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TV tonight: festival season climaxes with Sting, the Manics and Sugababes live
(www.theguardian.com)
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Steven Moffat on ‘Doctor Who’ bosses being “Chief Satan of the Nation” and how not to adapt British series for the U.S.
(www.hollywoodreporter.com)
In his appearance, Moffat also discussed his latest show, Douglas Is Cancelled, an ITV commission with SkyShowtime, which was produced by Hartswood Films and launched at the annual BBC Studios Showcase in London earlier this year. The series, which debuted in the U.K. in June and will be rolling out in other markets soon, stars Hugh Bonneville (Downton Abbey, Paddington) and Karen Gillan (Doctor Who, Guardians of the Galaxy) in four 45-minute episodes revolving around respected news host Douglas, regarded as a national treasure, and his younger co-anchor Madeline. Co-starring are Ben Miles (Hijack, The Crown), Alex Kingston (A Discovery of Witches, Treason), Nick Mohammed (Ted Lasso, Intelligence), and Simon Russell Beale (Firebrand, Thor: Love and Thunder). Ben Palmer (Breeders) directed the series.
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Asked to explain the premise to the audience since the show hasn’t aired in Canada yet, Moffat quipped: “Illegally download it.” He later joked: “Please watch my new show. Legally.” In the context of piracy, Moffat shared that he used to look online to see how quickly new shows of his became available, suggesting the entertainment industry’s approach to release and windowing strategies may not be the best. “We are a strange industry. We get really, really cross that people are so enthusiastic about our product that they desperately want to get it early,” Moffat said. “I feel as though some other industries might have had a different solution to that. Yeah, it may not be the greatest business idea in the world: ‘no, you can’t have it yet’.”
Moffat does not believe in the argument that in an age of political correctness comedy can’t be successfully conceived. “You make comedy by breaking rules, right? So the more rules there are, the better,” he explained.
Was he ever canceled? He recalled that when he worked on Doctor Who, there was much hatred from fans directed at him. “The level of hate you get could down three passenger jets. I mean, seriously, it doesn’t stop,” he shared. “I was vilified endlessly. I was a homophobe, misandrist and a misanthrope and a sexist and misogynist and a racist. I was against so many people I could only be described as an omni- bigot, which I would suggest means I’m treating everybody equally.” Moffat concluded by joking that any Doctor Who showrunner is taking on the role of “chief Satan of the nation.”
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Moffat closed his appearance by explaining that his advice on writing is simple. “Every sentence has to make you want to read the next sentence,” he shared. “Keep people reading.”
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Lord of the Flies series adaptation coming from BBC – with a Hans Zimmer score
(www.empireonline.com)
With Lost back in the air for its 20th anniversary, and the wait for Yellowjackets Season 3 stretching on, you might be looking for your next desert island TV fix. And the BBC has picked up your message in a bottle: the broadcaster (along with Australian streamer Stan) is preparing to strand a cast of kids on a faraway shore in a new four-part series take on Lord Of The Flies. William Golding’s novel is being adapted by none other than the perpetually-busy Jack Thorne, with director Marc Munden behind the camera. While the series was announced last year, new details are emerging now that it's started filming in Malaysia.
Most notably, Hans Zimmer has signed on to provide a score – along with Kara Talve – meaning this take on the castaway tale should sound suitably epic. “Hans has already shared his first sketches for the score, which are hugely inspiring. We are honoured to be working with him,” says executive producer Joel Wilson. Plus, after an open casting call, the cast of youngsters has been confirmed: David McKenna will play Piggy; Winston Sawyers is Ralph; Lox Pratt is Jack; Isaac Talbut is Simonl; Thomas Connor is Roger; Noah and Cassius Flemyng are twins Sam and Eric; Cornelius Brandreth is Maurice; Tom Page-Turner is Bill.
