to that format. More goals: the introduction of online programming and, looking long-term, the creation of a children’s channel.