UK TV

An archive of blog entries about UK TV programmes and production.

News: Time Traveling Bong, Hugh Laurie’s Chance, The Crown, Damien trailers, Younger, Broad City renewed + more

7 January 2016 Rob Buckley Post a comment

Internet TV

  • Teaser for season 2 of Netflix’s Daredevil
  • Trailer for Netflix’s The Crown
  • Teaser for Netflix’s The Get Down
  • Hulu green lights: two-season adaptation of Chance, with Hugh Laurie

US TV

US TV show casting

New US TV shows

What TV’s on at the BFI in February? Including Nuts In May, Penda’s Fen, Artemis 81 and Leap In The Dark

6 January 2016 Rob Buckley Post a comment

Time to look at what the BFI is showing in February. Yes, February. I never got my January guide, and since it’s now January and the February guide turned up yesterday, let’s just do February. I’ll be ahead of schedule for a change then.

February’s actually not got a huge amount of TV, but what there is is largely TV plays – and good ‘uns, too. As well as Dexter Press Gang Fletcher introducing Nuts In May, we also have a season of David Rudkin’s TV plays. Who’s Rudkin? Well, he wrote about 90% of the pagan dramas in TMINE’s guide to religion, including Penda’s Fen and Artemis 81, both of which get an airing in the season (although since the BFI describes the latter as ‘one of the medium’s greatest productions’, I’m not entirely sure they’ve actually watched it yet). 

But as well as those, Rudkin’s The Living Grave is also being shown. This was part of a somewhat odd, supernatural anthology series that aired on BBC Two called Leap In The Dark. This ran for 20 episodes in four series, over a period of eight years from 1973 to 1980, and featured work from Rudkin, as well as Fay Weldon and Alan Garner among others. Each episode featured a different incident of the paranormal, some in the modern day, but most set in other time periods.

So far, so ordinary, you might think. What’s odd about Leap In the Dark is that all these incidents were real events – indeed, the first series consisted only of documentaries, while the later series are technically docudramas, rather than dramas. Rushkin’s The Living Grave is about a young woman who regresses under hypnosis to the 1700s, with Rushkin’s play recreating both the hypnosis sessions and the 1700s. And it’s this week’s Wednesday’s Play.

Continue reading “What TV’s on at the BFI in February? Including Nuts In May, Penda’s Fen, Artemis 81 and Leap In The Dark”

News: Jekyll and Hyde, Girls cancelled, The Royals renewed, Netflix’s Trollhunters, RTL goes international + more

6 January 2016 Rob Buckley Post a comment

Internet TV

European TV

UK TV

US TV

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New US TV shows

New US TV show casting

News: Wallander joins The Fall, Yahoo Screen to shut, Rocky Horror casting, I Loved Lucy + more

5 January 2016 Rob Buckley Post a comment

Theatre

Internet TV

UK TV

UK TV show casting

US TV

US TV show casting

New US TV show casting

  • Victoria Justice and Ryan McCartan to star in Fox’s The Rocky Horror Picture Show ‘reimagining’
  • Derek Wilson promoted to regular on AMC’s Preacher

‘Walter presents’ is now live. Am I out of business now?

4 January 2016 Rob Buckley 14 Comments

One of this blog’s dearest aims is to reveal to you the best TV shows from around the world – while warning you about the worst. Channel 4 have clearly noticed this and regard it as A Good Idea. As a result, they’ve just launched a new online service called ‘Walter Presents‘ that does something similar. Allegedly curated by a bloke called Walter*, it’s supposed to be the cherry-picked best of the world’s best foreign-language TV programmes. Here, let Channel 4 explain (apparently Walter can only talk about TV, not himself):

Some of the shows are also going to be available on Channel 4’s regular broadcast channels, with RTL’s Deutschland 83 having started on Channel 4 last night, while Canal+’s Spin is hitting More4’s schedules on Friday. However, most are exclusive to Walter Presents and currently include the likes of:

  • Heartless (Denmark)
    From the writer of The Bridge and the director of The Killing, a dark, steamy supernatural thriller
  • Match Day (French)
    A moody, tense thriller with shocking family secrets at its heart
  • Kabul Kitchen (Afghan)
    Funny, mischievous, irreverent comedy set against a backdrop of the war in Afghanistan
  • Cenk Batu (German)
    A brooding undercover agent infiltrates Germany’s deadliest crime rings
  • The Lens (Czech)
    A young cameraman is recruited to Prague’s elite crime squad after the tragic death of his father
  • Pure Evil (Afghan)
    A psychopathic sect leader vows to make a former policeman and expert criminologist’s life a living hell
  • 10 (Swiss)
    Award-winning crime thriller. A high stakes poker game, a wanted criminal, a rigged room

So there you go. Provided it’s not in English or Welsh and you don’t mind watching TV on a computer**, you don’t need me any more. You’ve got Walter.

Sobs.

* Like Channel 4 would ever call it something like ‘Kevin presents’
** I checked the All 4 iOS app and it does include Walter Presents content. I imagine the Android and the Amazon Fire apps do, too. No Amazon Fire Stick app yet, though, although I hear that’s due soon