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The second season of the charming ode to British comedy begins. Plus: Michael Palin visits Africa’s biggest floating slum. Here’s what to watch this evening
9pm, Sky Max
Gemma Arterton is back for a second season as the 60s sitcom star Sophie Straw in this charming ode to British comedy, written by Morwenna Banks and based on Nick Hornby’s hit 2014 novel Funny Girl. Now that her breakthrough show, Barbara & Jim, has been cancelled, she is going it alone with Just Barbara. Will she reunite with the old writing gang to ensure its success? The bigger question for fans, though, is: can she and Dennis (Arsher Ali) finally be together? Hollie Richardson
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TV tonight: Volodymyr Zelenskiy’s remarkable pivot from comedian to president
(www.theguardian.com)
How a TV star playing a fictional leader went on to lead Ukraine. Plus: Rob and Romesh perform a Metallica classic at Download. Here’s what to watch this evening
9pm, BBC Two
It is not a new story, but it is remarkable and almost unbelievable – the TV comedian who played a fictional president and went on to be elected the real president of Ukraine. It’s told here in three parts. In the first episode, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, his wife, Olena, and the people who know him best rewind and paint a portrait of a clever, funny, popular man who had the unlikeliest rise to power. Other contributors include Nancy Pelosi and the Guardian’s Luke Harding. Hollie Richardson
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TV tonight: from Charli xcx to Cat Burns, who will win this year’s Mercury prize?
(www.theguardian.com)
The ceremony will be broadcast live from Abbey Road studios. Plus: a throuple seek help in Couples Therapy. Here’s what to watch this evening
8pm, BBC Four
A sense of mounting disarray surrounds the music awards this year – expect a scaled-down event at Abbey Road studios (no sponsor has been forthcoming) and the usual sense of mild confusion about what exactly is being celebrated. The do is being filmed and broadcast live, with this year’s leading contenders including Charli xcx (for the summer-defining Brat), Corinne Bailey Rae (for Black Rainbows), Cat Burns (above, for Early Twenties) and Beth Gibbons (for Lives Outgrown). Annie Macmanus and Huw Stephens host the ceremony. Phil Harrison
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Louis Theroux’s production company is behind this startling documentary. Plus, Gemma Whelan’s crime drama The Tower returns. Here’s what to watch this evening
9pm, BBC Three
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Can Ashley and Gordon’s new relationship survive without their dog? Plus: Freddie Flintoff’s cricket tour wraps up. Here’s what to watch this evening
10pm, BBC Two
The word-of-mouth hit Aussie comedy is back – but there is a paw-shaped hole as the second series starts. Ashley and Gordon (real-life couple and co-creators Harriet Dyer and Patrick Brammall) are regretting giving away Colin, the injured dog who brought them together. They are also realising that their relationship may not last in his absence. Can they get him back? The hurdles ahead include a bombshell secret and an excruciating meet-the-parents encounter. High jinks, hilarious one-liners and heartbreaking shots of Colin ensue. Hollie Richardson
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The popular Brighton-based cosy crime drama is back for a third series. Plus, behind-the-scenes footy action in Mission to Burley. Here’s what to watch this evening
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cross-posted from: https://feddit.uk/post/16878799
The BBC has unveiled a first look at the upcoming Wallace and Gromit adventure that will air on the BBC in 2024.
In Vengeance Most Fowl, Gromit worries that Wallace has become unduly reliant on his creations, and his worries are validated when Wallace creates a "smart gnome" that appears to have an independent mind.
The League of Gentlemen and Inside No. 9's Reece Shearsmith is the voice for Norbot, who can be heard in the new teaser.
In terms of other cast members, Ben Whitehead stars as Wallace, who previously worked alongside the late Peter Sallis (the original voice of Wallace) on other Wallace and Gromit brand projects.
The cast also includes Peter Kay, Lauren Patel, Diane Morgan, Adjoa Andoh, Lenny Henry, and Buzz Khan.
The BBC confirmed earlier this year that the renowned supervillain Feathers McGraw will make a comeback in the new 79-minute film.
Directed by Nick Park and Merlin Crossingham, the film will make its UK premiere on BBC iPlayer and BBC One this Christmas. Later in the winter, it will be accessible on Netflix worldwide.
