Events

Time for our regular look at what’s on at the South Bank in London in July. First though, just a mention that there’s been an addition to the BFI May programme – they’re showing a preview of Psychoville tonight, followed by a Q&A with Reece Shearsmith, cast member Daisy Haggard and producer Justin Davies. It’s on at 6.15pm, so get your skates on.

There’s going to be quite a lot of TV fun at the BFI in July, thanks to a moon season in particular, but also a large number of previews of forthcoming TV shows:

• 1st: Canada Day TV Special – Bernard Braden
  Episodes of On the Braden Beat and Now and Then
• 3rd: Moonshot: The Flight of Apollo 11 + Q&A
  ITV ‘Docu-fiction’ about the the moon landing, starring James Marsters and Andrew Lincoln
• 3rd: Doctor Who – The Moonbase + Moonbase 3 – Departure and Arrival
  The two surviving episodes of Patrick Troughton Cyberman story The Moonbase followed by the opening episode of futuristic sci-fi soap The Moonbase, written by famed Who writers Terrance Dicks and Barry Letts back in 1973
• 6th: The Planets – Moon + Stranger than Fiction – The Truth Behind the Moon Landings
  Documentaries about the origin of the moon (BBC) and the possibility the moon landings were staged (Five).
• 14th: Desperate Romantics + Q&A
  Preview of the first episode of the BBC1 drama about the 19th century Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood, based on Franny Moyle’s book. Q&A with writer Peter Bowker, producer Ben Evans and co-exec Franny Moyle.
• 21st: Charles Dickens’ England + Q&A
  A Sky Arts documentary featuring Derek Jacobi and various Dickens experts as they look at the various towns and villages that feature in Dickens’ work. Q&A afterwards with Derek Jacobi and Film London CEO Adrian Wootton.
• 21st: Everyone’s Going to the Moon + Horizon – Beyond the Moon
  ITV documentary about the training of astronauts followed by James Burke on BBC’s Horizon discussing the US space programme
• 31st: UFO – Survival + Space: 1999 – Breakaway
  A lone alien attacks SHADO’s moonbase in the Gerry Anderson show, plus the first episode of the sequel show which saw the moon escape the earth’s orbit

Members’ priority booking opens: 11.30am June 2
Public booking opens: 11.30am June 9

As always, visit the BFI web site for more details

UPDATE: The BFI tells me that Moonshot: The Flight of Apollo 11 will now include a Q&A with Richard Dale, head of research Dan Parry and (hopefully) cast members.

The BFI’s remembered to send me the brochure this month, so here’s our regular look at what’s on TV-wise at the South Bank in London in May.

• 9th: The Best of Ianucci
  Armando Ianucci’s choice of his best work as performer and writer-director
• 9th: Ianucci in person
  A career interview in which Armando Ianucci will talk about his TV work. Asking the questions: Graeme Garden of The Goodies. No, seriously.

However, other than that, everything else is dedicated to a John Mortimer retrospective.

• 4th/22nd: The Sunday Night Play: The Wrong Side of the Park; Monitor: Mortimer’s Hampstead
  A play about a malicious lodger and a Monitor item providing context.
• 8th: Television Playhouse: Collect Your Hand Baggage; Shades of Greene: Special Duties and The Invisible Japanese Gentleman
  Kenneth More as a man who has never grown up; John Gielgud as a CEO who hires a nun to buy him out of purgatory; Denholm Elliot musing on the curse of ‘the writer’s eye’.
• 10th/18th: A Voyage Round My Father; The South Bank Show
  Mortimer’s best-loved play, followed by a special devoted to Mortimer’s methods and philosophy.
• 14th: Thirty Minute Theatre: Bermondsey; Knightsbridge; King’s Cross Lunch Hour; and Mill Hill.
  A heady and controversial mix of gay sex and class; high farce; Mortimore’s most Pinteresque play; and a dentist’s sexual fantasies.
• 17th: Play for Today: Rumpole of the Bailey
  The very first appearance of Rumpole. BBC4 showed it recently and it’s very good. Followed by:
• 17th: John Mortimer Remembered
  A panel of guests who knew John Moritmore discuss his work and influence. Includes Daisy Goodwin, Jacqueline Davis, Colin Rodgers and Alvin Rakoff.
• 21st: Will Shakespeare (episodes one and two)
  Tim Curry plays William Shakespeare in this demonstration of how events in his life fed into his plays.
• 22nd/28th: Playhouse: Unity
  A dramatisation of the English aristocracy’s collusion with fascism.
• 23rd: Titmuss Regained
  A three-part satire of the Thatcher era starring David Threlfall.
• 29th/31st: Edwin; On Reflection: Mortimer on Oscar Wilde
  Alec Guinness wonders whether a friend’s son really is his son. And Mortimer refelcts on Oscar Wilde – obviously.

Meanwhile, back in the Mediatheque, there’s a season of ‘Funny Girls’ that includes episodes of Sykes, Fawlty Towers, Wood and Walters and The Mrs Merton Show, as well as the pilot of Meet The Wife.

Members’ priority booking opens: 11.30am April 7
Public booking opens: April 14

As always, visit the BFI web site for more details

UPDATE: Yes, Tim Curry as Shakespeare: