Events

Previews of forthcoming events and reviews of past events.

BFI Radio Times Festival 2019
BFI events

The BFI Radio Times TV festival is back next year and here are some of the highlights

12 December 2018 Rob Buckley 1 Comment

Since the first one was in 2015 and the second one was 2017, I’m going to hazard a guess that the rechristened ‘BFI and Radio Times Television Festival’ is now a bi-annual thing, as it’s back at the BFI between 12 and 14 April next year. It’s a little far out to have the full details yet, but here’s what’s just been announced:

The BFI & Radio Times Television Festival, the biggest, most exciting public television festival in the UK, featuring the very best TV shows and a star-studded line up of talent, is returning for a second outing at BFI Southbank from Friday 12 April – Sunday 14 April 2019.

Over three days the BFI & Radio Times Television Festival will showcase some of the biggest hits on TV today, preview the most eagerly awaited new shows of 2019, celebrate classic series and perennial favourites and feature unique events that spotlight rarely-seen material from the BFI National Archive.

Some of the biggest names in front of and behind the camera will join audiences to discuss their work on stage at BFI Southbank. Guests already confirmed include:

  • Jed Mercurio, the man behind one of 2018’s most critically acclaimed programmes, Bodyguard, and creator of BBC One’s hit police corruption drama Line of Duty. Jed will be talking about the return of the hit series and introduce stars from the cast.
  • Jamie Oliver celebrates 20 years since the programme that launched him, The Naked Chef, which changed the way we cook. Jamie will be talking about his life and career and whisking up a classic recipe in a live demonstration.
  • Big Narstie (Tyrone Lindo), star of Channel 4’s cult comedy The Big Narstie Show, one 2018’s breakout hits, will be joining proceedings alongside co-star Mo Gilligan, aka Mo the Comedian.
  • For over 30 years murder has stalked Midsomer. Now the stars, past and present, of ITV’s Midsomer Murders reveal what it’s like to make one of the deadliest – and most popular – detective shows ever made.
  • The festival will also be celebrating one the most loved British comedies of all time, Dad’s Army. Three episodes from the second series – The Loneliness of the Long Distance Walker, A Stripe for Frazer and Under Fire – were seemingly destroyed after they were first broadcast and are now being remade. Hear from the new cast about the making of the new shows.

The full line-up, with over 30 sessions over the weekend, will be announced in early 2019. Co-programmed by the BFI and Radio Times, the festival will draw on the expertise of both organisations, to entice a broad range of audiences from telly addicts and boxset-bingeing aficionados to those who love to discover archive gems and people who love nothing more than coming together to watch the latest in prime-time entertainment. This year’s festival will also include a strand programmed for and by young people, to reflect their radically different TV viewing experiences.

On sale dates

Thursday 7 February, 11:30 – BFI Champions and Patrons
Friday 8 February, 11:30 – BFI Members
Monday 11 February, 11:30 – Radio Times Subscribers
Friday 15 February, 11:30 – General public

Talent appearances subject to change. Please check the BFI website for updates to the programme and sign up for email alerts about the festival: www.bfi.org.uk/tvfest

Antonioni
BFI events

What TV’s on at the BFI in January? Including Dear Antonioni

5 December 2018 Rob Buckley Post a comment

Every month, TMINE lets you know what TV the BFI will be presenting at the South Bank in London

After a rather full schedule before Christmas, the BFI appears to want to settle back into its armchair, loosen its belt and have a quiet snooze in January, because there’s a grand total of one TV presentation the whole month. Yep, just one – and it’s a film documentary at that. Plus the ticket prices have gone up by a quid, although if you’re over 60, this one documentary is free, so you won’t notice.

Full details after the jump. Or you can watch it now, because Dear Antonioni is on YouTube. If you’re over 60, you’ll probably want to go to the BFI instead.

Continue reading “What TV’s on at the BFI in January? Including Dear Antonioni”

Care
BAFTA events

What TV’s on at BAFTA in November and December? Including Care and The Craft of Directing

9 November 2018 Rob Buckley Post a comment

Every so often week or so, TMINE flags up what new TV events BAFTA is holding around the UK

Adding to the previous events in November, BAFTA’s just announced a few more towards the end of the month, as well as one in December.

Programme

Care
Alison Steadman and Sheridan Smith in Care © LA Productions – Photographer: Tony Blake

TV Preview: Care

Tuesday, 27 November 2018 – 6:15pm
Princess Anne Theatre, BAFTA 195 Piccadilly London W1J 9LN
A preview of the new BBC drama followed by a Q&A with writers Jimmy McGovern and Gillian Juckes and actress Sheridan Smith.

Care follow Jenny (Sheridan Smith), a mother-of-two raising her girls alone with the support of her mother Mary (Alison Steadman). When Mary suffers a devastating stroke and develops dementia, Jenny’s world comes crashing down. Finding herself torn between her own life and the wellbeing of her mother, Jenny soon discovers that another way could be possible – but she’ll have to fight for it. The 90-minute drama is produced by LA Productions for BBC One.

Book Tickets

The Alienist

An Audience with Luke Evans

Thursday, 29 November 2018 – 7:30pm
National Museum of Wales, Cardiff

Luke was born in Pontypool and grew up in Aberbargoed. He received a scholarship to the London Studio Centre, and graduated in 2000. An established star in film and on London’s West End and, Welsh actor Luke Evans continues to make an impression in Hollywood.