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Stephen Mangan hosts Password, with team captains Daisy May Cooper and Alan Carr. Plus: a gripping new French drama. Here’s what to watch this evening
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Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony is joyously celebrated at the Proms. Plus: what happened when a pilot was sucked halfway out of the cockpit. Here’s what to watch this evening
8pm, BBC FourIt is the 200th anniversary of Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony, and given that it’s arguably the most well-known piece of classical music, it’s only right that it is commemorated. Nicholas Collon conducts the Aurora Orchestra in a signature memorised Proms performance. Soloists include Masabane Cecilia Rangwanasha, Marta Fontanals-Simmons, Brenden Gunnell and Christopher Purves. The National Youth Choir of Great Britain joins for the final, joyous movement. Phil Harrison
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She is this week’s adventurer into the past on Who Do You Think You Are? Plus: Interview With the Vampire takes an intriguing turn. Here’s what to watch today
9pm, BBC OneThis popular long-running genealogy series has a way of making you count your blessings: one thing that’s usually evident is how few generations most of us are from grinding poverty. That’s true of this week’s adventurer into the past, former Spice Girl Melanie Chisholm, whose Liverpudlian family’s journey involves a workhouse, incredibly bleak manual work and a hasty flight from the great Irish famine of the 19th century. She is also fascinated to learn that her fourth great-grandfather was a campaigner for improving working men’s lives and rights. Phil Harrison
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The 17th summer instalment promises 11 days of sublime sport. Plus: Chloe Ayling is interrogated in Kidnapped. Here’s what to watch this evening
6.30pm, Channel 4
If you’re feeling wistful for the wholesome cheer of the Olympics, part two of the summer Games, the 17th of the season’s Paralympics, is here. Clare Balding presents coverage of the opening ceremony – this time, the participants will parade up the Champs-Élysées and then in the Place de la Concorde. Eleven days of competition involving more than 4,000 athletes start on Thursday. Team GB finished second in the medal table in Japan three years ago; how will they fare this time out? Phil Harrison
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Your biggest foodie questions are answered by experts. Plus: Celebrity MasterChef cooks on. Here’s what to watch this evening
8pm, Channel 4
Why is there so much air in a bag of crisps? What distinguishes cordial from squash? How does the shape of a chocolate change its flavour? These are the big foodie questions answered by Jimmy Doherty, Kate Quilton and their team of experts in this special Unwrapped episode about the best party food and drink. Samosas, martinis and sugarwork are also on the menu, as well as the essential ice bag. Hollie Richardson
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cross-posted from: https://feddit.uk/post/16672044
Shot on color 35mm film, the 1.37:1 2K restorations look outstanding, the 17 episodes generously spread across six Region_Free Blu-ray discs. Partly this is to accommodate all the extra features accompanying specific episodes, but in any case, each episode is extraordinarily clean with excellent color and contrast. Audio is offered in LPCM 2.0 mono and DTS-HD 5.1 remixes (the latter on episodes of The Prisoner only, not the Danger Man shows). While the 5.1 remixes aren’t original to the initial broadcasts they do add enormous oomph and are well-mixed. Also included are original music & effects tracks. In English only, optional English subtitles are provided. It all comes in sturdy hardbox packaging limited to 1,500 copies.
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The extra features, much of it new, is practically endless. The fat booklet is loaded with great behind-the-scenes photos, an exhaustively researched making-of article by Andrew Pixley, material prepared by ITC to sell the show abroad, and an excellent episode guide with detailed credits.
Two feature-length documentaries are included: Don’t Knock Yourself Out, a 95-minute piece from 2007 about the making of the series, and In My Mind (2017), an 82-minute documentary about filmmaker Chris Rodley’s experiences trying to wrangle and interview with Patrick McGoohan. Patrick McGoohan 1983 is 30 minutes of outtakes of Rodley’s McGoohan interview. Catherine McGoohan 2017 features the actor’s daughter.
