“I think this is going to be a day that nobody forgets.”

Kirsty Soames makes a prediction on the morning of her wedding to Tyrone Dobbs.

She’s not wrong.

I was at ITV’s London launch yesterday for next Monday’s two wedding day episodes.

Always a treat to see Coronation Street on a big screen with an audience.

And then a showreel of what is to come in the weeks and months ahead.

Including some delicious scenes involving Gail (Helen Worth) and Lewis (Nigel Havers).

Plus the return of Roy’s mother Sylvia, played by the wonderful Stephanie Cole.

Along with the twists and turns ahead involving Tyrone, who has suffered months of abuse at Kirsty’s hands.

All but three of his Weatherfield neighbours unaware of what has gone on behind closed doors.

The screening was followed by a Q&A involving Alan Halsall (Tyrone), Natalie Gumede (Kirsty), Jennie McAlpine (Fiz) and Michelle Keegan (Tina McIntyre).

You can read my full transcript further down the page.

There are spoilers below. So if you don’t want to read them, stop now.

Without them knowing, Kirsty discovers Tyrone and Fiz’s secret affair on the eve of her wedding.

Scenes which you can see during this Friday’s (Jan 18) episodes at 7:30pm and 8:30pm.

A moment that left me almost feeling sorry for Kirsty – a testament to Natalie’s acting skills.

But as you can see from the photos, she turns up for her Grawley Lane Chapel wedding to Tyrone.

With viewers finding out next Monday if they marry or not.

Later next week Kirsty tumbles down the stairs during a row with Tyrone.

And then accuses him of a campaign of physical violence and psychological abuse against her.

Which leads to Tyrone’s arrest and, eventually, the prospect of a trial.

Producer Phil Collinson introduced the screening.

“This storyline has been a very important one for us,” he said.

“It really seems to have captured the imagination of our audience.

“That’s because of the performance of the company of actors. But, in particular, Jennie and Michelle and Natalie and Alan.

“The joy of a show like Coronation Street sometimes is, when you find a storyline that you can really burn slowly. That you can really unpick.

“And just try and understand human nature and what makes us tick.

“I think this story has been a perfect example of that.

“A real chance to get inside not just the mind of a victim of domestic violence but also the perpetrator.

“Natalie has done a wonderful job helping us see why this person has turned into the woman that she is.”

Natalie is nominated for Newcomer in next Wednesday’s National TV Awards.

With Alan and Michelle both nominated for Serial Drama Performance.

Plus Coronation Street itself is nominated in the Serial Drama category.

You can vote online here.

My Q&A transcript:

Q: What’s going through Kirsty’s head when she turns the tables on Tyrone and accuses him of domestic violence?

Natalie Gumede: “I think something has really died inside of Kirsty. Tyrone was the love of her life and that’s the one piece of happiness she thought she had. And I think throughout their relationship, despite all of her mistakes, he has at least appeared to forgive her. So I think she thought she had a new start. And her world has fallen apart. She had a very unhappy childhood and a lot of unhappy relationships. And just when she thought everything was going to go right, it all goes wrong. She’s so in love with Tyrone and she hates him for what he’s done. If she can’t have him then nobody can. It’s that thing of trying to still get their attention. While she’s doing this to him, she still has him, she still has a hold over him. She’s not willing just to walk away and let him be happy. No way.”

Q: What was that like to play?

Alan Halsall: “To be honest, for me, it’s just been another twist in what’s been such a great story. I think it’s run for the best part of a year, the whole domestic violence thing. It’s nice to have a long-running story and it was just another twist along the way. It’s been brilliant because it’s been a bit like that for us. We’ve received the scripts and gone, ‘Ooh, we’re doing that now?’ So it’s been really good in terms of that and it’s been a great story to tell from the very beginning. And there’s more to come, as you can see.”

Q: Just how far will Kirsty go now? Are there any limits?

Natalie Gumede: “That’s a great question. I don’t think there are. I don’t think it’s as calculated as planning far ahead. But she’s an intelligent girl and she knows how to manipulate. So whenever she’s given a set of circumstances she knows how to turn them into her favour. I think there’s definitely a pang of guilt there. When you love someone, no matter how much you want to take revenge on them, you don’t really want to see them unhappy. She still wants to be with him. She’s clever enough to dream up in the moment, toss a pebble in the water and see what ripples, what comes from it.”

Q: How long does it take you to calm down after filming those scenes?

Natalie Gumede: “It gets quicker now because we’re so used to doing it and we film so quickly, we have so many scenes to do in succession that there’s not really time to indulge in de-stressing, to be honest. It’s straight on to the next one. We can be straight on to a quite happy scene straight away. So there’s not much to be done in that sense.”

Q: Obviously the abuse is her own responsibility – she must realise that’s why this has all happened? She seems to be a bit like the wrong woman. She’s not taking any responsibility?

Natalie Gumede: “Sure. I think that’s the difficulty with her character at this stage. There was a point where she had an opportunity to learn from her mistakes. She talked with Tyrone at length about the abuse that she suffered. And she had the opportunity to make it right. But I think pride and a denial of being like her father…I don’t think she can face the fact that she’s so like her father. That means that she’s not learning from it and she’s really on a downward spiral now.”

Q: We’ve seen some reasons for Kirsty acting the way she does, if not excuses. Do the cast think that she’s an out and out villain? And can she be redeemed?

Alan Halsall: “I personally think, what’s been great about the character is, there’s a real depth there. Once we got to find out about her childhood, with her father and stuff, there’s a real depth to the character. I don’t know how far she can go…a character is always redeemable because this is a soap opera, we’re always telling a story. There’s a lot that goes with that. We’ve gone very far in terms of it’s changed once there’s a child involved, the tables have turned as you’ve just seen. So it’s not whether she is redeemable anymore. It’s what people will believe. So, again, it’s just a great twist in the story. It kind of takes it away from whether she’s redeemable or not. There’s a story now that branches off from that, as you can see, with the twist. I don’t know, really.”

Q: Is there guilt on Tina and Fiz’s part, that they have effectively stood by and not forced Tyrone to speak up and gone along with it?

Michelle Keegan: “I think Tina wanted him to speak up from day one. But he never did. So I don’t think she’d feel guilty because she’s always stood by him as a friend and she’s been there for him and she’s tried to help him and try and make him speak out to people and tell them what Kirsty did.”

Jennie McAlpine: “You can’t force someone to do something…if it’s a true friend, I don’t think you’d force them because it’s his choice to say it. It’s such a complicated thing and it’s something that two young girls like Fiz and Tina, they’ve never dealt with any of this before. It’s like, ‘How the hell do we help a friend who’s going through…’ We’re used to just having normal problems, like, ‘Should he sell the garage or not?’ This is a really serious, adult, grown-up, scary problem. I don’t think they know what the hell to advise him. They’ve advised him as best they could…”

Michelle Keegan: “I think it’s with the child involved as well. Obviously Tyrone had a child taken off him. He didn’t want that to happen again. So you can’t really force him.”

Q: Does Fiz now become the villain of the Street?

Jennie McAlpine: “Yes! She does. I became the villain last time and it wasn’t my fault. Yes. (laughter) Yes, is the answer.”

Q: (From me as it happens) What sort of reactions and feedback have you had from the public and others to this storyline?

Alan Halsall: “For me, personally, I’ve never had a reaction like I have to this storyline. I’ve been in the show now for quite a while and this story has definitely been my favourite story to be part of. And the reaction that we’ve had – I think it’s difficult at times for people to watch because it’s a serious issue. This is something that happens a lot more than people think. So it’s difficult at times. But I think people have appreciated the story. And there’s a lot of depth to the story. This is my first year on Twitter, so you get an immediate feedback from the fans. Which has been fantastic, actually, to realise how passionate the fans are of Coronation Street and, in particular, this story. So I’ve loved it. Even though it can be tough at times for people to watch – I get that – I found out that the charity that we work with along the way (ManKind), their calls have gone up by 300 per cent since Coronation Street took this story on, which I didn’t know until today. So it does affect people. It makes you feel proud to be part of a story like this.”

Natalie Gumede: “Very much the same. Obviously there’s an element of worrying for your own safety. There’s warnings given to you along the way. But for the most part people have been hugely supportive and just really intrigued to see what happens next. I certainly expected a lot of negative feedback because Kirsty’s not the most likeable character. But it’s been lovely that people have seen past it and I feel really lucky for that because I think Coronation Street as a whole has told a really important story. So I’m glad that I haven’t had too much negativity.”

Q: Do you feel like you’ve done your job right if people hate you?

Natalie Gumede: “It’s my first experience of something so huge. It’s hard to really take that concept in. We just work on a TV set and we don’t really think about the wider impact. We just work day to day and do our best to tell a good story. But the fact that people have responded well to it has been really gratifying. It’s been lovely.”

Q: Alan – I wondered how the storyline has affected you personally? Is it one of those where when you clock off at the end of the day you’re still carrying Tyrone’s turmoil around?

Alan Halsall: “I don’t know why or how this came about, but when I finish work I’m home – and my personal life is obviously very different. So I can leave it at work and go home to my own personal life. I’ve not found that so much an issue. The storyline was a challenge in itself to get into because, obviously, it’s so different. I’ve no personal reference to start with in a story like this, I’ve never experienced it. I’ve never even spoken about this kind of subject before we got the story. So it was hard in that way. But no, I go home and I have my own personal life and I leave all Tyrone’s angst over Kirsty at work.”

Q: When they were researching it, is it accurate that this is what happens? If people are in this situation in real life, do people have to have weddings or could you do a DNA test or something?

Natalie Gumede: “There’s been an awful lot of research done by Corrie. And we’re telling a story as well. We’ve tried to make it relateable and, hopefully, that’s helped people along the way. But I’m sure at some points…we’re telling a story and not everything is true to real life”

Coronation Street spokeswoman Alison Sinclair: “We’ve researched with a legal team – the parental responsibility. If his name’s not on the birth certificate then if he’s married, it gives him a lot more leeway.”

Alan Halsall: “When we got case studies to read through…I was a little bit the same, I was reading the case studies and it was horrifying to read at time. But it still kind of felt like a story. And I had these questions in my mind, ‘Why didn’t they just leave? Why didn’t they tell somebody?’ And I couldn’t get past that for a while. And we met a chap who suffered with domestic violence quite seriously. He helped me get through some of those…and I thought what Coronation Street did well, all the case studies showed that they were so isolated from the friends and the family and that’s what Kirsty did to Tyrone. He was isolated. He didn’t really have anybody to go to. So I know the writers and the production team did an awful lot of research. As we tried to. But, again, it’s a subject that’s not really talked about. We had to get to it through the charities because there was nobody to go and speak to about such a taboo subject.”

Q: Alan, I know it’s only acting but Natalie’s rages are so terrifyingly real, have you ever found yourself feeling slightly scared of her?

Alan Halsall: “Not scared. But I found myself watching her sometimes in scenes, you know she can snap and I go, ‘Ooh, oh, I better be acting here.’ Because as well, what’s happened with the character of Kirsty, especially in the beginning, it was very much just a moment and she snapped. And so, yes, it was quite brilliant to watch at times. It’s been fantastic. Some of the earlier ‘hits’, if you like…they came as a shock to myself and Tyrone.”

Q: What happens after a fight scene? Do you have to hug each other to show you’re friends?

Alan Halsall: “We hug it out? I tell you what generally happens, for myself I’m generally just getting hit and then I run off. It’s the scenes afterwards that are quite emotional for my character. Whereas Natalie has to get herself into such a place, like a frenzy for Kirsty when she hits him, that when they shout ‘cut’ I run off and make a cup of tea and bring back Natalie a biscuit and say, ‘There you go.’ We calm it down for a couple of minutes.”

Natalie Gumede: “He looks after me.”

Q: Natalie – what did you think of your wedding dress? It’s quite unusual?

Natalie Gumede: “It was. It was very Kirsty-appropriate. We always knew when we talked with the costume designers that Kirsty wasn’t a traditional white wedding kind of girl. I think I’d said I’d originally wanted black. But they drew a line and said, ‘No, you’re going too far now?’ So we went for purple and they made that costume in three days. I thought they did an incredible job. It’s not what I’d personally choose, no. But I think it’s great for Kirsty.”

Jennie McAlpine: “You looked stunning though.”

Q: And the falling down the stairs…you could see how it could happen in a fishtail dress?

Natalie Gumede: “Yes!”

Alan Halsall: “Tell me about it!”

Q: Did you do that yourself or..?

Natalie Gumede: “We may have had a bit of help. A little bit. I did throw myself on to a mat which was at the top of the stairs. That was terrifying enough because there’s still stairs underneath. And then I did a bit of slumping. And we may have had some help inbetween. Trying to get the wig right was difficult…” (for the stunt woman).

Q: There was some talk from some fans on a forum that introducing a love story into the domestic abuse storyline, maybe it was distracting away from the real issue? I just wondered what you guys thought about that?

Jennie McAlpine: “I think like any story of this kind, the thing is, because these kind of things happen and love stories happen and this kind of thing happens, you can only ever tell one story at a time. So you can only tell Tyrone and Kirsty’s story and, in this instance, Tina and Fiz have come into it. People might say, ‘That didn’t happen in my circumstance. I don’t think that would happen.’ You can only really tell one story that’s happening and you can try and bring as many elements that other people might have experienced and that other people might be able to empathise with you. But you can never show what everyone has experienced.”

Coronation Street spokeswoman Alison Sinclair: “And I think they’ve (Tyrone and Fiz) got history. He didn’t just go out and meet someone. It came out of her caring for him. I think that’s what’s slightly different. And it is a drama.”

Q: Your National Television Awards nominations? Is it weird going up against each other?

Alan Halsall: “No, not really. It’s thrilling. I’m pleased and I’m sure Michelle is. I’m really, really thrilled. But it’s so weird to stand up and be nominated as an individual because it’s such a huge collective of people to make something like what you’ve just seen happen. But thrilling, especially with this storyline, that people have enjoyed it and have nominated us for the awards. Really thrilled. But we all do the same job and that’s how it is between us – and the rest of the soaps.”

Michelle Keegan: “We really support each other.”

Alan Halsall: “Absolutely.”

Michelle Keegan: “I couldn’t believe it. I was so chuffed that I was up for it and I was so grateful that people voted for me. Just to be up against Alan is amazing. I’ve said this before in an interview, and I’m not being biased, my vote is totally with Alan. If he doesn’t win it…honestly.”

Alan Halsall: “And I’ve asked Michelle to thank me in her speech.” (laughter)

Q: Michelle – you are always in the “sexiest” category and now to be nominated for dramatic performance…it’s all about your acting?

Michelle Keegan: “Yeah, it is. It’s amazing. I think because I came into Corrie as a new actor as well, five years down the line I’m up for an award like that and have been shortlisted, is just unbelievable. I’m going to have to pinch myself now and again.”

Q: Natalie – where do you think Kirsty would like to be in 12 months’ time, if she could have her wish come true? Would she like Tyrone to be banged up as punishment or would she like to have him come grovelling back..?

Natalie Gumede: “I think the latter. I think all that she’s doing now is in aid of that, really. From her perspective, from the way she’s seeing it, is probably she may come to a point where she realises a lot of this is of her own doing. And I think ultimately she would see, in her ideal world, that they’ve both made mistakes and there may be a way back.”

Q: Natalie – Corrie has got a great history of villains. How does it feel to be the latest one?

Natalie Gumede: “I’ve never really…up to this point where a couple of people have asked the question recently…I’ve never really considered her as a villain. I’ve always considered her as somebody who’s just really troubled and damaged. But I can see that she’s crawling into villain territory…charging into villain territory. It’s lovely to be thought of in the same bracket as some of the great villains that Corrie have had. To be given such a platform and to be given such a role where she’s so dark – I’ve really had something to get my teeth into. It’s been such a juicy role for me and I never dreamed of having a platform like this. I never dreamed of coming into Coronation Street and being part of a lead storyline in such a short amount of time. I just feel really lucky to be considered as such, really.”

Q: Michelle – we say in those episodes that Tina is starting to get a little baby bump now and that’s going to be upon us probably before we know it. How do you feel about giving birth on screen and have you spoken to your co-stars who have done that before you?

Michelle Keegan: “I was there when Kirsty was giving birth and, honestly, it looked so real. I’m the next one to give birth. I don’t know how I’m going to follow it. I’m a bit nervous about it. Because I was there when she did it. Unbelievable. I don’t know how I’m going to do it. But it’s going to have come out some way.” (laughter)

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Neil and Jason in next week’s episode.

SAD news today for Midsomer Murders fans.

It has emerged that next Wednesday’s ITV episode will be the final appearance of Jason Hughes as DCI John Barnaby’s regular sidekick DS Ben Jones.

Here’s the full Midsomer statement:

‘Schooled in Murder’ will be the last ever episode starring Jason Hughes as DS Jones, sidekick to DCI Barnaby played by Neil Dudgeon.

Jason has decided to leave after filming over 50 episodes of the popular and long running series MIDSOMER MURDERS.

He says: “It was a tough decision for me to go, as I have had a great time working on the show, both with John Nettles and now Neil Dudgeon, and the crew are like a second family.

“I feel it is the right time for me to leave, and after spending 7 happy years on Midsomer I am now looking at other projects, and my first one will be the pilot season in the US.

“It’s a new year for me career wise which I am looking forward to, and though I am sorry to say goodbye to Midsomer, I hope to be able to come back if there is a ‘special episode’ in the pipeline!”

Producer Jo Wright of Bentley Productions is currently looking for the right person to replace Jason.

She said: “We are sad that Jason has decided to leave the series and of course will miss him tremendously. We are now looking for his replacement, and it’s very exciting to start looking for a new face.”

Jason’s first episode was ‘The House in the Woods’ in 2005.

He went on to film over 100 hours of Midsomer Murders starring alongside John Nettles in 38 episodes.

Since Neil Dudgeon took over the leading role, the latest detective duo have clocked up a further 14 episodes.

Jason’s first day filming involved finding a dead body in a car, a foretaste of the many bizarre murders he then went onto investigate.

As DS Jones, Jason has also been almost killed by a tractor, dressed up as a nun, fallen out of trees, and gone undercover in a cult.

He has fallen in the lake in the middle of freezing January and sang naked in the shower.

In that one, he was a bit shocked when he was told to take his boxer shorts off, and then found out that they had to dub over his singing anyway because of a rights issue!

Jason’s other credits include This Life, Plain Jane, The Flint Street Nativity, Phoenix Blue, Killing Me Softly, Mine All Mine, Waking The Dead, Coming Up and Dante’s Daemon.

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THERE were other interviews after this week’s special Coronation Street preview screening in London.

You may already have read my transcript of the main cast Q&A at Coronation Street: Wedding Drama.

I later spoke to Michelle Keegan (Tina McIntyre) about a different subject:

Shopping, Katherine Kelly and Mr Selfridge.

Here’s the full version of my story:

***********************************************************************

Katherine Kelly as Lady Mae Loxley.

Michelle Keegan says she would love to bag a role in hit period drama Mr Selfridge.

The Coronation Street actress was working on the make-up counter at Selfridges in Manchester when she landed her Weatherfield part.

Co-starring with Katherine Kelly, who played Becky McDonald, now winning rave reviews for her portrayal as posh society hostess Lady Mae in Mr Selfridge.

“I’m a big fan of period dramas and absolutely love Mr Selfridge,” revealed Michelle, 25, who plays Corrie’s Tina McIntyre.

Asked if she would she like to make a cameo appearance as a shopgirl, Michelle told me: “100 per cent, yes! I’d love to do something like that. I’m qualified!

“I know the history behind it all. When I first started in Selfridges we had a big talk about when and how it first opened and they talked about Mr Selfridge.

“And then I found myself working with a lady who is now in the drama of Mr Selfridge, which is amazing.

“Katherine Kelly is wonderful as Lady Mae. I remember when she first got the part, I said, ‘Oh my God, what an amazing role to get.’

“And I’ve never seen Kate do anything else than Becky. So to see her on TV in a period drama is amazing. She’s brought proper life to the character and got it off to a T.”

Michelle was stunned to be plucked from her shop role in 2007 to star on the cobbles after what was just her second-ever audition.

“I heard about the Corrie audition and went just for the experience. I didn’t think I had a chance.”

Stockport-born Michelle is nominated for Serial Drama Performance at next Wednesday’s National Television Awards.

Mr Selfridge continues on ITV at 9pm on Sunday in an episode featuring the daring first steps to open the make-up counters Michelle later worked on.

With Harry Gordon Selfridge (Jeremy Piven) shocking the staff by suggesting they openly sell make-up, including lipstick – thought of in 1909 as only fit for showgirls and prostitutes.

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Rob James-Collier as Aidan.

MOVING On is back with a Scandinavian twist.

Created by Jimmy McGovern, the fourth series of BBC1′s daytime drama has the usual impressive cast lists.

This time including actors from The Killing, Borgen, Wallander and Lilyhammer.

Regular readers will know that I have a lot of time for all involved in Moving On.

Having written about it at Moving On: Plays For Our Today and Moving On 3.

Moving On is a series of stand alone dramas providing TV opportunities for writers and skilled production workers in the North West.

With some famous faces in the casts working more for love than money.

Along with Johnny Vegas and Robert Glenister making their BBC TV drama directing debuts in this new series.

Colin McKeown’s Liverpool-based LA Productions performs drama miracles on a budget that would no doubt be an insult to shoestrings.

With little sign of the financial constraints on screen.

Broadcast on BBC1 at 2:15pm on consecutive days from next Monday (Jan 28), here’s just some of the highlights from this 2013 series.

Which you can also, of course, record if at work or catch up with later via the BBC iPlayer.

Downton Abbey’s Rob James-Collier makes a return appearance, having played estranged husband Clive in a Moving On series three story called The Milkman.

This time he’s a lot more charming, going back to school as supply teacher Mr Evans. Or Aidan to his friends.

In episode two: Visiting Order, written by Colette Kane, one of two films directed by Noreen Kershaw.

Marian Saastad Ottesen as Liv.

He’s immediately smitten when he meets Scandinavian single mum-of-two Liv, played by Norwegian-born Lilyhammer actress Marian Saastad Ottesen.

Social worker Liv also likes the look of Mr Evans. But keeps a secret from him.

Her father Kris is serving a long sentence for drug trafficking.

And in another casting coup, he is played by Bjarne Henriksen, who many UK viewers will know as Theis Birk Larsen from The Killing series one, as well as Borgen.

Jason Manford as Gary.

Jason Manford may surprise some as black cab driver Gary in the fifth and final film of this series: That’s Amore.

Directed by Johnny Vegas, Jason co-stars with Wallander’s Rebekah Staton, who plays his fed up wife Lisa.

“Bone idle” beer-swilling couch potato Gary has no idea anything is wrong.

Until Lisa tells him their house is up for sale and she wants a divorce.

Telling him: “People in comas make more decision than you do, Gary.”

Forced to live apart in the same house while they wait for a buyer, Gary becomes increasingly frustrated.

Concluding: “My life’s turned into one big episode of Jeremy Kyle.”

Colin McKeown says: “Johnny spotted something in Jason and it’s paid off.

“I think Jason’s performance will surprise people, so watch this space.

“I also think Robert Glenister’s episode will take people by surprise because for a first time director its an extremely assured piece of work.

“I think both Robert and Johnny have a great future as directors.”

Paul McGann as Phil.

Former Hustle star Robert directs episode four – Blood Ties – which features Paul McGann, Jack Shepherd and Jennifer Hennessy and is written by Arthur Ellison.

Robert maintains: “Moving On is the best reason for ressurecting the single play on primetime terestrial telly.”

Gillian Kearney as Danielle with Ashley Ogden (Mia) and Joseph Wilkins (Tom).

Episode three – Friends Like These – is written by Shaun Duggan and features Gillian Kearney as busy single mum Danielle.

She earns a little extra cash by child-minding for her friend Sam, played by former Accused and Coronation Street actress Rachel Leskovac.

With Natasha Little as Sonia, a new mum at the school who has a home Danielle can only dream of.

Sonia befriends Danielle and decides to help her.

But as Sam warns Danielle: “Beward of the middle classes bearing gifts.”

Sally Carman as Sarah.

Series four begins with The Shrine, written by Karen Brown and starring Matthew Kelly, Barbara Flynn, Shameless actress Sally Carman and Rev’s Steve Evets.

As LA Productions explain: “Moving On explores contemporary issues, from divorce and public displays of grief to obsessive friendships, relationships and caring for the elderly.

“All linked by the common theme of characters who reach a turning point in life and then move on.”

Scroll down for more photos and links.

Barbara Flynn and Matthew Kelly in The Shrine.

Rachel Lescovak in Friends Like These.

Natasha Little in Friends Like These with Olivia Cosgrove (Sofia) and Alex Lee Taylor (Kai).

Jennifer Hennessy in Blood Ties.

Jack Shepherd in Blood Ties.

Director Robert Glenister.

Director Johnny Vegas.

Marian Saastad Ottesen as Liv and Charlie Concannon as Eric.

Moving On 4 begins on BBC1 at 2:15pm on Monday (Jan 28) and at the same time on the next four days.

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Idris Elba as John Luther.

THE stars of BBC Drama gathered in London last night for a preview of what is to come in 2013.

Along with leading writers, directors, producers and executives.

With members of Her Majesty’s Media – me included – also invited along to the event at The King’s Fund in Cavendish Square.

BBC Drama controller Ben Stephenson made a speech and a number of announcements about new dramas, plus the latest on Doctor Who’s 50th anniversary.

Followed by a three minute showreel of highlights.

Doctor Who’s representatives included showrunner Steven Moffat, Mark Gatiss and Jenna Louise Coleman.

With famous acting faces dotted around the room, including Alison Steadman, Idris Elba, Anne Reid and the cast of New Tricks.

Below is my transcript of what Ben said about new and returning BBC dramas.

Plus a full transcript of what he said in the main part of his speech.

The BBC Media Centre has the “prepared” version of the latter but I thought some might like to read the slightly expanded transcript of what he said in the room.

Ben Stephenson.

Ben Stephenson on new and returning BBC drama in 2013:

“The first piece I want to talk to you about is a 13-part new series commission to take over from Merlin. It’s called Atlantis. It’s written by the absolutely brilliant Howard Overman who created Misfits for Channel 4. It’s his first mainstream series. Produced with Johnny Capps and Julian Murphy, it is a remarkable vision and adventure, set in the lost city of Atlantis with Greek myths. It’s a thrilling adventure with huge but spectacular challenges for the Merlin slot this autumn. We’re casting it at the moment and I’m really excited.

“We’re also starting to think about who plays Mr Darcy. We are doing PD James’ wonderful book Death Comes To Pemberley on BBC1. Now I’ve had lots of suggestions…

“We’ve got some other brilliant pieces to come out on BBC1. Two eight-part series from writers with their first ever series commission. Breakdown, written by Jack and Harry Williams, and The Interceptor by Tony Saint. Two thrilling new additions to BBC1.

“We’re also doing Jamaica Inn, a book that I have loved for years and not been able to get the rights to, written by Emma Frost.

“Remember Me by Gwyneth Hughes, which is a fantastic ghost story.

Call The Midwife and the birth of more BBC drama.

“Of course we’ll also be bringing back – this was a hard decision for me – Call The Midwife. (laughter) It’s had rotten ratings but we thought we’d give them another go. (laughter) So we’re doing another eight-part series of that and a marvellous Christmas special.

“We’re also bringing back Death In Paradise again. A very, very easy decision considering it’s been getting eight million and I think is the highest midweek series on any channel for quite a long time.

“Adding that to the return of Ripper Street and that is every single show, every series we’ve launched so far this year coming back.

“I’m very excited – you’re about to see a showreel – Luther is about to come back. I’ve just seen episode one. I’ve literally never been so scared in my life. I actually screamed in the office. Idris is amazing. It is beyond frightening. And I’m also very pleased to announce that the very scary Ruth Wilson – she’s not scary in real life, she’s lovely in real life…but the character she played, Alice Morgan, will be back at some stage. She wears black gloves and she does very evil things.

“But it’s not just about BBC1. We’re also bringing back Sir David Hare’s single play as a series…two single films, Turks and Caicos and Salting The Battlefield, again with a fantastic cast, including Bill Nighy.

“Slightly sad news, BBC4 will be ending its drama. But we’ve had re-investment on BBC1 and on BBC2, so I thought we can more than make up for it with the ambition there. But we wanted to end it in spectacular fashion. BBC4 has been the home for the new generation of biopic. I felt it was absolutely right to end with that. So we are doing – and it is so exciting – Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton. A story that maybe you don’t know, which is after they were divorced…they toured New York in a production of Private Lives. Any of you will know it’s about a couple who are divorced. We’re very excited that we’ve got Helena Bonham Carter and Dominic West to play Burton And Taylor. Both of them have been on BBC4 before, so it feels like a wonderful end to the BBC4 drama story.

“Now…we’ve also got an anniversary this year. It’s the 50th anniversary and, of course, it’s that tiny little show called Doctor Who. I’ve got the new assistant in front of me, I’ve just got a bit starstruck (laughter). So this year is the 50th anniversary of Doctor Who. I can’t say anything about it because I can hear Steven Moffat somewhere in the room and he is quaking with what secrets I might reveal.

“I think this is a crucial part of the BBC’s output this year. Last year we had the wonderful Jubilee and the wonderful Olympics. This is an opportunity to make drama a landmark event for the BBC. I think everyone has a connection to Doctor Who, everyone has their own Doctor – Peter Davison, but I love them all – and I think that we can really do something spectacular with this.

“The only thing I can announce, and this is very exciting for a show that is constantly innovative – it’s going to be 3D. Which feels like a bold innovation that absolutely is right for what Doctor Who should be.

“We’re also at the moment filming Mark’s (Gatiss) fantastic behind the scenes of how Doctor Who started. I had a little cry at the read through. It was very, very moving.

“Now I’m going to show you a showreel. I haven’t shown it to anyone, apart from a few, because I wanted it to be secret. There are lots of other shows in here – New Tricks, Mayday, The Politician’s Husband, the brilliant In The Flesh, Quirke, Frankie, The Syndicate, Prisoners’ Wives, Case Histories, The Fall, Our Girl…”

Colin Morgan as Jimmy in Quirke.

My transcript of Ben Stephenson’s BBC Drama Speech in full:

“I think that 2012 was the most successful year for BBC Drama this century. A bold statement. Thanks to all the people in this room and many who can’t be here tonight. It is one that I believe – I would say that but I think I’ve got evidence. So really I want to say thank you to everyone as well as taking this opportunity to look forward to new horizons, new ambitions and a BBC with an exciting new DG (Director-General).

“The passing of some wonderful series in 2011 and 2012 marked the end of an era. Danny (Danny Cohen, BBC1 Controller) and I needed to find the next generation of returning series. And whilst this hunt still continues, I’m really, really pleased that 2012 saw the arrival of six new series, all of which will be returning in 2013. And I hope for many, many, many years to come.

“From Call The Midwife to Last Tango In Halifax, these series prove that if you create a show with intelligence, love and authorship the audience will follow. It’s also good to note that four of those six series were created by female writers with only one of them a crime show.

“So I’m determined that the next few years follow suit. But we’re also going to introduce a rich new line of shows on to BBC1 with rich, real filmic scale, including epic dramas we’ve already announced, including the 10-part The White Queen, Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrel and The Village, which I think take our ambition up to a new level.

Maxine Peake (Grace) and John Simm (John) in The Village.

“2011 saw the beginning of BBC2’s drama really coming back to life. But I hope that 2012 proved why it really mattered. Janice (Hadlow, BBC2 Controller) and I were thrilled that Line of Duty, Parade’s End and The Hollow Crown, amongst many others, proved how much audiences had missed BBC Drama. And with Jane Campion, Wolf Hall and again many others still to come I hope this will be just the beginning.

“Last week it was very, very nice to see a first. Every single drama nomination at the BPG and the South Bank Awards were won by a BBC drama. I’d always rather have audiences over awards but nevertheless that was quite a nice moment and it means that I don’t have to worry quite so much about what wins. (laughter)

“So, getting to the heart of what I want to talk about. Drama and the BBC really are inseparable. It’s written through the BBC like a stick of rock. No other broadcaster in this world, I absolutely believe, has drama so firmly embedded deeply in its DNA. Knock down any BBC building and I can prove to you that at the heart of it is a writer sat in the ruins typing away.”

Writer Lucy Gannon shouted out, “And crying.”

Ben continued: “Crying. Alright. Fair enough.” (laughter)

“A couple of weeks ago I was very lucky to be taken on a tour of the Royal Opera House by Lord Hall, our new DG. I found both the space and my time in his company absolutely inspiring. We talked about the BBC as a cultural organisation with an international reputation. One to make us proud and one that allows us to strengthen our creative muscles.

“When you go to the Royal Opera House or the Royal National Theatre there’s a buzz in the theatre before the curtain goes up. That buzz comes not just from what you’re about to see but because the space, the history, the values of the place add up to something extraordinary.

“It’s that electric crackle of excitement that I want to create at BBC Drama. I want to make BBC Drama a cultural institution. A touchstone for quality and modernity with all the excitement and glamour of the curtain going up.

“Part of the reason a couple of years ago I introduced the ‘Original British Drama’ tag line was because I wanted BBC Drama to add up to something. It shouldn’t just be about individual shows. I want audiences to feel that anticipation when they see our logo. When they hear that there’s a new BBC drama coming on I want their expectations to be enormous and I want them to be really tough if our ambition isn’t as huge as they demand.

“But crucially I want you – some of the absolute best talent in the world – to feel genuinely excited about working for BBC Drama.

“I hope that some of the changes I’ve made to BBC Drama in my four years in the job have helped. I hope it feels more welcoming, broader, more driven by creative talent and, crucially, at times, more fun.

The Syndicate 2: Tom Bedwell (JIMI MISTRY), Becky Atkinson (NATALIE GAVIN), Alan Walters (MARK ADDY) , Mandy Atkinson (SIOBHAN FINNERAN), Rose Wilson (ALISON STEADMAN).

“Of course there’s no escaping from the fact that we are a weighty institution with weighty and, yes, sometimes labyrinthine processes. But as much as possible I want to bypass that and create a place that feels inspiringly creative, where there is a buzz of creativity and an ‘anything goes’ optimism.

“And that means setting our values out more clearly than ever, articulating that we are the adventurous, gung-ho market leader that the competition can only follow. And sometimes, maybe, copy. And, yes, I am looking at you Sky and your ‘Original British Drama’ tag line.

“It means continuing to foster the best possible culture we can inside and having the top notch best team of staff in the country. And whilst frustrating, it’s also good news that I’m constantly having to stop my staff being poached.

“I want to build a BBC Drama department that has an enormous international reputation. When Sundance premiere Top Of The Lake and it’s called a masterpiece or Ripper Street is the highest new show to premiere on BBC America. Or actors like Idris Elba, Cillian Murphy and Elisabeth Moss come back from Hollywood to join our repetpoire. It’s really good for us. It makes us bolder and it makes us bigger. It adds a bit of spice and glamour to the mix and I think it takes us out of ourselves.

“As any of you will have heard me bang on before, you’ll know that I tend to view the word ‘international’ as a bit of a dirty word. It makes me think of Euro Puddings – that’s a real term – and pitches that have the budgets attached but no writers. It will probably have a picture of a crown or a sword on its laminated cover. All you producers know what I’m talking about, you’ve all seen it.

“But at all costs we must protect our own British values, without which we’re just a cheap imitation of Hollywood or a less Scandi version of Scandi. Why copy other countries when we can be the best at what only we can do? I want us to be international but, crucially, on our own terms.

“And that means making us more British than ever – rather than chasing a naive ambition to be a British HBO and chasing famous names it’s about applying the great Danny Boyle vision to our work, a bold, adventurous, authorial approach that exports because of its Britishness, not despite it.

“In Boyle’s vision of Britain, Mary Poppins sits alongside Brunel, Shakespeare alongside James Bond. And so it should be at the BBC. But Britishness absolutely does not mean that we don’t work with the best international talent. We should have really open creative borders.

“But none of this talk is about being niche. I want packed houses to watch our shows. The ambition to be popular and brilliant runs through the BBC. Of course I am being ridiculously, deliberately idealistic. Because without a vision, what do we have to aim for?

“Now some of you will be thinking, ‘Yeah, this is all very well but you turned my script down last week.’ Or, ‘You’re so bloody slow.’ And of course we’re never going to agree on everything and we’re all going to have our ups and downs. But whilst we are far from perfect, I want us to move with integrity at all times. I know some other broadcasters talk about themselves as paragons of virtue but we’re not. But we will keep getting better.

“Ultimately I think I can boil this down to one thing – I want to make BBC Drama the hallmark of quality and the automatic home for the best talent in the world.”

Update: Fans of BBC2′s The Hour will be disappointed to learn that it will not be returning for a third series, having not been re-commissioned by the BBC.

BBC Drama 2013 Showreel

BBC Drama

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Luke Newberry as Kieren Walker.

IT looked like it would be an intriguing drama.

And lived up to expectations.

In The Flesh is a three-part BBC3 series starting at 10pm on Sunday (March 17) and also heading to BBC America.

It’s been trailed as a zombie drama but is much more than that.

Written by first-time TV writer Dominic Mitchell and directed by Jonny Campbell, it stars Luke Newberry as Kieren Walker and Emily Bevan as Amy Dyer.

Both are Partially Deceased Syndrome (PDS) sufferers.

Humans have won a war against zombies who are now, thanks to modern medication, being re-introduced into society.

Transformed via drugs, make-up and contact lenses to a more normal appearance.

But members of the Human Volunteer Force (HVF) and others are not convinced, also remembering those who lost their lives in the fight against the zombies.

Trick or Treat and Halloween is still banned in the small rural community of Roarton, such are the nightmare memories.

So what does that mean for people like Kieren, who originally killed himself, returning home to their parents after the horrors of what has gone before?

With his own sister Jem (Harriet Cains) a member of the HVF.

Kieren returned home.

Last month I was invited along to a press screening in London which was followed by a Q&A and other interviews.

If you think In The Flesh is just for a youthful BBC3 audience, then – I’d argue – you’d be wrong.

With cast members including Kenneth Cranham, Steve Evets and Ricky Tomlinson, it has a cross-generational storyline relevant to a wide age group.

Including an exploration of prejudice, discrimination, extremism and redemption.

Director Jonny’s past credits include Eric & Ernie, Ashes To Ashes, Doctor Who, Shameless and Spooks.

So he knows a thing or two.

“What drew me in about this is that it was, effectively, a device,” he explained.

“It’s not really about zombies, you could argue.

“Yes, it’s got elements of that. But actually it’s about family and a drama which can ask questions which other dramas can’t.”

Made by the BBC Drama production team in Salford, there’s plenty to say about In The Flesh.

Below is the story I wrote a few hours after the screening.

That’s followed by a full transcript of the post-screening Q&A.

And then a transcript of a further chat that evening with Luke.

**********************************************************************

THE star of a new TV zombie drama got a shock when he fell asleep in the make-up chair.

“It was three in the morning during a night shoot and I took a nap,” said In The Flesh actor Luke Newberry.

“I woke up and caught myself in the mirror – I was terrified!”

The three-part BBC3 drama tells the story of the aftermath of a war between humans and the risen dead.

Defeated zombies are now classed as suffering from PDS – partially deceased syndrome -  and receive NHS medication to allow them to be re-introduced into society. 

Luke plays Kieren who is returned to his parents in the isolated rural community of Roarton where members of the HVF – Human Volunteer Force – still hunt the undead.

Kieren, aged 18, has nightmare flashbacks about killing a young girl in a supermarket when he was in a rabid state.

“It was very weird to film ripping open a scalp and eating a brain,” said the Devon-born actor, who has also appeared in Sherlock, Mrs Biggs and Harry Potter And The Deathly Hallows: Part 2.

“Even though I knew it wasn’t real, I did feel very odd about it.

“It was like Angel Delight and actually really tasty. I look like I’m enjoying it and I was!

“The prosthetic brain was attached to the real actor’s head. I don’t think she minded,” added Luke, currently starring in ITV’s Lightfields.

Emily Bevan also had to spend hours in the make-up chair to play PDS sufferer Amy, who originally died from leukaemia.

“I came off the worst. I looked absolutely hideous,” she said.

“But in terms of getting into character it was incredibly helpful just to look in the mirror and be horrified by yourself.”

The series also features Rev star Steve Evets as Bill, leader of the local HVF, who is married to Janet, played by Karen Henthorn, who played twisted Teresa in Coronation Street.

With The Royle Family’s Ricky Tomlinson as Roarton resident Ken and Kenneth Cranham as Vicar Oddie.

In The Flesh begins on BBC3 at 10pm on Sunday March 17.

**********************************************************************

BBC3 Controller Zai Bennett echoed the wider themes of In The Flesh in his introduction before the screening.

“I will say zombie drama for now…

“The dead have risen. The zombies and humans have had a huge war and the humans have won. This drama begins where the zombies are being re-integrated into society. And for me that was just a really arresting, different pitch to read. And with that pitch came a wonderful script and a huge bible of all the mythology – Dominic had mocked up NHS leaflets for the partially deceased. Just amazing. It was a really easy commissioning decision once you’d read all of that. It was a world that he had thought so much about and knew intimately. It was so different and arresting that I thought we had to do it for BBC3.

“Dominic wrote In The Flesh and submitted it to the (BBC) Writersroom. Then it was developed by BBC North through the Northern Voices scheme. So things like this really do happen. A first-time TV writer – here’s a three-part drama. In only two years.

“In addition to being written by a hugely talented emerging writer, we’ve also had the chance to blend some wonderfully seasoned actors with some great new talent.

“Also what Jonny has done with the directing and the style – it’s a very different drama to what you’d normally get for 16 to 34s. Normally it’s super fast cut pace, loads of heavy music over everything and in your face. This is a wonderfully arresting beautiful drama which actually treats our audience like adults.”

Q&A:

Kate Harwood, BBC Production Head of Drama, England:

“I am so proud of this show that I could talk about it endlessly. To actually bring Dominic’s imagination to screen as a first-time television writer was a real honour and something that doesn’t happen very often. Then to have Jonny Campbell direct it was equally an honour and a privilege.”

Q: Dominic, Zai earlier on referred to the legendary ‘bible’ that we all read and were completely knocked out by. Where does it all come from? How did you come to this idea and how was it imagining this world? What drew you into it?

Dominic Mitchell: “I was watching a zombie movie, it was about five years ago, late at night. It was a typical zombie movie where you had a bunch of survivors and they were just blasting away zombies. They were doing it with such glee and macho gusto that I started feeling sorry for the zombies. One of the survivors, they blew away a young man and I was like, ‘Ah, he had a mother and probably had a father and maybe a sister. Maybe that’s an interesting take on it?’ And then I was developing an idea about a young lad who’d had a psychotic episode and he does something really terrible in his rural community. He gets treated and he gets medicated and he was coming back and dealing with all that guilt. I kind of was getting stuck on it. It was a bit too on the nose. Then when I watched the zombie movie I was like, ‘Oh, maybe he’s my young lad who had the psychotic episode? Maybe he didn’t have a psychotic episode? Maybe he’s a zombie?’ I was always like, ‘What would really happen in a zombie apocalypse in Britain?’ There would be this war and then the scientists would always be trying to get a solution to it. They would be like, ‘Right, we’re going to try and get them medicated and try and manage them.’ And that sparked off all the other ideas. And I was like, ‘Oh, yeah, that could happen and that could happen.’ You never see a zombie apocalypse…well you see an immediate aftermath…but I was like, ‘But what happens four years on when the undead and the survivors who battled the undead are trying to get on with their lives?’ So I thought, ‘That’s the way to go.’”

Emily Bevan as Amy Dyer.

Q: The bible of mythology ahead of the script?

Dominic Mitchell: “It was really fun to do this massive bible. Because I had to get all the back story right in my head and what happened in The Rising and what the medication was…Nortriptyline…what effects does it have on the brain? So I did this big patient information leaflet where I know all the side-effects of Nortriptyline and what poor Kieren has to go through every day. With this kind of show you have to know everything about it before you can write the scripts.”

Q: Jonny – what drew you to this?

Jonny Campbell: “Everything Dom said is encapsulated in the opening stage directions of this script. And there was only the one script but it totally drew me in and I had to read to know what was going to happen next. But it was something in the tone of voice in the way he writes the stage directions which really drew me in most. For example, in the opening scene in the supermarket, you could have just written, ‘Oh, there’s a girl and she’s getting some supplies and then she gets attacked.’ But he went into such great detail, saying she was buying Monster Munch and none of the major food groups were accounted for in her trolley. And similarly, in the scene in the treatment centre where they’re sitting round having a therapy session, again it could have been, ‘There’s a group of people having a therapy session.’ But it was, ‘You could be forgiven for wanting to play a morbid game of guess the cause of death.’ It just nuanced it and gave it a sort of mischievous quality which went right the way through it.”

Steve Evets as Bill Macy.

Kate then opened up questions to the audience:

Q: (From me, as it happens) Dominic, what sort of themes and issues did you want to explore in the series?

Dominic Mitchell: “It was about redemption and prejudice as well. There’s this rural community…the Human Volunteer Force are very against zombies. So it was about, coming back to having a psychotic episode, that thing of mental illness. Paranoid schizophrenics are medicated now but would you want one of them, even medicated, living next door to you? And I thought that’s something that you can actually talk about but not talk about, because it’s a zombie show. And that idea of extremism with the Undead Liberation Army and on the other side Vicar Oddie (Kenneth Cranham). When you don’t know. Because in The Rising, they don’t why it happened. So when there’s a vacuum then anything can fill it. And usually it’s quite extremist views that fill that vacuum. They were the sort of things that I was looking to explore.”

Q: Watching that, it made me think it could be an allegory for somebody who is maybe on the Sex Offenders’ Register?

Dominic Mitchell: “Yeah, definitely…they get a list. It was definitely that, that I was thinking about as well.”

Q: There are a lot of zombie things at the moment. Did that stymie you at all? Were you thinking, well I’m going to have to differentiate mine from the others. Have different zombie rules and that kind of thing?

Dominic Mitchell: “Yeah, sure. I was thinking about this idea five years ago and now it does seem like the zeitgeist with Warm Bodies and all this other stuff and World War Z coming in. But I love the zombie genre anyway. So any sort of zombie movie I will watch. I knew about Warm Bodies, the book. And I was like, ‘No, I can’t read it because it will seep in.’ I wanted to keep away from anything that was like that. I still watched The Walking Dead because I love The Walking Dead. And then they’re about survivors. It’s very tried and tested that kind of thing.”

Jonny Campbell: “That’s what drew me to it. It wasn’t like everything else I’d seen. I’d watched The Walking Dead and I carried on watching it. And I did find that at a certain point it becomes a bit more like a computer game. That it’s very, very samey. When the zombies don’t evolve, they just go round blowing the zombies away. The location changes but the story doesn’t really. And what drew me in about this is that it was, effectively, a device. It’s not really about zombies, you could argue. Yes, it’s got elements of that. But actually it’s about family and a drama which can ask questions which other dramas can’t. So, for example, ‘Why did you bury me?’ / ‘Didn’t I go to your funeral?’ / ‘Why did you choose that epitaph for me?’ You don’t hear that every day. And it just allows the characters to go back through things. Like, ‘Why did you commit suicide? Why didn’t you leave a note?’ They’re the kind of questions that people are facing every day, wanting to know answers. And this sort of drama allows some of those answers to come through. So it was fascinating for me as a director and a storyteller.”

Kenneth Cranham as Vicar Oddie.

Q: Dominic – why did you choose to set this in a rural setting as opposed to a city? What do you think that brings to the drama?

Dominic Mitchell: “Well, I’m from a rural setting myself. So I guess write what you know. We wanted to keep it really small scale. If we’d set it in Manchester or London, I think it would just have been too big. I think setting it in a little rural village, it’s like a microcosm about what’s happening maybe in the cities and Britain as a whole. Because I’m from a rural village I know those sort of characters, the whisperings and things like that. We didn’t have to go big on it. We could just go really small and that’s what I was really drawn to, to set it in Roarton, which is a village.”

Q: Question for the cast. How did you get into character for your rabid state?

Luke Newberry (Kieren): “Hours of make-up preparation. It was quite nice, actually. Because you could just come in, in the morning and just chill out and zone out while you had your face ravaged with prosthetic make-up.”

Emily Bevan (Amy): “Yes, the prosthetic cheeks we had to make us look a bit more gaunt and a wrinkled forehead. I think I came off the worst. I was absolutely hideous. And layers and layers and layers of make-up. In terms of getting into character it was incredibly helpful just to look in the mirror and be horrified by yourself.”

Luke Newberry: “I took a nap once, when I was in my full…it was like three in the morning where we were doing a night shoot. I woke up and caught myself in the mirror. I was terrified. There was a lot of that.”

Emily Bevan: “I remember in Shaun of the Dead there was a great scene – how to be a zombie. To teach them how to blend in. And I remember, ‘vacant with a touch of sadness’ was quite a useful reference. I’m not sure if any of that will come across but..”

Ricky Tomlinson as Ken Burton.

Q: Dominic – were there any autobiographical elements to the story?

Dominic Mitchell: “Like I say, I’m from a rural village. I didn’t kill anyone and then come back from the dead. But there is quite a lot of autobiographical stuff up there. I guess I was different. Growing up and being a teenager, definitely I was different. I think rural communities or just my community were a bit afraid of that, a bit afraid that I listened to rock music – Guns and Roses. And I don’t think it’s that bad, Guns and Roses. And then Nirvana came along…I had long hair, I wore cardigans…and that made me like the bad lad of the village, the black sheep of the village and there was a lot of whispering about that Mitchell lad at number 11. So I kind of know where Kieren is coming from. And, of course, it’s incredibly heightened because he’s also a PDS sufferer who ate people in the village.”

Kate Harwood: “One of the things that I always find incredibly moving about it is Kieren chose to die, Amy didn’t…his energy coming back is particularly poignant because he wanted to go. And hers is very different because she didn’t.”

Q: Is it conceived as a three-parter or could it continue?

Kate Harwood: “Who knows? It’s a very BBC answer isn’t it? It’s a very complete three-parter. But let’s see who’s still there by the end credits and we’ll see how we go in the future. We were very aware of wanting to make this an event three-parter that really satisfies in its own right, rather than spending the whole time looking round the corner and trying to keep things going just in case.”

Jonny Campbell: “It was clear to me when I read the first script that this was a really interesting idea. Having said that, it was a fairly low budget piece but we had the three-parter to make. And Dominic has, as you can already tell, ideas to fill quite a long-running series. Having said that, we had three hours. So part of the conversation was about trying to, not clip Dom’s wings in any way but just make the most of what the story was giving you in that first episode and making sure that we weren’t going to tantalise viewers with, effectively, a three-part pilot for something. I think that’s really important because I think that happens far too often and I think it was really key for this to have a cathartic, wholesome three-part story that, as Kate says, hopefully like a lot of good things, if you think it’s good we’ll leave you wanting more. And that was the ambition behind it.”

Dominic Mitchell: “We wanted it to have a really good resolution. You see a lot of these things where you’re like, ‘Oh, they’re going to get to it on series two.’ We didn’t want that. We wanted the audience to feel satisfied at the end. There are doors open and I’ve got loads of…well, this bible, which weighs about 50 tonnes. But, yeah, we just wanted it to be a complete story and have that. I think that’s fine.”

Harriet Cains as Kieren’s sister Jem.

Q: You got the commission through the initiative for new writers. What was the day job? What were you doing before? And can you talk us through how this affected you?

Dominic Mitchell: “My background was in theatre. I was a struggling playwright. A starving playwright…I was writing plays. When I first came up with this idea, I wrote a one-pager and I was like, ‘This is a TV series. It’s not a play. Should it be a stage play? No, it is definitely a TV series, I see it so clearly in my head. But I don’t know where to go.’ Because I had no contacts in TV at the time. And then this BBC Writersroom Initiative came up, which was Northern Voices – you could spend 12 months being mentored and developed…a great writer called John Fay. And it was just the four of us – three other really talented writers. It was great. I could learn how to do a TV drama because I’d never written a TV script before. So that was fantastic to do that 12-month thing. Then it was lucky enough to read by Simon Judd (script editor) and Hilary Martin, the executive producer. They liked it and we had a meeting and they optioned it. Then from there I started on this massive bible. It’s so incredible because of course it’s developed and changed – but a lot of the initial ideas, five years ago, are on the screen. It’s just incredible to see. And I think done really fantastically. It’s amazing.”

Kate Harwood: “This is made by our BBC Drama production team in Salford. Hilary and Simon snapped it up and brought it to mine and Ben Stephenson’s (BBC Controller of Drama) attention the minute they read it. Nothing in drama moves fast, but for drama it’s moved pretty fast actually. And we’re very, very proud of it.”

Luke Newberry as Kieren.

Luke Newberry plays Kieren Walker:

Q: Your background?

“I was a child actor, I guess, from when I was about seven, doing some TV and film and stage. A bit of everything really. I went to a normal school and took my A-levels and thought, ‘I really want to train.’ So I got into the Bristol Old Vic when i was 17 / 18 and went there for three years and graduated in 2011. Then I’ve had a year of being really busy and doing lots of amazing different projects and different parts and really varied roles. It’s been a great year. But this, obviously, was my biggest part that I’ve ever done.”

Q: How did you want to approach him?

“I wanted to make him believable. Obviously he’s very low, he’s very depressed and he didn’t leave the world in a good place and he doesn’t come back in a good place either. So it was a tricky balance of finding how to play all that – everything he’s battling with. And then new things he’s battling with coming back, like flashbacks. And also not making him just totally flat. I think Kieren goes on a very long journey throughout the episodes and you see that different characters unlock different things in him as they go along. Like Amy unlocks the fun in Kieren and slowly he starts to grown different parts of him back again.”

Q: You told the story about having the nap in the make-up chair. What time did you have to get in and how many hours were you in the chair on a heavy day?

“Depending on the location, maybe like a five or six start in the morning and then two hours in the make-up chair. And then on most days I’d be in every shot of every day, as well. And my make-up would be being re-touched throughout the day. So I’d be wearing an awful lot of make-up. Then we’d finish at seven or whatever. Unless it was a night shoot and then we’d go through. Then it was an hour of the make-up, depending on the day – whether it was prosthetics. The easy days were the days were the days when I was just in my foundation without any lenses in. But sometimes it would take an hour to get off and I’d get back to the hotel and just collapse.”

Preparing to return home.

Q: How were those contact lenses?

“I got used to them. I’m not a contact lens wearer so I found it difficult. We all had difficult times with it. But actually, apart from the first day, they became quite comfortable. And they’re big. They’re massive. They are clear but they’re hand-painted so you’re a bit tunnel vision with them. It changed the way I was, really. Because when you can’t see everyone – it did make me go a bit inward. Which helped me then Kieren because he is very introspective. So it didn’t hinder anything at all, really.”

Q: So it must be quite shocking to see yourself at first in the mirror?

“Yes.”

Q: Have your family or friends seen any photos of you? What do they think?

“Yes. Horrified! Thrilled! A lot of my friends couldn’t believe it. And couldn’t believe it was me. The weirdest make-up was probably the orange foundation at times because I look like me but just slightly not quite right. Which is almost more disturbing than the prosthetic cheeks and all that. Because that looks more generic zombie.”

Unexpected item in bagging area. Riann Steele as Lisa and Emily Bevan as Amy.

Q: The flashback of you eating?

“The brain? When I eat the brain? It was like Angel Delight stuff. It was actually really tasty. So I look like I’m enjoying it and I was. It was great. Very weird though. Ripping open a scalp, which I actually did, and then eating. Even though I knew it wasn’t real, I did feel very odd about it. It was attached to the real actor’s head. So it was like an extension of her head. It was all a bit of a blur. Three in the morning in a supermarket, lenses in. I just went in and did it. It was like being underwater, slightly, because you had something on everything, in my eyes…so you just had to come in and go for it. I don’t think she minded me eating her!”

Q: Did you have any unexpected encounters on location with members of the public?

“We did a lot of my rabid stuff in the studio, so it was a bit more out of the way. The funniest thing was doing the funeral scenes, in my orange state, my foundation cover-up. And people in the crowds maybe not quite knowing the ins and outs of the story, knowing that I wear cover-up – and getting wolf-whistled by them. People must have been thinking, ‘Why the hell is that guy wearing so much make-up? And who’s his make-up artist?’ I just felt like screaming at everyone, ‘Just watch it. You’ll get it.’”

Q: Any other memorable moments?

“Me and Emily, who plays Amy, at four in the morning in a supermarket staff room, completely covered in prosthetics. She looked completely burnt. And both of us being a little bit hysterical. We’d had far too much coffee, going absolutely nuts. We couldn’t stop laughing for about an hour. That was a highlight. It was just so surreal. It was in a break. We were having our lenses put in and they couldn’t get mine in because I was laughing so much. Just very surreal. ‘How did we get here? And what are we doing?’”

Q: In The Flesh is partly about overcoming obstacles. With some really interesting issues in this?

“It looks at mental health issues, prejudice, things that obviously drama touches on a lot. But I think this can go further because by using Kieren being a zombie you can feed more in through that, in more interesting ways as well. I forget it’s about zombies when I watch it. And I think that’s interesting. It’s a funny one to describe. That’s great that it’s about zombies but it’s not that totally. I find it really hard to describe to people. I generally just have to say, ‘You’ll just have to wait until it’s on.’”

Q: Can you see it coming back?

“I’d love to. It works so brilliantly as a three part drama. But there are lots of different avenues that it could go, that would be really interesting. I was sad on my last day of filming saying goodbye to Kieren because I’d lived him for two months. So it would be a joy.”

Q: We get to more about why Kieren killed himself and his relationship with best friend Rick (who was Bill Macy’s [Steve Evets] son, killed by the Taliban while serving with the Army in Afghanistan)?

“Yes. Much more comes into play as we go through the series. And different sides of Kieren I get to show as well, through the different people he meets and the different experiences he has.”

Q: Other recent work and coming up next?

“I’ve got a series called Lightfields (which began that night on ITV). And a horror film. I’m doing another genre thing called Frankenstein’s Army which is coming to cinemas soon, I think. But apart from that I’m just focusing on promotions for this and meeting for stuff.”

In The Flesh begins on BBC3 at 10pm on Sunday March 17

BBC In The Flesh Official Site

In The Flesh BBC Media Centre

BBC Writersroom

John Fay

Ian Wylie on Twitter

“AND the Doctor’s greatest secret will be revealed.”

Doctor Who showrunner Steven Moffat speaking at a London press conference last Friday morning.

The content of which was embargoed until now, just after midnight in the early hours of Monday, together with the new pics which also feature on this page.

We were shown The Bells of Saint John – the opening episode of series 7b – written by Steven Moffat.

To be screened on BBC1 and BBC America on Saturday March 30.

The media preview was followed by that Q&A with Matt Smith (the Doctor), Jenna-Louise Coleman (Clara) and Steven Moffat.

You can read my full transcript further down this blog, edited to remove any major spoilers.

Steven’s reply was part of the answer I got after asking the trio to talk about their personal highlights in the next eight episodes.

Followed in November by Doctor Who’s 50th anniversary celebrations.

Although the latter are still under wraps, the press conference did give us a tiny taste of what is ahead.

“You won’t be disappointed,” promised Matt, having seen the script for the birthday episode.

“I read it and I clapped at the end.

“It’s going to be the biggest, the best, the most inventive, the most exciting year for the show.

“And I think this script, it delivers on all those points that you want it to for where the show is at this time. It’s brilliant.

“It somehow manages to pay homage to everything and look forward. And I think that’s the mark, the genius of it.”

Jenna agreed: “Reading especially the finale of this season as well, without giving too much away, it really is epic and I think it’s really a treat for the fans of the last 50 years.”

As you’ll see from the Q&A transcript, there was plenty to interest fans of the Time Lord, as well as those of Sherlock.

Steven explained his decision to bring back the Ice Warriors in one episode while also saying that Doctor Who no longer had to raid its back catalogue for old monsters.

While Matt revealed:

“Towards the end of the season…I think we might have one of those clever Moffat creations.

“One of the new classic monsters. And they’ve got a great name and they are so brilliant.”

The opening episode – actually ep seven of series seven after a series break – is very possibly the best “first episode” I have ever seen.

Directed with a pace to rival James Bond’s Skyfall and also set in a modern day London.

Introducing a 2013 Clara as perhaps the most intriguing companion in the show’s long history.

With Jenna a joy to watch on screen.

Most will already know that it introduces The Spoonheads and involves the perils of wi-fi and the web.

Including a very good joke from Steven about Twitter, hewn from his own experience before quitting that particular branch of social media.

If you’re looking for a sign of just how memorable this 50th year is going to be, then look no further than The Bells of Saint John.

I won’t spoil it for you, but to put part of the Q&A into context, we see the Doctor as a monk…and there are Jammie Dodgers.

Along with a portrait of Clara Oswin Oswald and her now classic line: “Run you clever boy…and remember.”

As Jenna pointed out during the press conference: “There’s nothing worse the Doctor hates than an unsolved mystery.

“And that is what she is.”

It certainly sets up a fascinating, epic path ahead.

With a 1963 programme called Doctor Who in the very best of hands.

BBC Drama Controller of Commissioning Ben Stephenson introduced the screening:

“As ever, I can’t say anything about anything because everyone keeps running over to me saying, ‘It’s embargoed.’ So I’m saying to all of you, ‘It’s embargoed.’ But the reason it’s embargoed is because it’s brilliant. What I can say is Jenna, having flirted with the show over the last two episodes she’s been in, finally commits and is one of our most marvellous assistants, I think in the history of Doctor Who. So it’s a real treat to see her coming through in this eight part series.

“As ever, Matt Smith is a god…as ever, he just does something extraordinary with his Doctor. He’s always funny and yet always truthful. And I think as the series goes on you really see the depth of that character coming through. He makes you cry and he makes you laugh. And that’s just in real life.

The Rings of Akhaten. Episode 7.8 written by Neil Cross.

“And, of course, TV’s Steven Moffat, without whom we wouldn’t be here. Last week I got three brown envelopes from Steven Moffat. Well there were four. One of them had money in, but that’s something else. And one of them was episode one of Sherlock. One of them was the DVD of this and one of them was the script of something to do with Doctor Who that’s happening later in the year…(laughter). That’s how hard he works.

“And I know it’s boring to talk about people working hard and not very glamorous. But sometimes in all of the conversation about how brilliant people are, we forget that people are committing hours and hours and hours and nights and night and nights. Committing themselves to writing shows as brilliantly as this. So on a pure hard work level, I want to thank Steven and everyone else involved in the team.

“But, of course, he doesn’t do it alone. There an army, phalanx of producers. And, of course, Wales plays a huge part in this. Roath Lock is an extraordinary studio complex. It’s the most Hollywood you’ll get in the whole of the country and it’s in Wales.

“So, as I say, you can’t say anything about this episode. What you can say is that it’s brilliant and you can also say it’s the best first episode of Doctor Who ever. That’s official. You can definitely say that.

“I really hope you enjoy it. Afterwards there will be a Q&A with Matt and everyone. So that’ll be exciting. Thank you. Sit back, enjoy.”

The post screening Q&A with Matt Smith, Jenna-Louise Coleman and Steven Moffat, hosted by Boyd Hilton.

My full transcript is below but edited to remove any major spoilers.

Q (Boyd Hilton) : So Jammie Dodgers?

Steven Moffat: “We get no free Jammie Dodgers. Let’s just get that straight right away.”

Matt Smith: “I have actually been sent a box of Jammie Dodgers. No, no I haven’t…”

Q: It felt almost slightly James Bond-ish. Exciting, London-ey…was that a conscious thing?

Steven Moffat: “We were talking about the fact we were going to have to do a modern day story to introduce Jenna yet again. But this time not kill her. And Marcus Wilson, our producer, said, ‘Let’s do it as a proper London thriller.’ So as close as we can get – given that Doctor Who is mad – to James Bond or Bourne or something like that.”

Q: Jenna – this is your proper introduction. Obviously you’ve been in two episodes and you’ve had various deaths and personalities. Do we feel this is it? We’re finally meeting you? Does it feel that way to you?

Jenna-Louise Coleman: “I suppose this is kind of take three. And then this is the Clara that we will be with for the next episodes. But with all of the Claras, there’s kind of an essence that’s the same running throughout. But this is the Clara that we will be with and know for the next…”

Steven Moffat: “Unless we kill her.” (laughter)

Cold War – episode 7.9 written by Mark Gatiss.

Q: Matt – how has it been dealing with a new companion who has so many different levels and personalities and deaths?

Matt Smith: “I think it’s quite nice for the Doctor because I think having got his grieving for the Ponds out of the way, I think she’s re-ignited his curiosity in the universe and given him his mojo back, for want of a better word. Yeah. And I just have to say that I think she’s done…I mean you see on the screen…I think she’s absolutely brilliant. It’s been a joy to work with Jenna and I’m really proud of the work we’ve done. And I think it’s exciting for the character. It gives him a new lease somehow.”

Q: Riding a motorbike?

Matt Smith: “It was such a lovely day in London. We both went, ‘This isn’t a real job?’ It was great fun. That and just playing football…if I get to play football in the show. And I’d just like to say that I think the director Colm (McCarthy) has done the most fantastic job. I think he directed it with wit and verve and pace. I think it was brilliantly made.”

Q: Yes, it was an incredibly fast moving, exciting episode?

Matt Smith: “Yeah.”

Q: Do you feel Steven – I was watching an old episode the other day to try and work out what the difference was…and the pace seems to be, for me, the main difference. These episodes…you pack so much in. Is that fair?

Steven Moffat: “Yes, of course it’s got faster down the years. But the truth is all television has. If you look at old Doctor Who compared to other television shows at the time, it was faster. So, yes, you do try and go madly fast in Doctor Who – more stuff, more colour and more sooner all the time.”

Q: You keep saying that every episode is going to be like a film – every single episode to be packed full of a whole film in 45 minutes?

Steven Moffat: “Next week he’s in a cupboard. No, he’s not. Actually can I just tell you that I think what we’ve got, in effect, this year is we’ve got three opening episodes. The next two are fast-paced nail biters as well. So as normal we get one big, super-fast mad one at the beginning and settle down. But we don’t settle down for ages in this one. It’s like having three episode ones in a row.”

Hide – episode 7.10 written by Neil Cross.

Q: And there’s an episode coming up where you journey into the centre of the TARDIS…

Steven Moffat: “Oh, you’re a fanboy at heart.”

Q: …I was talking to Matt the other day about that episode, just the title alone (Journey to the Centre of the TARDIS) is incredibly exciting. How much can you tell us about it? How much will we see of the TARDIS?

Steven Moffat: “You will go to the heart of the TARDIS. You will see more of the TARDIS more properly than you’ve ever seen it before. It’s all that stuff. The moment I got that title and gave it to Stephen Thompson, who wrote it, it was just the title alone gets…because I remember years ago…in the Radio Times there was a little article saying, ‘In this week’s episode the Doctor dodges the Sontarans through the many rooms of the TARDIS.’ I could not wait for Saturday. But there was a problem with the scenery or something and they shot it all in a disused hospital. And it was so disappointing. And I thought that day, ‘Some day! Somehow, I will do what I can to get into television and do that properly!’ (laughter) And that worked out. So Michael Pickwoad (production designer) goes mad and gives us the TARDIS and gives us all manner of things.”

Q: And apparently a swimming pool?

Steven Moffat: “Wait and see. There’s way more than a swimming pool. Wait ‘til you see what’s in there.”

Q: Jenna – how has the chemistry worked with Matt? You’ve worked on it but not worked on it. Do you feel that from the start you had that? You had something between you that was going to work on screen? Or have you worked on that? Have you literally sat there with Matt behind the scenes going, ‘Right, let’s work on it.’”

Jenna-Louise Coleman: “I think it’s a bit of both. Instantly from the first audition I definitely felt it. And it was a feeling of walking away from the audition room thinking…I kind of felt like I’d been knocked off my feet a bit, actually. It was a bit of a hurricane. But just the feeling of, ‘This is what I’d really like to do day in and day out.‘ Because every day really is so different and I really don’t know what he’s going to throw at me, which is great. It’s keeping that spontaneity. And then I suppose you get used to each other rhythms as well. They both feed into each other really.”

Matt Smith: “And I think that that’s something that you got so immediately. Jenna…with Steven’s writing there’s such rhythm to it. I think you were immediately inside it. And then we have fun, don’t we? That’s the main thing. It’s such a fun show to make. But it is something where you’re cast – and it was the same with Karen – and then it’s like, ‘Have chemistry!’ And acting chemistry, because you’re exposing yourself and all that…and this show, she’s done so brilliantly at jumping in and jumping on the train of it. But there’s always a sort of period of evolution with any characters. That’s the fun bit, I think.”

Q: You’ve already snogged, so we’ve got that out the way.

