Radio Times

‘at last – drama worth staying in for’

WOW! SO MUCH DRAMA! The final two episodes of Poldark… Andrew Davies’s adaptation of Jane Austen’s unfinished novel Sanditon… a new series of Peaky Blinders… Midsomer Murders. What a bank holiday weekend (but not in Scotland; I know). Usually bank holidays are television wastelands: you can hear the blood rushing in your ears because the schedules are so quiet, whether this is due to the TV bigwigs thinking we’re all cavorting on our yachts in Monte Carlo, or because THEY are all cavorting on their yachts in Monte Carlo. But at long last we have plenty of stuff worth staying in for, or catching up on if you are indeed yachting in Monaco, or taking shelter from the rain in your Gower Peninsula holiday cottage and need something to watch on iPlayer…

this week 24—30 august 2019

WHAT I’M WATCHING… SANDI TOKSVIG ‘Gentleman Jack was terrific,” says the host of Bake Off, “and I think Suranne Jones should win every award going. Initially I watched it because she’s my friend, but that isn’t why I admire it – it was the character of Anne Lister that I liked.’ Bake Off is back — p10 NOEL FIELDING ‘I’ve just got into Killing Eve because Julian Barratt is in one of the episodes, and because Jodie Comer is so good,” says the other host of Bake Off. “And obviously I’ll be watching the new series of QI…’ Noel as you’ve never seen him before — page 14 WHAT WE’VE LEARNT THIS WEEK Spain’s fascist dictator Francisco Franco enjoyed doing the football pools. Perhaps he took Johan Cruyff’s view that as every football match in Spain begins with…

news

CHRISTIE AT CHRISTMAS Autumn is nearly upon us and our thoughts will soon be turning to Christmas television. One of the BBC’s centrepieces is their now annual Agatha Christie drama. This year it’s expected to be The Pale Horse, again from the pen of Sarah Phelps, who caused something of a stir last Yuletide with The ABC Murders, which rather imaginatively fleshed out the character of Hercule Poirot (played by John Malkovich). In The Pale Horse, Rufus Sewell (left) plays Mark Easterbrook, who investigates a list of names (including his own) found in a dead woman’s shoe, before travelling to a mysterious village, Much Deeping, where there are rumoured to be three witches. Doctor Foster star Bertie Carvel plays key witness (and pharmacist) Zachariah Osborne. The Christie Estate seem pleased with the…

going back to thra…

For The Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance, Netflix’s new series reboot of the 1980s fantasy adventure, which launches on 30 August, the entire art of live-action puppetry had to be resurrected. “Since Dark Crystal, nobody has made puppets like this, so they had to discover how to do it again, essentially start from scratch,” says Brian Froud, who was the designer on the original movie and has been brought back for the new version. Re-creating the world of Thra, with its evil Skeksis rulers and their oppressed Gelfling slaves, took more than two years, based at Langley Studios in Berkshire. Sixty separate sets were built as the backdrop to more than 200 full-size puppets — some of which required four people to operate. “It’s always been the preference that everything should…

‘a warning from history’

REPORTING THE CONFLICT in Northern Ireland for almost 50 years has been like tiptoeing through a minefield. Over time, you get to know where the mines are, but you can’t always avoid detonating them and being hit by the shrapnel. That comes with the territory of covering a murderous conflict in a corner of the United Kingdom that has cost over 3,600 lives. Brexit has only heightened the risk of detonation. Northern Ireland voted 56 per cent to 44 per cent to remain and Brexiteers are now running the government, reliant on ten crucial votes in the House of Commons supplied by the Democratic Unionist Party. Given these acute sensitivities, the current political parliamentary numbers game inevitably raises the stakes on how reporting Northern Ireland will be viewed. This, then, would…

from the rt archive… 28 aug—3 sept 1982

WHAT WE WATCHED The BBC was celebrating 60 years of broadcasting in 1982 and Terry Wogan was our guide to the Diamond Jubilee in Wogan’s Guide to the BBC. In this personal history, Wogan visited various BBC departments and also the set of the desert drama Beau Geste — in Dorset. “It’s a misnomer to call it ‘Auntie’ BBC,” Wogan told us. “It’s Daddy BBC and, like any Daddy, it’s kindly not stern. The children can misbehave, but only within the confines of the family. Working for the BBC is like working for your father — a great deal is expected of you, and you don’t get paid much!” WHAT YOU SAID The Falklands War had ended earlier in the summer and a BBC documentary Task Force South: the Battle for the Falklands had…