Seven episodes—Arrival, The Chimes of Big Ben, The Schizoid Man, The General, Dance of the Dead, A Change of Mind, and Fall Out—feature audio commentaries by various writers, directors, production managers and others that worked on the show. All 17 episodes offer text commentaries. These are, like everything else, very informative and exhaustively researched, though a little difficult to focus on in conjunction with the running of each episode.
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If you’re a fan of The Prisoner, British ‘60s television, or innovative television generally, you are going to want to have this. The shows look great and the extras are extremely worthwhile though it will take you weeks and weeks to go through everything. One of the year’s best TV releases.
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I still have the notepad where I first doodled an idea about MI5 spies. I pitched it to the production company Kudos, which made documentaries: they didn’t have a drama department but the idea appealed. What producer doesn’t secretly want to make James Bond? Channel 4 and ITV said no, but the BBC liked it and we were off.
I grew up in the US and wanted to capture the adrenaline, ambition and scale of American shows. I remember asking: “Can I blow up a car?” The BBC kept saying yes. Back then, spy dramas still had this dark, dour Le Carré legacy. We dared to be shiny.
We had written four scripts when 9/11 happened. The show then became about the people stopping that happening in Britain. Who are they? How do they operate? Spooks was my preferred title. I had considered Five, then the BBC came up with the tagline: “MI5, not 9 to 5.”
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Killing off Lisa’s character with a deep fat fryer was originally going to be in the series finale of season one. We decided to move it to episode two and break viewers’ hearts. It created the sense that nobody was safe. There was a furore afterward but you hardly see anything – it’s all implied. Somebody in LA told me that JJ Abrams screened it for his writers’ room and said: “This is how you do it!”
Advisers who can’t be named were instrumental in keeping things authentic. We’d rip plots from the headlines. Sometimes, the Ten O’Clock News bulletin after the show looked like an extra scene. One episode was referenced in Hansard. After a storyline about an attack on Sellafield with a Scimitar missile, an MP asked: “This TV drama is talking about our defences, why aren’t we?”
The morning after it first aired, I got a call saying ratings were 9.6m and we’d been recommissioned straight away. It was the sort of moment you dream about. MI5 had been having some trouble with recruitment but applications went through the roof. Today’s geopolitics mean you can easily imagine Spooks returning. New threats, a new generation, Harry passing the torch. In fact, I recently had an idea for a festive reboot. Imagine Harry alone on Christmas Day, drinking a rare Scotch. Someone visits with a gift and it gets worse from there …
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She made the brave decision to make this emotional documentary. Plus: Saudi Arabia’s prince shells out for a Leonardo. Here’s what to watch tonight
8pm, BBC One
When Strictly dancer Amy Dowden was diagnosed with stage-three breast cancer in May 2023, she made the brave decision to allow cameras to follow her during treatment. This film is the result and, as you might expect, it’s an emotional rollercoaster involving surgery and chemotherapy – but also uplifting moments, including her appearance in last year’s series finale. It has been a difficult few months in Strictlyworld but this story, at least, offers some redemption. Phil Harrison
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Crime and corruption in the former coalfields as Monica Dolan and David Harewood join the cast. Plus, what becomes of a dangerous illegal dog? Here’s what to watch this evening
Sunday, 9pm, BBC One.
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‘Sue Johnston’s first day on set, she was biting someone’s nose off’: Ben Wheatley on his zombie drama Generation Z
(www.theguardian.com)
cross-posted from: https://feddit.uk/post/16589411
The old eat the young. That is the back-of-a-beermat pitch for new Channel 4 drama Generation Z. And because the Z stands for zombie, the eating is meant literally. “I loved the idea of a horror story about societal breakdown, told from the perspective of different generations,” says its writer-director Ben Wheatley. “Once I started writing it, I couldn’t stop.”
The film-maker’s first original series for TV begins with an army convoy crashing outside a care home. The subsequent chemical leak turns the residents into marauding monsters who attack local youngsters. “It’s a bit of a Brexit metaphor,” admits Wheatley. “But it’s by no means binary. We discuss it from each generation’s viewpoint, exploring the notion that boomers have ruined the lives of the young. Because it’s a genre piece, that’s basically by biting their hands and eating their brains.”