Steven Moffat: “In the show.” (laughter)

Q: You snogged Dawn French this morning, didn’t you? (On Radio Two’s Chris Evans’ Breakfast Show Red Nose Day special)

Matt Smith: “For 50 quid. And Jennifer Saunders. On Radio Two. It was nice. I had a good time.” (laughter)

Q: Will you be giving out Comic Relief snogs to anyone…

Matt Smith: “Hey, for 50 quid a snog, if it raises a bit of money for Comic Relief.”

Q: I’ll give you 50 quid.

Matt Smith: “Go on then.”

(Matt and Boyd then enjoyed a polite kiss to applause from the audience)

Matt Smith: “That was a bit of a pansy snog as well!” (laughter)

Steven Moffat: “What do you do for a hundred?’ (laughter)

Matt Smith: “Stop pimping Doctor Who!”

Steven Moffat: “It’s my career…”

Q: Matt did tell me that he’s read the script for the 50th anniversary thing. He said, ‘You will not be disappointed.’

Steven Moffat: “That’s what we’ll put on the poster then.”

Q: What do you mean by that?

Matt Smith: “Well, it sort of does what it says on the tin. You won’t be disappointed. It’s my cryptic way of going…no, the thing is, much as we’d love to tell you everything, I read it and I clapped at the end. I think it’s hilarious and I think it’s epic and I think it’s vast. I’m telling you nothing more. But you will not be disappointed. I think it’s going to be the biggest, the best, the most inventive, the most exciting year for the show. And I think this script, it delivers on all those points that you want it to for where the show is at this time. It’s brilliant.”

Q: And how did you (Jenna) feel when you read it?

Jenna-Louise Coleman: “Exactly the same. How do I say without saying anything? This is a new skill that I’m learning. Reading especially the finale of this season as well, without giving too much away, it really is epic and I think it’s really a treat for the fans of the last 50 years.”

Matt Smith: “It somehow manages to pay homage to everything and look forward. And I think that’s the mark, the genius of it.”

Steven Moffat: “Information content of that – zero! You know less and less…we are subtracting information. That is my aim.”

Q: So the filming takes place soon, in April. And the filming of the new Sherlock…it’s all happening at the same time? How do you feel about that?

Steven Moffat: “Fresh and vigorous..well, it’s very exciting. I always end up belly-aching about it because I think if I did anything other than belly-ache I’d sound like I was boasting a lot. But it’s absolutely brilliant, incredibly exciting. We’ve just had the read through for Sherlock, which was in storming form, and now we’re just embarking on the 50th (anniversary) Doctor Who.”

Q: How do you both feel about being…you’re the Doctor, you’re the companion, in the 50th anniversary year? When you got the role did it hit you that, ‘Actually, I’m going to be playing it in the 50th anniversary year?’

Jenna-Louise Coleman: “No, no, not immediately at all. The focus was on the story coming up and those things. But going to the stamp launch that we went to the other day and seeing the 11 Doctors on a stamp and it all gets signed off by the Queen…”

Matt Smith: “Does it?”

Jenna-Louise Coleman: “Yeah. You got signed off by the Queen.”

Matt Smith: “Cool.”

Jenna-Louise Coleman: “At 10 ‘o clock on a Saturday morning…”

Matt Smith: “That’s what she does?” (laughter)

Jenna-Louise Coleman: “It just makes you realise what you’re part of, things like that.”

Q: Matt – when did it strike you that you’re the incumbent?

Matt Smith: “Well it’s the show’s year. But to be the incumbent Doctor, it’s the most thrilling…it’s been the most thrilling ride anyway but to be part of it now is a huge privilege. I’m thrilled. And as I say, we’re upping the scale of everything. It’s 3D…I won’t say anything about the event but there’s just a bit more for your buck. There’s more bang for your buck.”

Q: It’s longer?

Steven Moffat: “46 minutes…I’ve just said that for the sheer hell of it. Someone is going to write that down and create a whole blog of that. ‘Moffat Says 46 Minutes.’”

Boyd then opened questions to us journalists in the audience.

Q: Can I ask Jenna-Louise to talk a bit more about being blown away at that audition? What was so impressive about what you were seeing that made you feel it was like a hurricane?

Matt Smith: “Yeah, what was so impressive?” (laughter)

Jenna-Louise Coleman: “It was more because…obviously I had read the scenes and prepared them in a certain way. And then basically, as soon as you’re approached by Matt all of that goes out the window and you don’t quite know what’s going to happen or where it’s going to go. So it was that kind of spontaneity. We kind of just played around. And what was lovely as well is Matt made me feel like he was auditioning with me, which was really nice. So it was kind of like show and tell – all of the producers left the room and left me and Matt to just literally run around and play.”

Matt Smith: “We had team time, didn’t we?”

Jenna-Louise Coleman: “And then everyone came back in and then we got to do it. I just didn’t know where it was going to go. I just felt thrilled and excited by it. And, again, it was the idea of doing this day in, day out. It was cool.”

Q: (From me, as it happens) Obviously you don’t want to give too much away. But can you talk us through some of your personal highlights of this series and the guest stars that you’ve got coming in?

Matt Smith: “Gosh, yeah. We’ve got Liam Cunningham, who is a personal favourite actor of mine. We’ve got a submarine. We’ve got the Ice Warriors, we’ve got the Cybermen back in new guise, we’ve got Neil Gaiman writing a script, we’ve got Diana Rigg playing an old hag (laughter) – but brilliantly with great charm and sexiness and grace. And her daughter (Rachael Stirling), who is also brilliant. And the scenes between them. That’s a Mark Gatiss script which is full of fanboy love. I think both of his scripts.”

Jenna-Louise Coleman: “I’ve never seen you (Matt) as quiet on set, with Dame Diana and her daughter as well. Both of us were sat watching them both and watching the dynamic. We go to a big alien planet…”

Matt Smith: “Yeah, that was fun, wasn’t it? With as many aliens as we’ve ever seen in one place…”

Jenna-Louise Coleman: “Yeah. In an amphitheatre of aliens. So we’ve got so many pictures…we’ve got an entire day of us sat, kind of like all of you guys (the audience) but you all had prosthetic heads on as aliens.”

Matt Smith: “Doing a little swaying…”

Jenna-Louise Coleman: “Yeah, swaying away. (laughs) We are under the sea, we’re in a submarine. We are in the infinite interior of the TARDIS…”

Matt Smith: “And I think towards the end of the season – I don’t want to give too much away but I think we might have one of those clever Moffat creations. One of the new classic monsters. And they’ve got a great name and they are so brilliant.”

Jenna-Louise Coleman: “They are. They are absolutely brilliant. They’re a monster that…they don’t chase you, they just come at you slowly. And they’ve got a style which I find really quite terrifying. They’ve got a style to them. But I think that’s all we can probably say.”

Steven Moffat: “And the Doctor’s greatest secret will be revealed. And actually will. I’m not lying.”

Q: With this being the 50th year, has there been a bit more of a pressure to keep the balance between fanboy referencing and keeping it accesible to maybe first time viewers?

Steven Moffat: “It’s been a long time since we’ve bothered, really, hasn’t it? The thing about Doctor Who…I think there was one problem within the first year…when it came back. Because I think everyone just became a fan. And the truth is people stop me in the street with the most abstruse questions. And they’re real people. They’re not fans like me. And I’m thinking, ‘You’re not supposed to know that stuff. That’s supposed to be mine…’ To be honest, it feels like everyone’s a fan. The level of knowledge is very intense. But it’s very, very easy to keep Doctor Who accessible because it’s designed to be. The format can be summed up in such a short sentence, even after all this time. ‘It’s a man who can travel anywhere in time and space in a box that’s bigger on the inside.’ We’re done. That’s all you need to know. Everything else you can pick it up. People quite often ask me, usually Americans, ‘What’s a good jumping on point?’ And you say, ‘Well that’s like asking, what’s a good James Bond film to start with?’ They’re all fine. You’ll get it. I don’t think it’s difficult…and it’s not difficult to balance that. It’s surprising how much the general audience want the detail and the continuity and the call backs to their childhood…because we all remember it.”

Q: Two things. Firstly Matt, your socks are amazing…”

Matt Smith: “Thanks.”

Q: …I’ll give 50 quid to Comic Relief for those. Secondly, Steven – you talked about television has got faster over the years and I was taken at how well directed that episode was. The scale of intensity of what directors are doing with television at the moment has just been on a real roll for the last 10 years or so. I’m wondering where you’re finding your directors and what kind of things you’re looking for. Because we’ve talked about how Jenna’s jumped into the show…you’re bringing lots of new directors and talent in as well?

Steven Moffat: “It’s a very good question. I hope I can do it justice. Where do we find them? We find directors like Colm (McCarthy) there, sitting right behind you, with ambition, not just to get the show made but to show off a bit. That’s what you’re looking for. Directors who – and the same with Sherlock – actually actively want to impress you. They’re not just there to get the show done in the time. Which is actually quite difficult in itself. But ones who are really ambitious – storytellers…and we make no demands on Doctor Who for it to be the same every week. We are saying, ‘This one’s your one. Make it your one.’ We say that to every…the writers as well…treat it like you own it. And that’s really important. So there’s a category of writer and a category of director – and that category is called talented, I would say – where they leap at that. They say, ‘This is mine. Right now it belongs to me and I can do what I like with it.’ That’s what we want. People with authorial ambition.”

Q: Jenna – I just wondered how you feel like Clara’s relationship with the Doctor has changed since Christmas and also before that?

Jenna-Louise Coleman: “Well, obviously, for her this is a completely clean slate. She is oblivious. She is meeting the Doctor as he turns up on her doorstep as a monk for the first time. So that’s her first impression. So, for me, it’s to treat it completely as a clean slate. But what I really love, and especially because that’s the first time we’ve seen…is that the dynamic is so different because there’s nothing worse the Doctor hates than an unsolved mystery. And that is what she is. So you can really see it arcing over the next episodes.”

Q: I just wanted to ask you Steven about doing Doctor Who and Sherlock at the same time. How you keep them separate, whether you ever have ideas for lines then you’re torn over who to give them to? How you separate them?

Steven Moffat: “They’re just in little different parts of your head. They honestly feel really quite different. The way the pace of a Doctor Who goes is completely different to the pace of a Sherlock. Although I’m talking about television being really, really fast, it is – but Sherlock has the longest scenes in the world…it just lives in a different place…and Mark (Gatiss) and I are both always saying, ‘You can never not do something or do something based on the fact that we both do both shows.’ You can’t say, ‘But we had that in that show, so we can’t do it in that show.’ If Doctor Who and Sherlock were made by different people you wouldn’t ever worry about that. Aesthetically I don’t find it at all difficult to divide it in my head because they feel very, very different places to me.”

Q: With the 50th anniversary script now landing on people’s desks in brown envelopes, as we heard earlier, what sort of lengths do you have to go through to protect the secrets of this episode (the 50th) in particular?

Steven Moffat: “Random execution…we’re just very, very careful and we kill people. Was I smiling? Look, it’s difficult. What can I say? I’ll tell you, one length I’ve gone to, which I think is a really, really good security measure – I make sure I don’t get a script. Because I will lose it. So I forbid people to hand me one. It’s just on my computer at home under lock and key.”

Matt Smith: “Well, you cultivate the habit of giving nothing away. And then it’s quite nice. You’re sat on all this information and people are genuinely intrigued. It’s one of the responsibilities of being in this show. You have to be discrete about what you tell people. But you have to give people enough. Because otherwise what’s the point in all you guys turning up? You scratch our back, we’ll scratch yours…” (laughter)

Steven Moffat: “For 50 quid.”

Matt Smith: “So that’s the fun bit, I think. But the show – it’s based on impact. And we want it to be. And that’s why we’re so grateful when you are…when you see these things and you write about them in a certain way, because it’s based on delivering it on a Saturday night to people in their homes.”

Q: Just wanted to ask Matt about Doctor Who’s new clothes. Did he choose them himself and what was the inspiration, because they’re quite Teddy Boy-ish, I thought?

Matt Smith: “Yeah. Well, they’re still tweed. I always wanted something purple. But it was perhaps too bold in season one. And if you look back at all the interviews that I’ve done previously, I’ve always said I thought the costume would continually evolve. We’ve got a wonderful costume designer Howard (Burden) and it was one of those things. The Ponds leaving and the Doctor’s mentality changing slightly and a new title sequence and a new beginning for a new era. We thought, ‘Why not give the Doctor a little revamp?’ And I think it really works. I like it.”

Q: Questions for Matt and Jenna. There’s a few digs in this episode about Twitter and as far as I’m aware, Matt, you’re still not on Twitter..?

Matt Smith: “I’m not on Twitter, no.”

Q: …but Jenna you are…

Jenna-Louise Coleman: “Oh no I’m not.”

Boyd Hilton: “Fake Jenna…”

Q: So why is that? And what do you think about Twitter?

Matt Smith: “I don’t think they’re digs. I think they’re gags. A dig would be like…I don’t know…but maybe it is. Why am I not on Twitter? I don’t know really. I spend so much time on my phone and I find the idea that you communicate your life via Twitter quite peculiar. And so it’s just never really interested me. But, that said, I think it’s wonderful that you can gauge, if you’re a fan of…I don’t know who’s on Twitter…but Steven Moffat (IW note: Who left Twitter some time ago) or whoever…that you can engage with them if you’re a fan. But it’s just not really up my street. I’m not on Facebook either. I can’t be bothered.”

Jenna-Louise Coleman: “Yeah, I’m the same. It’s just about trying to keep off the internet, really.”

Matt Smith: “Yeah. And also eventually…anyway, it’s just not my cup of tea really.”

Boyd Hilton: “You were on Steven, weren’t you? And then you weren’t. What’s your current Twitter status?”

Steven Moffat: “I’m not there anymore. The trouble is, it does take up your time when you start looking at it. When I sit at that computer I need as few distractions as possible. So I removed it from my life. I think it’s a fascinating thing Twitter. And as a means of promoting something it’s brilliant, extraordinary. The trouble with it…I mean the only way to – I think if you’re involved in something like Doctor Who – go on it, and I haven’t done this, would be to go on with a different name. Because then you can just talk to people as opposed to everybody asking you, ‘How does Sherlock survive?’ or something. It gets a bit tedious after a while.”

Q: Jenna – when my 16-year-old nephew heard I was going to be coming here today to talk to you in a press conference he got rather hot under the collar and asked me to get your autograph. I wondered what reaction you’d had from fans generally since you’ve started in Doctor Who? Any love letters, any marriage proposals, that kind of thing?

Jenna-Louise Coleman: “No. (laughter) No, not at all. I kind of feel slightly removed from it, really. I’ve had some lovely fan mail through but I think I’m just too short. I don’t get recognised….”

Steven Moffat: “That’ll change.”

Jenna-Louise Coleman: “You see Matt’s tall and he’s got quite a distinctive walk.” (laughter)

Steven Moffat: “Somebody stole his horse.”

Jenna-Louise Coleman: “Whereas I’m shorter and I’m honestly convinced that’s mainly part of the reason.”

Matt Smith: “What? So people recognise me because of my walk?”

Jenna-Louise Coleman: “Like you can see you from behind. In the same way you could recognise Ricky Gervais from behind…”

Steven Moffat: “You’re piling on the flattery now. It’s perfect chemistry.” (laughter)

Q: (Australian journalist) Australia has got strong connections with the Doctor. Next year will be the 25th anniversary of it being in Australia and I think an Australian was involved with the first episode – the theme music. Even Kylie. Any chance at all in the future of the Doctor visiting Australia in the TARDIS?

Steven Moffat: “Well sure. These things are story driven. It’s not like you phone up and offer us incredibly lucrative deals to film there. But if they wanted to…but it’s an amazing location, Australia. It’s quite far away so we’d need to sort it out. But it’s an amazing place to be.”

Q: The Doctor’s fez?

Matt Smith: That’s his hat which he (Steven) never gives me for very long.”

Steven Moffat: “It’s become your iconic headgear.”

Matt Smith: “At all the conventions, that’s what everyone wears.”

Q: A couple of questions for Steven. Firstly, what do you think of previous anniversary episodes that have been made?

Steven Moffat: “I loved them all.”

Q: Any in particular?

Steven Moffat: “Technically The Three Doctors wasn’t an anniversary episode. We just remembered it that way. But it was one year early for it. But I think that was a glorious show. I remember adoring The Five Doctors when it came out…I just remember thinking it was fantastically good. I like a big party bash.”

Q: And also can you tell us a bit more about the return of the Ice Warriors?

Steven Moffat: “Oddly enough, I slightly resisted them. I was slightly worried that…well first of all, I don’t think we still have to go into the back catalogue of the old show any more. Originally we did that to affirm that this new thing really was that old thing. Now that both shows are merged together and nobody really bothers to make a distinction between them anymore, we don’t really need to do that. And I always slightly thought they’re slow moving and you can’t hear what they’re saying. Is that the archetypal slightly silly monster? But then Mark (Gatiss) had been going on and on about it during a phone call which was meant to be about Sherlock, he started pitching this idea…a couple of very, very clever ideas of what we could do with an Ice Warrior. And I went for it at that point. But we were very concerned, as you’ll have seen in the clips, that that design hasn’t been seen enough to be updated in a way. So it’s a super version of the original. Sometimes you think a design should be upgraded because it’s so familiar. That one is slightly less familiar so you will be seeing the Ice Warrior in a familar form but with at least one big surprise.”