Luke was most recently seen starring as ‘John Moore’ in the crime TV series The Alienist, which premiered at Sundance Film Festival and was released in April on Netflix. A sequel series, The Angel of Darkness, has been commissioned to begin filming next year.

There are 60 free tickets for members (available on a first-come, first-served basis) to include a drinks networking reception. Members of the public can purchase tickets for £10 inc VAT from the BAFTA ticketing site

Masterclass: The Craft of Directing TV Drama

Tuesday, 4 December 2018 – 7:00pm
Princess Anne Theatre, BAFTA 195 Piccadilly London W1J 9LN

Join a panel of practitioners who will share insights and experiences on leading a creative vision, working with writers and actors, and their key collaborators on set and in the edit, as well as what they see as the current challenges of excellence in storytelling. The global TV drama boom continues providing opportunities for directors to develop and deliver their creative visions on screen like never before.

Speakers:

  • BAFTA-winning director Jonny Campbell (Informer, Westworld, In the Flesh, Eric and Ernie)
  • SJ Clarkson, director (Succession, Collateral, Vinyl, Star Trek 4)
  • BAFTA-winning director Euros Lyn (Kiri, Damilola: Our Loved Boy, Happy Valley, Sherlock). He also won the BAFTA Cymru Sian Phillips award in 2015.

Book tickets

Ben Elton
BFI events

What TV’s on at the BFI in December? Including The ABC Murders, The Midnight Gang and Sound of Movie Musicals

1 November 2018 Rob Buckley 1 Comment

Every month, TMINE lets you know what TV the BFI will be presenting at the South Bank in London

December is usually when the BFI starts dolling out its TV presents to one and all, like Scrooge after the third ghost has visited, and this year is no different. As well as the traditional League of Gentlemen chat and the usual Missing Believed Wiped revelation of what previously lost TV has been recovered this year (as well as a new animated Doctor Who episode anyone?), there’s a whole bunch of TV previews with starry Q&As afterwards:

  • Sound of Movie Musicals, with Neil Brand
  • The ABC Murders with Rupert Grint and Tara Fitzgerald
  • The Midnight Gang, with David Walliams and Alan Davies
  • Mrs Brown’s Boys Christmas Special with Brendan O’Carroll, Jennifer Gibney, Paddy Houlihan and Danny O’Carroll

There’s a short season devoted to the rise of alternative comedy, while Nish Kumar and special guests will be discussing the new wave of TV satire. There’s even a sitcom workshop for young people. All that before Christmas, too!

Full details after the jump.

Continue reading “What TV’s on at the BFI in December? Including The ABC Murders, The Midnight Gang and Sound of Movie Musicals”

Stand Up Nigel Barton
Events

What TV’s on at Birkbeck in November? Including Stand Up, Nigel Barton and The Land of Green Ginger

23 October 2018 Rob Buckley Post a comment

Not exactly a regular TMINE feature, this one, but Birkbeck College is putting on a Classic TV event next month, so I think it’s worth letting y’all know about it. Plus it only costs a fiver.

British TV and the Working-Class Homecoming

Birkbeck Cinema, 2nd November 2018: 18:00-21:00

As university fees sit at record highs and the cost of accommodation and living in major university cities continues to spiral, the gap between working-class and lower-middle-class students and their more well-off peers grows wider and more self-evident. The idea of a ‘flattened’ culture is being exposed for the myth it is, and the ‘classless society’ truly has never arrived.

This programme represents a timely intervention in a phenomenon currently being underexplored; by returning to two classic British television presentations of the ‘working-class homecoming’ we can begin to find some representation of the experiences of current young working-class people attempting to bridge the gap between two worlds – the world of privilege and ‘opportunity’ and the oft-threatened and ‘common’ world of their background, and what happens when they return to the place of their birth.

The Wednesday Play: Stand Up, Nigel Barton (1965)

Stand Up, Nigel Barton is acclaimed television playwright Dennis Potter’s first great play; Potter draws on his own experiences of moving from the mining villages of the Forest of Dean to Oxford on a scholarship in showing a young man (Keith Barron) tortured by his inability to fit in with rich academia and student life, and his alienation from his old village way of living. Mocked by both his fellow students and his father’s friends, Nigel attempts to untangle a knot of guilt-ridden memories and find the room at the top without betraying his family background. Presaging Potter’s celebrated Blue Remembered Hills and The Singing Detective, Stand Up, Nigel Barton demonstrates the ways that those who attempt to traverse class boundaries can find themselves caught in a sort of no-man’s land.

Play For Today: The Land of Green Ginger (1973)

The Land of Green Ginger is rarely-screened but is a jewel in the crown of the career of Alan Plater (The Beiderbecke Affair, Trinity Tales). Plater’s alter-ego is Sally (Gwen Taylor), a young woman who has moved from university into a career in London. Offered an long-term job abroad she attempts to make up her mind about whether to leave or return to Hull, her family roots and her fisherman boyfriend. Almost impressionistic at times in its montages set to folk songs performed by The Watersons, the play serves as a celebration of Hull and maritime industry, a bitter lament for its decline and (again) a portrait of the siren call of the past, a working-class rootedness that is nonetheless under attack by the ruling powers, grappling with ideas of personal social and economic mobility.

Book tickets