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“I love telly and watch a lot of it – Battlestar Galactica, The Sopranos and Deadwood were the golden age for me – so I was keen to play with a different train set,” he says. “It was exciting to write in longer form, rather than the sprint that is a film script. In terms of production values and cinematic scale, TV has closed the gap on film. It’s like the difference between a single and an album. Actors move freely between the two now. The skillset’s no different. Any stigma has long gone.”
Fittingly for a series punctuated by gruesome deaths, he’s assembled a killer cast. Playing the pensioners are veterans such as Sue Johnston and Anita Dobson. “Sue’s first day on set, she was biting someone’s nose off,” he says. “They got to do stuff they don’t usually do, running around covered in gore, and had a blast doing it.” The gore is created the old-fashioned way. “Everything is practical, with prosthetics or models. There are very few CG effects. When arms are ripped off and blood spurts, there are people pumping plasma just out of shot. We use jelly when organs need to be edible. It’s all very visceral.”
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Generation Z is coming to Channel 4 this autumn.
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The pop-soul star performs orchestral versions of their hefty back catalogue. Plus, a sunny jaunt for Tory traveloguer Michael Portillo who visits Lisbon. Here’s what to watch this evening.
8.25pm, BBC Two
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TV tonight: Daisy May Cooper, Russell Howard and more take Jimmy Carr’s ultimate telly quiz
(www.theguardian.com)
Nigella’s ‘meecro-wah-vey’ and a Bake Off controversy are just some of the topics covered. Plus: Brian May goes to battle for badgers. Here’s what to watch this evening
9pm, Channel 4
Pedro Pascal’s brutal Game of Thrones death, a controversy on Bake Off and Nigella Lawson’s “meecro-wah-vey” are just some of the topics in Jimmy Carr’s ultimate quiz on all things television. Babatunde Aléshé, Daisy May Cooper, Natasia Demetriou, Jamie Demetriou, Judi Love and Russell Howard form the teams. Hollie Richardson
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cross-posted from: https://feddit.uk/post/16514035
Blake’s 7 is one of British sci-fi’s greatest, most subversive cult classics. From the mind of Doctor Who scribe Terry Nation—after he’d sent the nation into Dalekmania in the ’60s—the 1978 show was wildly ahead of its time, with ideas as bold as its budget was threadbare. Imagine if classic Doctor Who had less money and more balls, and you get a rough approximation of what Blake’s could be at its very best. Now, at long last, the series is getting a familiarly loving home release treatment.
Today the BBC lifted the lid on a brand-new Blu-ray remaster, Blake’s 7: The Collection. Styled in the vein of the corporation’s lavish Blu-ray remasters of classic seasons of Doctor Who, the first of Blake’s four series will release later this year. Including a brand-new remastering of the series—available for the first time on Blu-ray after an infamously rough home release history on VHS and DVD decades prior—complete with all new practical model work for the show’s VFX sequences, the first volume of Blake’s 7: The Collection will include all 13 episodes from series one, as well as new interviews with surviving cast and crew, and a previously unreleased documentary planned for the show’s DVD release, The Making of Blake’s 7.
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Blake’s 7: The Collection series one releases in the UK November 11.
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Negan and Maggie get their own show. Plus: a surprise or two for Paddy McGuinness. Here’s our pick of what to watch this evening
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TV tonight: the young people tackling the housing crisis in a remarkable way
(www.theguardian.com)
How to create a property portfolio with an Instagram account. Plus: the brilliant Celebrity Race Across the World continues. Here’s what to watch this evening
12.05am, Channel 4
The average deposit for a house in the UK is £53,000. This, along with extortionate rents, has made home ownership a distant dream for many without the financial help of parents. The hardest hit are Black people, with only 32% across all ages groups owning their own place. In this report, Daisy Maskell investigates the young Black people creating property portfolios and showing exactly how they do it on social media, which they also use as a tool to raise the money they need. Hollie Richardson
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