Doctor Who BBC Site

BBC Roath Lock

Ian Wylie on Twitter

Celia Imrie as Miss Kizlet.

Lacey Turner as Molly Dawes.

FALL in you horrible lot…

Our Girl is a 90-minute drama on BBC1 at 9pm this Sunday.

Written by Tony Grounds and starring Lacey Turner, I highly recommend it.

A story of one young person’s struggle and hope for the future.

You can learn more in my story below, published the day after the London press launch earlier this month.

Followed by my transcript of the Q&A with Lacey, Tony and producer Ken Horn.

Edited to remove any really major spoilers.

At ease.

EX-EastEnder Lacey Turner shed real tears when filming BBC1 Army drama Our Girl.

The former Albert Square actress plays new recruit Molly Dawes who trains to serve in Afghanistan.

Lacey, 25, wept while filming a scene in a military cemetery, part of a real war graves tour that all potential squaddies experience during their training.

Molly uses her mobile phone to call her mother and leaves an emotional voicemail while standing among the last resting place of the fallen.

“The scene in the graveyard was pretty much my imagination and my mum,” revealed Lacey.

She also thought of her mum for scenes where Molly has to write a “letter from the grave” to her parents, in case she is killed in action.

“I don’t know that I could write a letter like that. It was actually really tough. Just thinking about my mum while reading it was enough to take you to a sad place.”

Tears flowed when the cast filmed their fictional Passing Out Parade at the Army Training Centre in Pirbright, Surrey.

Lacey and other cast members marched alongside 200 real trainees doing a final parade ground rehearsal on the eve of their own big day when they finally became soldiers.

“That was the scariest moment of my life so far. Because I felt if I put a foot wrong, it was their real rehearsal.

“As I walked on to the Passing Out Parade I was actually crying with fear because I felt like it was just going to go like dominoes and it was all going to be my fault.

“But luckily I had a girl in front and behind and they were mouthing things out of the bottom of their mouth. Just little hints. It was amazing.”

One Army General even mistook Lacey and other actors for real soldiers and congratulated them.

Explained Lacey: “It happened quite a lot because we were in the same uniform. Someone would just come up and shout at you before you had a chance to say, ‘I’m with the BBC.’”

One of five children, bleached blonde Molly works in an East London nail bar and fears a dead end future is all mapped out for her.

But she decides to train to join the Royal Army Medical Corps after throwing up outside an Army recruitment office on her 18th birthday.

Written by award-winning Tony Grounds, the one-off 90-minute drama shows her journey through training to active service as an Army combat medic in Afghanistan.

Tony explained: “I wanted to write a film about hope and the potential in all young people. But it’s not a recruiting video.”

Lacey admitted: “I thought I was quite fit and then when I got to the training centre I realised I wasn’t.

“I said to one of the Corporals, ‘I thought I was quite fit.’ And she said, ‘There’s civilian fit and Army fit.’

“So I did a lot of fitness training and spent hours marching round the car parks in Borehamwood, which was fun.

“Weapon training, assault courses – we did lots of different training. I really enjoyed it.”

She added: “I did lose a bit of weight and tone up. I think it was a bit of a shock to the system.

“But the food there is just carbs. It’s my favourite things like sausage, chips and beans and shepherd’s pie.

“We ate like animals every lunchtime. At the end I was dying for a lettuce leaf.”

Lacey said she had total respect for everyone in the Army but could not do the job for real.

“I’d like to do the training but I don’t know that I’d ever get on the plane to actually go. I don’t think I’m brave enough.

“It’s such an amazing thing that they do. They risk so much and I’m not that brave. But I did really enjoy the training.

“You got to play with rifles and swing off bars and meets loads of different people.

“I waited weeks to fire a gun. It was brilliant. I wasn’t allowed live rounds. But it was fun. Something you don’t really get to do that often.

“I might take it up.”

Our Girl is on BBC1 at 9pm on Sunday March 24.

Post-screening Q&A / press conference with Lacey Turner (Molly), writer Tony Grounds and producer Ken Horn:

Q: What was going through all the training like, Lacey?

Lacey Turner: “It was great actually. There were so many different types of training. Just basic fitness. I thought I was quite fit and then when I got there I actually realised that I wasn’t very fit. And I said to one of the Corporals, ‘I thought I was quite fit.’ And she said, ‘There’s civilian fit and Army fit.’ So I did a lot of fitness training and spent hours – well we all did – marching round car parks in Borehamwood, which was fun. Weapon training, assault courses – we did lots of different training. It was great. I really enjoyed it.”

Q: Lacey – you were virtually in every scene. What was that like for you?

Lacey Turner: “It was fun. There was no waiting around. (laughter) I didn’t really get a minute to sit down. So it’s good because when you’re working such long hours, it’s easier to actually just keep going. When you get a bit of a break you want to go to sleep. So it was quite good, actually, being in every scene.”

Q: Can I ask Tony where the idea for this came from and also what the research process was like?

Tony Grounds: “First of all, I wanted to write a film about hope and about the potential in all young people. And often young disenfranchised people. So that was where the starting idea came from. I then happened to have a friend who was in the Army and I went with him to Colchester, where he was doing some stuff. There were lots of female soldiers there and I said, ‘The female soldiers, how quickly can they get out to Afghanistan?’ And he said, ‘Well, an 18-year-old can if they join the Royal Army Medical Corps because you do your 14-week basic and 24-week Phase 2 training. We had this one girl came in and she was as wild as a feral cat. She came in and she turns out to be one of the best combat medical technicians we’d ever known in Afghanistan. So this wild kid came in and now she’s there, she’s calling in the Chinooks, she’s tourniqueting people…’ So that was where the first idea came from. And then I met up with (executive producer) John Yorke (at the time BBC Controller of Drama Production) when he was at the BBC and he said, ‘I don’t suppose you’ve got anything for Lacey Tuner?’ I said, ‘Do you know what? I think I might have.’ And so that was where the original idea came from. Then I spent about a year going round to all the different Army camps. We went to Deepcut and Pirbright. Fortunately because I’ve got a friend who was in the Army and he happened to be Captain of the Army rugby team and captain of the Combined Services and he actually captained the Barbarians. So this gave him great access because he’s still a bit of a local hero in the different Army camps and still knows everybody because his contemporaries are still there. So I was able to get in. And although that particular girl he was talking about, I never met her – but they all keep diaries as Lacey knows…so all the recruits come in and keep diaries. So he said, ‘If any of them want to show you their diary, that’s fantastic.’ Of course they were all so willing. I had this big pile of diaries on their Basic Training and Phase 2 Training. So I just took those away with me and was able to go through all the diaires. Then I created Molly Dawes. And especially now I’d got Lacey in my mind, knowing how emotionally intelligent she is as a performer, I was then able to start to create this person.”

Q: And these diaries came from recruits at Colchester or Pirbright?

Tony Grounds: “Yeah. They’d gone all over. It was Deepcut. Now the training is done at Pirbright. But the Army changes their systems quite often. But it used to be Deepcut, as I’m sure you’ll know, and then Phase 2 was at Colchester.”

Q: (From me as it happens) Lacey – did you know much about Army life before you got this project and did you do any of your own research?

Lacey Turner: “I didn’t actually know anything at all, really. But we were all really lucky – the Army were so great in letting us go up there (Pirbright Army Training Centre)…because it is such tight security and you have to be followed everywhere. you go. But they were great. They let me up there whenever I wanted to go up. And I came up about a month before we started shooting and I was able to talk to some of the girls there and have a flick through their diaries and stuff like that. So most of my research really came from just observing up there because there’s something going on all the time. Constantly people marching past – there’s always someone doing something. So it mainly came from just being allowed to wander around Pirbright.”

Q: The drama itself was quite ambiguous about whether the Army is cult or family. I wondered, Lacey, if you had a view on that having played the part?

Lacey Turner: “For me, not knowing anything about the Army, I thought the Army was just really tough and you go and do your training and then off you go to war. And actually being there and talking to the people that were there, it all makes sense now. They are tough and they do scream and shout and your locker does have to be immaculate. But it does actually make sense. Because if you can’t keep a locker tidy then as a medic you’ve got a split second to make a decision about where you’re going – and if you’re not organised then when you go to war, how can you be?”

Tony Grounds: “What the Corporals are doing when…the soldier whisperers as they call themselves…is what they’re doing is trying to save the lives of the recruits when they become soldiers. So they’re trying to make sure that they come back. That’s what they’re doing. And it might seem hard…it’s difficult because, of course, it is a family and they regard themselves as a family. If you’re not a part of that family you might look at it and think it’s a cult. But everybody’s got to be drilled. You can’t dither. As the guy says, ‘You dither on a landmine and it’s not a good place to dither.’ So it’s all to do with that training.”

Matthew McNulty as Corporal Geddings.

Q: Tony – you mentioned Deepcut which obviously has a resonance of a very different kind, given what happened there. This is a very powerful…but it’s also quite a positive portrait of the Army. Were you anxious about making a sort of a recruiting video and did you feel any of the negative dimensions about Army life?”

Tony Grounds: “It’s obviously not a recruiting video. We were just able to shoot on an active Army camp. So you’re seeing the actual Army. When those girls are coming in they’re being trained in that facility.”

Ken Horn: “The only involvement they (the Army) had was from a factual point of view, to make sure that the training we were doing is what they do. They had no editorial control over what we did. They understood it was a drama. That was the only way we could do it. In no way did we want to make a recruitment video for the Army.”

Q: Were you quite impressed by your experience with the Army?

Tony Grounds: “I think the thing is, is that the kids that they get in – and obviously the situation at Deepcut – is this isn’t Sandhurst. The kids they’re getting in as these raw recruits at Pirbright are kids that had often had a lot of problems with education, often been in trouble with the law, episodes of alcohol or drug abuse. These are the kids that often have no other option but to come there. So they are a group that need careful handling. Now if you’re saying – do they train them well? They have to train them well because of the situation they’re going into now with Afghanistan. But obviously the resonance of Deepcut – it’s like everything else in society, things are changing all the time and you learn things. The situation which was happening in Deepcut where young soldiers lost their lives…one of the Corporals said to me, ‘There’s a lot of kids killing themselves on the street.’ And there were some instances in the Army which they don’t want to happen again. So now they don’t shout at the weak one, they shout at the strong one in each section, in an attempt to bring up the weak ones. So the strong ones are the ones that have to help carry them through. But it’s hopeful…it’s a hard call. I want to be hopeful about that there is a potential in every young person to do something brilliant. I wanted to make it hopeful about the individual rather than hopeful about saying, ‘Let’s have National Service.’”

Q: Lacey – if you did have to do this, what was it like writing a letter from the grave and do you think you could actually have been a soldier in real life having now gone through the training process, or part of it?

Lacey Turner: “I’d like to do the training but I don’t know that I’d ever get on the plane to actually go. I don’t think I’m brave enough. It’s such an amazing thing that they do. They risk so much and I’m not that brave. But I did really enjoy the training. I don’t know that I could write a letter like that either. It was actually really tough, just thinking about my mum whilst reading it was enough to take you to a sad place.”

Tony Grounds: “But you do doff your hat to those kids that are going out there. That’s one thing – you do totally respect those people that are going out there.”

Q: Which side of Molly you preferred playing, the blonde, drinking one or the Army one?

Lacey Turner: “The Army one. That was much more fun. Because you got to play with rifles and swing off bars and meets loads of different people. I waited weeks to fire a gun. It was brilliant. I wasn’t allowed live rounds, so I didn’t really get a kickback or anything. But it was fun. Something you don’t really get to do that often. I might take it up.”

Q: (Me again) Just further to what you said, Lacey, a moment ago about the letter…the tears in the graveyard – it might be a testament to your acting abilities but they looked very real on screen. How did you approach that and what were you thinking of? And also did you speak to any recruits or anybody else about the prospect of going out somewhere and perhaps not coming back again?

Lacey Turner: “Yeah, I did. The scene in the graveyard was pretty much just my imagination and my mum. That’s the root of that scene. (Filmed at Brookwood Military Cemetery in Surrey, close to Pirbright Army Training Centre) I got to speak to a group of girls who were seven weeks into their training. You ask people, ‘Why do you join the Army?’ There were about 20-sometning girls and some of their reasons, like Tony said…they’re not from great backgrounds, some of them don’t have very much opportunity. Some of them come from a family of military people. So it was a good mix of people. So I got to pick different bits from different girls to create Molly.”

Tony Grounds: “And that’s all part of the training. They do the war graves tour. And I think because Lacey…talking about her emotional intelligence, I think she so hones into the part that the tears are real because she’s in that part at that moment. Like all good actors.”

Q: (Me again. Sorry.) And the Passing Out Parade? Was that filmed at the same time as a real Passing Out Parade? How was it filmed?

Ken Horn: “We did it over two days. They allowed us to place Lacey and a couple of the other actors in the middle of them and march on to the parade ground. And we intercut that with the real Passing Out Parade the next day. But I think you guys (Lacey) said that’s the most frightening thing you’ve ever done?”

Lacey Turner: “Yes. That was the scariest moment of my life so far, in the 25 years that I’ve been alive that was definitely the scariest. Because I felt like, if I put a foot wrong. It was their real rehearsal. (200 of them) As I walked on to the passing out parade I was actually crying with fear because I felt like it was just going to go like dominoes and it was all going to be my fault. But luckily I had a girl in front and behind and they were mouthing things out of the bottom of their mouth. Just little hints.”

Tony Grounds: “Matthew McNulty (who plays Corporal Geddings) had to lead his line and it was fantastic. Because he was the cock of the north all the way through. And then they said, ‘Right, you’re leading the line now.’ His legs went – but he actually led them out. Which shows how much drill they’d had to do.”

Lacey Turner: “It was amazing. That’s one of those things…I’ll never get to be in a Passing Out Parade ever in my life because I don’t want to be a soldier. But it was good to be part of a rehearsal.”

Q: Is it right that the Army didn’t know that Lacey or Matthew were in the real Passing Out Parade?

Ken Horn: “One of the generals the next day, he mistook our actors for soldiers. And he congratulated them.”

Lacey Turner: “It happened quite a lot because we were in the same uniform. Someone would just come up to you and shout at you. And before you had a chance to say, ‘Well, I’m with the BBC….’”
Q: Lacey – did you lose any weight by going through the training process? Did you tone up very much?

Lacey Turner: “I did actually. I think it was a bit of a shock to my system. I did lose a bit of weight and I did tone up. But the food there – it’s just carbs. It’s my favourite things like sausage, chips and beans and shepherd’s pie. We ate like animals every lunchtime. At the end I was dying for a lettuce leaf.”

Q: (Final one from me) Tony – are you happy with the amount of West Ham references you managed to get in? Was it difficult to get that location (Molly’s family home overlooking the Boleyn Ground)?

Tony Grounds: “You can see (the home) from my season ticket seat. And I’m obviously from there. So I know the terrain…it’s quite interesting, when I’m writing it I’ve got the geography in my mind and then having been to Pirbright, then I start writing for Pirbright.”

Q: The issue of areas like this being multi-cultural and people joining the Army to fight in Muslim countries?

Tony Grounds: “East Ham, obviously, is a predominantly Muslim area now and the demographic changes slightly from Asian and Eastern European Muslims as well. But no, that doesn’t really arise in East Ham because I think there are so few people that are joining the military from there. I guess it’s an extraordinary situation. But there’s certain frictions. But as Molly Dawes says in her speech, that when East Ham works, it works brilliantly. It’s absolutely fantastic and it’s the greatest place on the Earth to live. And when it feels powder-keggy and it feels like it’s going to blow, then it’s the worst place in the world to live.”

Q: Is there the potential for a series here?

Tony Grounds: “Yeah, definitely. And it’s definitely something that I’d love to do. That idea of those recruits coming in and the potential that you’ve got…it’s so fascinating. Each of those kids has got a story. Every one of those 400 kids that are coming in every few weeks is a potential story.”

Q: Has the BBC indicated whether they’d like a series or is it too early to say?

Tony Grounds: “I guess they’ll see what happens when it goes out. They wait and see the reaction. And if people love it, I guess we get taken out for a Cup-a-Soup somewhere…”

BBC Our Girl

Pirbright Army Training Centre

Deepcut

Brookwood Military Cemetery

Cup-a-Soup

Ian Wylie on Twitter

“MY name is Bert Middleton. I’m the second oldest man in Britain.

“This is the last thing I’ll do so you better listen carefully…”

Old Bert (David Ryall) talks to a modern day TV documentary crew in the opening moments of new BBC1 drama serial The Village.

Before we go back to the summer of 1914.

“The summer the bus came.”

Created and written by Peter Moffat, the six-part drama arrives on BBC1 at 9pm this Sunday. (March 31)

John Simm and Maxine Peake play farmer John Middleton and his wife Grace.

With Nico Mirallegro as their eldest son Joe, aged 19, and Bill Jones as youngest son Bert, aged 12, the old man we met earlier.

The first episode was screened at BAFTA in London earlier this month, followed by a Q&A with Peter (who is also executive producer) plus cast members Nico Mirallegro, Juliet Stevenson (Lady Clem) and Rupert Evans (Edmund).

My full transcript of that Q&A with some fascinating quotes – not least from Peter – is further down the page.

Including his mention of “The Wrong Ducks in Lark Rise Syndrome”.

As you will read, Peter’s grand plan, given the chance, is to write a total of 42 episodes telling the entire 100-year history of the unnamed northern village.

With the camera never leaving the village and the countryside around.

The Village – at least initially – may feel to some like a BBC2 drama, rather than BBC1.

With a slow burn approach that could lose a section of viewers across the first 30 minutes or so.

But I’d urge them to stick with it for the later rewards which will be all the greater for the time and faith invested.

The Village has the potential to be remembered in decades to come as a classic television drama achievement.

As Peter said about the current TV climate during the Q&A: “It’s quite a unique moment in television.”

So I hope those involved in an eventual decision about a second series look at the longer term wider picture of what he is trying to do.

“The summer the bus came.”

The first series covers the period between 1914 and 1920.

There are some remarkable ensemble cast performances.

When we first meet John Simm’s John Middleton he is a frustrated, violent and repressed alcoholic, riven with guilt about something that happened 20 years before.

“Must a man pay all his life for one mistake? he asks.

Who thinks nothing of locking young Bert in a cupboard.

Maxine Peake’s Grace is the woman in the middle, struggling to feed and protect her two sons as the family farm hits hard times.

Some have tried to paint The Village in terms of a “gritty” anti-Downton Abbey view of history.

But that’s not what this is about.

There’s a manor house where Lady Clem (Juliet Stevenson) and her rather mysterious family live – including Rupert Evans as local MP Edmund Allingham.

Together with a rather unhinged young woman called Caro, played by Emily Beecham.

Seen later in the series by a psychiatrist called Wylie…

The story I wrote a few hours after the BAFTA event is below.

Followed by that full Q&A.

Nico Mirallegro as Joe.

THE Village star Nico Mirallegro was left speechless during filming after plunging naked into a freezing cold lake.

Former Upstairs Downstairs, Hollyoaks and My Mad Fat Diary actor Nico plays Joe Middleton in the epic BBC1 period drama series.

“I’m still traumatised from that scene in the lake,” he revealed.

Joe goes into the water to teach his younger brother Bert (Bill Jones) how to swim.

Then vanishes as he pretends to be pulled under the water.

“We just went for it – but I realised that I couldn’t say the line in the lake. It was physically actually shock in your body.

“I had to count to 20 in my head and literally force myself to say the line.”

But Nico was shivering so much that he later had to re-record his lake lines in a studio to be dubbed on to the final version of the drama.

The six-part series, on screen later this month, starts in 1914 and aims eventually to tell the story of one English village across the whole of the 20th century.

Joe is the eldest son of John and Grace, played by John Simm and Maxine Peake, growing up in extreme poverty on a family farm.

He also works as a servant at the nearby “Big House” and is seduced by that family’s young daughter Caro (Emily Beecham) in the woods.

While his naked adventure in the lake is witnessed by another young female admirer – teacher and local Methodist missionary Martha, played by Misfits actress Charlie Murphy.

Filmed in Derbyshire’s Peak District, the camera never leaves the village and tells the history of the century through the residents’ eyes.

Creator Peter Moffat, who hopes to write a total of 42 episodes, explained: “It’s small lives telling big events.”

The BAFTA Q&A hosted by Benji Wilson:

Q: Peter – do you want to take us through the genesis of the idea for this series?

Peter Moffat: “My father became ill and I started to talk to him. And we knew we had a finite time left. So we spoke a lot, for the first time properly, about his childhood, his father, his grandfather and their lives, which were on a farm. They were both shepherds in the borders of Scotland. And it was very new to me. I was struck by how in two generations a shepherd who feeds his dogs on one bowl of porridge every morning turns into a north London media fellow. And I thought I’d better have a look at it. There’s only so far you can go with your own family. The farm cottage they lived in isn’t there anymore. It’s gone. So physically and geographically it’s not possible for me to go back and look at it. So I thought, ‘We’ll have a look at everybody.’”

Q: And in terms of research, is this based on oral histories…or things you read…

Peter Moffat: “We decided it was going to be in the Peak District and the first thing I did was went and spoke to people. So it’s was partly a question of finding the oldest people in Derbyshire to talk to, which we did. It’s remarkable how all these villages…all have people in them who have oral histories, written histories, records of the past. I think it’s a particular fascination we have in this country. So a huge natural resource that’s there for me and the writers to tap into. So the people first and then the books.”

Juliet Stevenson as Lady Clem.

Q: Juliet – what attracted you to this project?

Juliet Stevenson: “The scripts. I thought they were just the most intelligent, imaginative scripts I’d read in quite a long time. I love the whole idea really. Like all great ideas it’s got a very simple heart. You just take this community of people who the audience will get to know and then you move them through the 20th century. So it’s a way of humanising history. And I think watching it – I hadn’t seen it before – it’s so humane. So when people are angry or hopeless or violent, you always understand why their historical circumstances are making them like that – or economic circumstances,. So I love the breadth of the compassion and the wit of it. I thought it was a very rich tapestry.”

Q: What was it like to film up in the Peak District?

Juliet Stevenson: “I was coming and going. It was very cold, as it would have been. You realise how crazy it was for the women in those skimpy frocks and little tiny satin shoes. A whole class thing of these women living in a situation which is completely inappropriate…freezing cold, soaking wet.”

Peter Moffat: “The first draft of episode one had a line…old Bert at the beginning who talks to the camera, and the line was something like, ‘There wasn’t a cloud in the sky the whole of that summer.’ Which is a uniquely disastrous thing…(to write). The weather was a great character. As you all know, it’s difficult when the weather changes during takes for consistency’s sake. But actually, in the end, you just have to say, ‘It changes every five seconds up there.’ And there we are. We’ll live with that and it’ll be great. And it was bloody seriously freezing. And I was sitting in a warm place writing for those lot to go and film…”

Joe (Nico Mirallegro) and Paul (Luke Williams).

Q: Nico – you must have been delighted when you read the script telling you that you had to go naked into the lake…

Nico Mirallegro: “I’m still actually traumatised from that scene in the lake. None of us had actually been in the lake. There were some divers in there pre-rehearsal. And then we just went for it. And when we did go for it, I realised that I couldn’t say the line in the lake. Physically – actual shock in your body. I was stood there for about 30 seconds. (trying to catch his breath) I had to count to 20 in my head and literally force myself to say the line. But that was ADR, so that (on screen) wasn’t what it sounded like.”

Rupert Evans as Edmund Allingham.

Q: Rupert – we didn’t see a lot of your character in the first episode. What’s coming up for your character, how is he going to develop?

Rupert Evans: “I think what Peter has done is very clever. Because as the series progresses, my family and myself, we see the big house and all that goes on there and there’s an interaction, both through business and politics of the village. As the local MP I get involved in the politics and the business side of the village. So there’s an interaction that moves out from the big house and there’s a crossover between us all. And as it moves on, certainly one sees the effects of war from the point of view of those that are left behind – the parents, the ones that didn’t get taken up in the draft. So we see it’s like a mini-world really and I think that’s what interested me in the beginning, was that idea that we see a village, that small world of what it was like in the 19 teens upwards. So as we progress we see the effects of war from the point of view of the villagers and the outcome of that. Whether it’s seeing who comes back and who doesn’t…and also business. Business during the war thrived in many areas and obviously not in some. So boot production is a big thing that starts kicking in, in the series and I get involved in that. So there’s a real criss-cross of storylines from everyone within the village.”

Q: What was the scope…we’ve already heard talk about going right through the 20th century. That is ambitious. How do you plan for a series that is going to last almost in perpetuity?

Peter Moffat: “An episode I’m reading now, which is getting ahead of myself – there may never be a second series. Who knows? But you have to do it. Research is everything. The great luxury of the first series is that I had about three years of working on it before writing. And the first episode took me six months to write. An American television writer said to me once, ‘Are you writing a play?’ I said, ‘Yes.’ He said, ‘How long does it take you, do you think, to write a play?’ And I said, ‘Nine months.’ And he said, ‘Nine months?’ And I’ve got no idea what he means. Whether that’s way too long…and actually, of course, with television, both is true. A lovely nine months to write a first episode and then, ‘Can we have episode six in three-and-a-half weeks?’ So different demands and interesting demands. Often, weirdly, how annoying is this? – the three-and-a-half week thing is a bit better…” (laughter).

Q: Why start it in 1914?

Peter Moffat: “Because it’s about as far back as you can go whilst just about being within living memory. So old Bert is tremendously old and there are two or three people who are his age who are still around – you can just still touch that time. Any earlier and there isn’t anybody.”

Charlie Murphy as Martha.

Q: To what extent is it accurate historically? Because you’re always going to get people sniping and saying, ‘Oh that wouldn’t have happened, someone wouldn’t have said that, they wouldn’t have worn that?’

Peter Moffat: “Yeah, that’s always going to happen. It’s the Wrong Ducks in Lark Rise Syndrome, isn’t it? In an episode of Silk, I had somebody writing to the BBC saying, ‘I know for a fact, because I live in Middle Temple, that there is never on a Sunday night loud music playing.’ It was the composed music that she was complaining about! It was actually a good point. I’m going against that now. I quite like a lot of silence…”

Q: Being cast back 100 years. What aspects surprised you?

Nico Mirallegro: “It was fascinating to learn about what went on in those times because we never really did anything about World War One in school. So to read about how they lived and how they worked. And how they earned their money. It was very interesting. And as far as the costumes and make-up was concerned, you know how it was going to look. It all helps as well – you’re on a farm and you’re in this gear that someone had on maybe 80, 90 years ago. It’s amazing to think that. And it is actual hard work. We were in the field picking potatoes and were actually picking potatoes.”

Q: Juliet – can you say a bit about where it was filmed? Where the big house was?

Juliet Stevenson: “It was near Buxton in Derbyshire.”

Peter Moffat: “Three different villages were used. Our village is obviously a fictional village. It’s never named. The camera never leaves the village. The camera will stay there. Small lives telling big events. That’s the point to it. That’s the ambition. But the Palace Hotel in Buxton, you’ve got to go. Haunted. Lots of cast won’t stay there.” (laughter)

Juliet Stevenson: “I stayed there.”

Benji then opened questions to the audience:

Q: Was the choice of Derbyshire influenced by the fact that there is a particularly strong agrarian and mills and chimneys, as they refer to it, oral tradition existing side by side in Derbyshire?

Peter Moffat: “I wanted to avoid choosing anywhere that would be too defined by one thing. So not a fishing village, not a coal mining village, because then you’d end up telling the story of the decline of coal or fish quotas, which arguably might not be so universal or interesting. So Derbyshire – there’s a lot of change in those villages over the period that we’re talking about. Because the camera never leaves the village…although actually we do…characters go up into that extraordinary landscape. So when you get out it’s blindingly beautiful. There is – Emma Burge (producer in audience) – I think no CGI at all in any of this…”

Emma Burge: “Just the odd pole rubbed out.”

Peter Moffat: “…so great to be able to breathe. The Peak District is often referred to as ‘the lung’. I like the idea that it’s right next to Manchester, Sheffield, urban conurbations. That sense that metropolitan life is right there at the same time as that extraordinary bleak and blasted rural landscape.”

Emily Beecham as Caro Allingham.

Q: Peter – to what extent were you on set and how much was the dialogue / text revised as you were filming?

Peter Moffat: “It was a very different writing experience, this, for me. I was very obsessed with stage directions. I had an experience a few years ago when I sat in a read through next to an incredibly well-known actor who was sitting next to me and as we read the script, crossed out all the stage directions. I had to say to him afterwards, ‘What’s all that about?’ And he said, ‘Well, you know, it’s just for the execs anyway, isn’t it? I just want to know what I’m saying.’ And I thought, ‘Well that’s not right, actually.’ Television writers maybe ought to think a bit more in novelistic terms. That when you describe something that an actor is doing in a scene, and it’s be gesture, say it. Put it down there. The actor can think about it, work with it, reject it, like it or not. And actually with Juliet, for example, when she was cast – and how great is that – we had a great conversation about her part, her character, her role. And I hope that can go on. I suppose what I’m saying is that writers and actors should speak a lot more. I think there’s a nervousness around that. Some of the people in the middle – not in this particular production – get worried about it. Much more of it, I reckon. Because these guys (the cast) are paying super attention to everything they’re saying, you know? And so am I. But maybe we might disagree. And that might be interesting.”

Q: Peter – can I just ask what it is about period dramas that has proved so popular with television audiences, the public this time? We’ve had Downton Abbey, Upstairs Downstairs…

Peter Moffat: “That’s a massive question. I don’t know. What is it? We’re all fascinated by the past. I didn’t come at this with an argument. I didn’t have an attitude about it. But I’m very struck…I think there’s an imbalance. I think we’re more interested in upstairs than we are in downstairs, actually. It just struck me as I was researching that there’s a whole wealth of material that isn’t about the posh folk. Which are all great stories or not, as it goes. So a broad spectrum of class in this, I think. Everybody.”

Q: Is there any even tacit political undercurrent to this? Are there any points you are trying to make?

Peter Moffat: “No, really not. But it’s…in this period, and with the First World War…we have a very strong feeling about it and it’s about remembrance. We remember it in very particular ways and in very strong ways. I think a little bit weirdly, it’s still a bit about Rupert Brooke. It’s still a little bit about gilded youth and the loss of that and how sunny it was before they all went to war. And arguably that’s out of balance really. Lots of people will have read, I’m sure, Ronald Blythe’s brilliant book Akenfield, which is a slightly different period. But he’s talking about men like John Simm (playing John Middleton) who drop dead in the field. From what? From work, actually. So that’s happening at the same time as Rupert Brooke is going swimming with no clothes on. So actually putting Nico in the freezing cold…

Joe Duttine as Rutter.

Q: What is it like for actors when you have your writer, also as exec producer, hanging around on set and looking over you? Is it useful?

Juliet Stevenson: “I agree with Peter. I think the days where actors and writers were talking to each other more have disappeared. It’s far much more difficult to have those crazy conversations and I would very much welcome them returning. But the great advantage in having a writer as an executive producer, as Peter is, or Paula Milne who I worked with a couple of years ago was, because then you know that if you have a conversation with a writer it may get through with the executive producer because it’s the same person. So that’s always handy. (laughter) But I would just like to echo and support what Peter said. Because I always think as an actor, you’re following in a writer’s footsteps. If they’re a good writer anyway. A fantastic one here. You have a sense that he has created…he has inhabited your character, each character, before you have. Then you come along behind and you re-inhabit them in your own way. So you bring your own stuff to it, your own sensibilities to it. You’re following in a path. They’re very closely linked those two roles, writer and actor. So I think it’s only fruitful when you have a chance to have conversations and share ideas and pool the possibilities.”

Peter Moffat: “Sophie Okonedo sits down and you go through the script line by line and talk about it. Absolutely brilliant. I thought, ‘What’s this? This is unheard of. What a great idea, actually.’ But there are 28 characters in this so it might be a bit tiring.” (laughter)

Rupert Evans: “As actors, we have our own paths. So we have our own private journey which we look at in a very detailed way individually. And actually after a while we disregard everyone else mainly and you see your own journey through the series in a very detailed way. And so on this, it’s lovely to be able to…sometimes it was madly phoning Peter in the early mornings or late in the afternoons and ask him what he was thinking and where we were going. Because invariably, if you get an understanding from the writer of what he was thinking, it can help you in that moment of crisis when you’re not quite sure what this means. So it was really easy.”

Q: (From me as it happens) As you’ve said, you can’t know yet whether you’ll get a second series, let alone a third or a fourth. But presumably you’ve mapped out the journey to the end of the century? What would come next in a second series after 1914 to 1920?

Peter Moffat: “So a second series would pick up straight off the back of the first series. So it would be the 1920s, up to and including the General Strike. So ’26, roughly. 42 parts is the plan (surprised reaction from audience). Provide them in three-and-a-half weeks? I’ve got a really good doctor. Just turned 50. Oh God.” (laughter)

Q: That must be overwhelming. That’s just so much history?

Peter Moffat: “Yeah. Great. I think it’s quite a unique moment in television. Box set culture has said long-form serial drama is now really possible. And how fantastic is it to be able to say that there is a possibility you might get to write 42 hours of television about the life of this country in the 20th century. You can’t do that at the National. I think BBC1, potentially, could and should be – people have said it before – the National Theatre. I really think that. I think there’s a good moment now. People don’t say so much, ‘I don’t watch much television but…’ People are now saying, ‘Here are the five things I really love.’ More quickly, arguably, than they’re saying it about film, which I think is interesting.”

Q: There’s a beautiful painting of Judi Dench in the National Gallery. It’s stunning. I think you’ve all crafted a really magnificent piece on the acting and writing. Even the light and colour. When you came to the end of the series, did you have a sense of loss of that era, of anything that we, as a nation, have left behind?

Peter Moffat: “Yes, absolutely. This is something my father was telling me, actually. They used to sing to each other the whole time. Just sit in small rooms and sing. At each other. For each other. That must have been great. Or not. I’m very cautious about nostalgia though. Because I think we get settled with it, attracted to it, live in it too easily. So I mentioned earlier about my great-grandfather’s dogs and how they get porridge every morning. I can feel my heart go, ‘But actually what a terrible idea. Poor dog, went to work all day on that.’ So warmth, glow, nostalgia, not sure. Be robust, be truthful if you can. Make it honest. And a big thing, an obvious, obvious thing – there is no hindsight when you’re there. Present tense all the time in the past. It’s crucial.”

Matt Stoke as teacher Gerard Eyre.

Q: The suffragette (Martha) coming through – will that progress? And your (Juliet’s character Clem’s) husband, the man who was covered, facially distorted…are you going to delve into some of the characters about why they are who are they are?

Peter Moffat: “Yeah. I had to write it as 42 parts. So I suppose it’s arguable that it’s slow burn, it’s slow moving. Yes is the answer. You’re absolutely going to get to find out about all of these people. You’re actually going to get to find out quite a lot more about them in these six episodes. Juliet’s character has a – I can’t think of another way of putting this, I so hate this – journey (laughter) to make. Which I think is a great and full and interesting one. And that happens in six parts. Where she’s at, at the end of episode six is a profoundly different – here I go again – place compared to where she is at the beginning of the episode we’ve just been watching. But it’s…don’t bish, bash, bosh. Don’t hurry up for the sake of it. Try and keep to the idea that it’s long form.”

The Village begins on BBC1 at 9pm on Sunday March 31.

Bill Jones as Young Bert.

BBC The Village

Company Pictures

Peter Moffat

Rupert Brooke

Akenfield

Ian Wylie on Twitter

Bailey & Scott.

SCOTT & Bailey series three begins on ITV at 9pm this Wednesday.

I’ve seen the first four episodes (of eight in total) and all involved have raised the bar once again.

For what it’s worth, I think it’s the best series yet.

It was my pleasure to carry out the cast interviews for ITV’s Production Notes / Press Pack.

As I did for series two.

For Scott & Bailey 2013 I spoke to Suranne Jones (D.C. Rachel Bailey), Lesley Sharp (D.C. Janet Scott), Amelia Bullmore (D.C.I. Gill Murray), Nicola Walker (Helen Bartlett) and Tracie Bennett (Sharon Bailey).

You can read the interviews by clicking on the link to the PDF document below:

Scott & Bailey 3 Ian Wylie Interviews

My interview with Danny Miller, who joins the cast from episode four as D.S. Rob Waddington, will be released nearer his screen arrival.

Along with some other extra material which must remain under wraps for now.

Nicola Walker as Helen Bartlett.

Scott, Bailey & Murray.

Amelia Bullmore as Gill Murray.

Tracie Bennett as Sharon.

The interview room.

ITV Drama

Red Production Company

Scott & Bailey 2: Interviews

Ian Wylie on Twitter

David Tennant as Aiden Hoynes.

AN invite to the premiere press screening of The Politician’s Husband last Friday night.

Followed by a Q&A with acclaimed writer Paula Milne, whose many credits include White Heat, The Night Watch and The Politician’s Wife.

We were shown the first two episodes, of three in total.

Including terrific performances from David Tennant and Emily Watson.

The series begins on BBC2 at 9pm tonight (Thursday April 25) and comes recommended.

Below is the story I wrote the next morning, which subsequently appeared here this week.

Followed by my transcript of that Q&A with Paula, hosted by BBC Drama boss Ben Stephenson.

Emily Watson as Freya Gardner.

DAVID Tennant turns into a sadist for his latest TV drama – in a sickeningly vicious sex scene.

The former Doctor Who star plays grey-haired Cabinet minister Aiden Hoynes in BBC2’s three-part The Politician’s Husband.

Appropriate Adult actress Emily Watson co-stars as his wife Freya Gardner, a Junior Education minister in Whitehall.

Known as Westminster’s “golden couple” they carry their House of Commons power games into the bedroom.

The two actors filmed several “combative” sex scenes as Aiden quits his ministerial post and his bid to become Prime Minister fails.

While rising star Freya steps out of his shadow and is appointed a Cabinet minister herself in “the cesspit of Westminster power politics”. 

Thwarted MP Aiden’s anger, jealousy and frustration eventually boil over and he commits a shocking sex act on Freya, leaving her emotionally battered and physically bruised.

Writer Paula Milne said: “The first sex scene we see with them, it is not entirely comfortable. It’s fine but it’s quite combative.

“But it becomes more brutal and it had the darkness shone on it.

“It is unforgiveable what he does.”

The former minister later becomes involved in a sex scandal after he is propositioned by a naked nanny.

Family au pair Dita, played by Sex Traffic actress Anamaria Marinca, walks in on Aiden when he is having a bath and makes plain that it is not his expenses she is interested in.

In another scene the ex-Time Lord dives fully clothed in a suit into a local swimming pool to rescue his screen son Noah (Oscar Kennedy), who has Asperger’s Syndrome, from the bottom.

The political melodrama also stars Roger Allam as Chief Whip, Ed Stoppard as Aiden’s  former best friend and political rival and Kirsty Wark as herself for a Newsnight interview.

With scenes set inside and outside No 10, including the Cabinet room, and the chamber of the House of Commons.

Mother-of-two Emily has spoken about filming the sex scenes and said that while David was a “complete gentleman” they are “always a bit of a nightmare”.

She added: “But this was particularly violent, and it’s a bit, sort of, ‘Mummy, what did you do at work today?’ Uh, well, you know that Doctor Who..?’”

Paula also wrote the acclaimed The Politician’s Wife, screened in 1995 by Channel 4.

She said this follow up was about “power within a marriage” and reflected voters’ “disappointment” with the current state of politics.

Also revealing that all the surnames in the drama are taken from the characters in one of her favourite shows – The West Wing.

BBC drama boss Ben Stephenson said: “Television has steered away from the depiction of sex and sexuality. But it’s at the heart of this piece.”

David spent time with famous MPs while preparing for his role in the political drama but refused to reveal names. 

He returned to his Time Lord role last week alongside Matt Smith to film scenes for Doctor Who’s 50th anniversary special episode.

The Scottish actor plays grumpy D.I. Alec Hardy in ITV hit drama Broadchurch, with millions about to discover tonight who killed young Danny Latimer.

*The Politician’s Husband begins on BBC2 at 9pm on Thursday. (April 25)

Introducing the screening, BBC Drama boss Ben Stephenson said:

“This is a really compelling, delicious slice of political intrigue. Paula has used a Shakespearean backdrop of the modern political system to tell a very deeply detailed story about the gender divide in a modern marriage. So although politics is the backdrop of this piece, ultimately that is just the way of emphasising and dramatising the detail of this extraordinary relationship, portrayed so beautifully and brilliantly and surprisingly by Emily Watson and David Tennant, our two remarkable leads.”

Post-screening Q&A hosted by Ben Stephenson:

Q: These character surnames ring a bell, Paula. Can you reveal…unleash the secret of the surnames?

Paula Milne: “The West Wing. It’s just a little homage, really. Every character…”

Q: The prequel – The Politician’s Wife. Just remind us of when it happened, what it was about and where you got your inspiration from?

Paula Milne: “That was 1994 / 1995, when the Tories were in power and John Major and family values and there was a kind of litany of David Mellor and Cecil Parkinson et al. And I remember in the Mellor situation, he and his wife and the family standing by the garden gate and thinking, ‘What if she didn’t forgive him? How could she forgive him and what if she didn’t?’ And that really spawned it. After it was made and went out, it was quite interesting – it caught the zeitgeist here because of what was happening in the Tory party and it was kind of on its last legs and the whole moral fabric and stuff was breaking down. But what was really interesting about it was that it was huge abroad, which didn’t have our parochial politics. So it obviously said something about – this is slightly precognition with hindsight – slightly maybe even like Borgen does, that if the politics are universal enough they don’t have to be that parochial. And in the end it was about the destruction of a marriage.”

Ed Stoppard as Bruce Babbish.

Q: Whizz forward to where we are now – what has inspired you to write this about politics today? What’s the atmosphere around politics that feeds this?

Paula Milne: “I have to rewind and just say that there were a lot of opportunities to do follow ups to The Politician’s Wife, around that time and subsequently. And I had a very strong instinct to leave well alone. That it was a good piece and had really connected, much to my surprise as anyone else’s, and not to be so cynical…but then recently…it was partly watching The West Wing again and The Thick Of It and thinking about politics and the expenses scandal and how people felt about that. And to write a piece that was not party political, which The Politician’s Wife blatantly was, but about the power games. And to take the same template. I’d actually done it before The Politican’s Wife of taking a marriage in Die Kinder – which was a marital kidnap situation – to take an emotional engine, a prism through which to look at a political thing, in that case the Baader-Meinhof. And I thought, ‘If that worked before, it would be interesting to do it again but in reverse, because times have changed. So that was the basic idea.”

Q: So what is it that you think you’re saying about politics?

Paula Milne: “I hope I’m saying what a lot of the audience, and therefore the voters, feel. Which is an understandable disenchantment and disappointment. It is a tricky thing to do this, because The West Wing in America, it was aspirational. And we don’t have that. And The Thick Of It, which was fantastic but that was satire. I’m not a satirist. I’m a dramatist. But I felt that what the audience feel is credent, it’s important and it should be validated. And I wanted to reach out to that, as it were, because that’s what drama should do. It should reflect what people feel and create that kind of conduit. So that was part of what it was.”

Q: But do you think we’re inherently cynical towards our politicians? Because you also look at a classic show like House of Cards, which obviously has terrific relish for politicians – but only if they’re serial killers?

Paula Milne: “Or Machiavellian, let’s say?”

Q: Yes but by the end he’s killed them anyway?

Paula Milne: Yes, yes, yes. I think we have a very long tradition in politics that makes us look at it…I mean this is a political melodrama. As indeed House of Cards was. And it’s very interesting I think that in the re-make of House of Cards, which I think is actually brilliant…but there’s one thing I would take issue with. When Ian Richardson turns to camera, there’s a sort of delicious collusion. He invites us in and he make us as culpable as him in his machinations. But when Kevin Spacey does it, he’s just kind of telling us what he’s doing. And it doesn’t quite have that same ring.”

Roger Allam as the Chief Whip.

Q: So talk to us about sex, Paula. Televison has, I think, steered away from the depiction of sex and sexuality. But it’s at the heart of this piece. I mean in terms of gender as well. What you wanted to do about male and female relationships?

Paula Milne: “To return very briefly to The Politician’s Wife…”

Q: Which was also quite explicit…

Paula Milne: “Yes, it was. I think several politicans said to me their favourite line was when she was hitting him and he said, ‘Not my face, not my face!’ But the disintegration of that particular marriage showed itself in bed. And you know, why wouldn’t it? That is obvious. If you’re depicting a marriage, a sexual relationship, then it’s going to manifest itself there. And so returning to the template version, I did deploy that same dramatic strategy to The Politician’s Husband. It’s more brutal. I talked to Simon (Cellan Jones) the director quite a lot about this. So that the first sex scene you see with them, it is not entirely comfortable. It’s fine but it’s quite combative.”

Q: It’s power play…

Paula Milne: “Yes. And they had learned, or understood, to keep that in the bedroom. But as things transpire between them, and is obviously clear in the second episode, it became more brutal. And if you like it had the light shone on it, or the darkness shone on it. So sex scenes in drama must carry narrative. They can’t just be there to consolidate something you’ve already seen. It has to carry narrative. To ignore that in this…specifically on what happens in that second episode…it is unforgiveable what he does. And extraordinary that she can even begin to tolerate it. But she has felt, if you like, the thermos of power and she has too much to lose not to tolerate it. I just think these things are very complex and interesting.”

Q: So what’s your feeling about an audience’s sympathy? Because I think in The Politician’s Wife it was probably clearer where your emotions lay?

Paula Milne: “Yes.”

Q: It was very much her revenge against him. Whereas in this, perhaps both of them are, at times, on rather different moral compasses. What’s your intention for what they audience thinks about these people?

Paula Milne: “In The Politician’s Wife, just to put that in context at the time, there had been quite a lot of political dramas at that time. There’s quite a dearth of them now, really. But then there were a lot. There was Blair and there was a whole load of things and they were quite satirical and they were very polemic. That particular piece characterised Tories as characters. And I thought that was really important. And therefore you could inhabit them and so on. And of course she had been betrayed. She did behave badly. And we always felt in this that there should be a tightrope where you knew where he was coming from and then recoiled. I think that again, to go back to the audiences, where they feel about politicians…I wanted to convey by making it an ordinary family with a kid with Asperger’s and they’d suffered the buffets of life that all of us are not immune to. So I wanted to convey that. But at the same time, that the quest for power had damaged them both…as is said in her speech in the second episode, ‘Perhaps all power does corrupt regardless of gender.’”

Q: And there’s not party politics in this. You don’t care who they are – whether they’re Conservative or Labour or…

Paula Milne: “No. I made a very conscious decision that I felt that unlike with the previous piece, it would just then become either coalition or become party politics. And what I was interested in was…first of all, what is the difference anyway? Frankly? I’m sure people must feel like me when they’re asked questions on Question Time and Sky News and ITN and so on and they don’t answer the question…the frustration that we feel of seeing them toe the party line and so on. And it’s the party line, not the particular party line, so it was the power games, the leadership bids, the coups, the select committees…”

Ben then opened up questions to the audience:

Q: (From me as it happens) Paula, you’ve said times have changed and you spoke a little about that. Can you just expand on your view of that…in terms of the political scene?

Paula Milne: “Well that (1995) was a very specific piece about a very specific thing that was happening in politics. When I wrote it…you have to remember…at the risk of sounding creepy, I applaud the BBC for making this and putting it out quickly. But also Michael Grade did that in Channel 4. He read the script and said, ‘We must make this and make it now.’ Because he understood that. And drama is labyrinthianly-slow to make. So this is really important, to catch whatever semblance of zeitgeist there is. That was about family values…and this was…I wanted to see if I could connect with an audience in what I felt in my disappointment. This is post-expenses and a number of other things. Promises broken, from Blair onwards. Nick Clegg…there’s some visceral disappointment, I believe, that exists in the public now about politics.”

Q: (Ben Stephenson) Is there any Miliband in this piece?

Paula Milne: “Sadly no. I would be disingenuous to say that that did not feature in the back of my…to make them such close friends obviously. When you say it’s a political melodrama, that’s another way of saying a political allegory, if you like. So those things do…there has to be a recognition factor with the audience. If you’re not going to do party politics and you’re not going to say it’s about obvious political couples, there has to be the odd moments where people go, ‘Ah.’ The shoes with Theresa May…”

Oscar Kennedy as Noah.

Q: The Asperger’s storyline is a surprise and unexpected. What’s the rationale from bringing that in?

Paula Milne: “Well it’s both kind of slightly cheap and decent. I’d done a lot of research into Asperger’s for another show that never got made (looks at Ben amid laughter) basically. So waste not want not. And what I felt about it at that time was valid. But also I didn’t want the whole thing to be about the usual stuff about kids and child care and stuff. To show in bite-sized moments for the audience that this family had dealt with something really meaningful. And in terms of the character of Aiden, I think that…to me, it was quite important, this relationship with his father, who as an academic had a pure relationship with politics. But Aiden had been, if you like, digging the dirt on the front line and had lost that. I spoke to many people with both my researcher and others and special advisors and a couple of politicians who helped with this and a line struck me, which I used but in a slightly different context, which is, ‘People hide in politics in plain sight.’ And a lot of them are hiding from things. And I thought that was very interesting and that the father’s deep disappointment in his child…it’s very difficult to acknowledge that you have a disappointment in your child. And so you displace it. So that was the idea.”

Q: Quite a lot of the characters are portrayed as selfish…do you think there’s space for the good in politics in terms of a drama? Or do you think it’s only the negative aspects of politics that really appeal?

Paula Milne: “I’m sorry to hear you say that. I believe – and I’m trying to convey this in the piece – that most people go into politics for good reasons. There’s not much money in it. It’s a tough journey. A lot of people go into medicine for altruistic reasons. Some don’t. But most people go in with really decent motives. And I believe that Freya and Aiden did. I’ve tried to convey that. Because what I was trying to say in the piece is, as she said, you get to be an MP, you think you can change things and as happened to him, you end up doing the holes in the road and the Post Office. And of course those things are important. But then you see that the things that actually can really change the infrastructure of society lie elsewhere. And that is what I was trying to convey. Not that they’re selfish. Quite the reverse, really. But he says at one point, ‘Sometimes you have to do bad things to get in power to do good things when you get there.’ And that is really what this piece is about.”

Ben Stephenson: “I’m always asked why there aren’t more nice families in EastEnders? And you think, ‘Because it’s boring,’ as well. So that was my answer to that.”

Off the Front Bench.

Q: Paula, I’m loving it. Absolutely fabulous. I’m very interested that he’s got his dad to talk to but she’s rather isolated. She doesn’t have a sidekick. Why did you decide to make her so lonely?

Paula Milne: “Maybe because she is. There was a thing on Woman’s Hour this morning that as women get successful, they get more isolated. I certainly know from my own case that the more successful I got, the less friends I had. That’s fine. I just had lots of children and made up for it that way. But I also think, just in narrative storytelling terms, when I went to Channel 4 to pitch The Politician’s Wife, the commissioning editor said, ‘Who is she going to confide in?’ And I hadn’t even thought about that. But immediately I said, ‘No-one. The audience.’ So in terms of suspense, you have to wonder what she’s going to do next. The most critical moment for me is when she’s alone in the Cabinet Room and she puts her hands on the table. I think the stage directions said that she felt the thermos of power. And that put the audience ahead of him and gave them a kind of, ‘Uh-oh.’ So if she’d had a confidante it would have ruined that. So a lot of it just actually comes down to sheer storytelling.”

Q: I wondered if you’d been influenced at all by Ed Balls and Yvette Cooper? They seem to me to be the most obvious couple where you’ve got two..?

Paula Milne: “They obviously are. I didn’t base it on them or talk to them or anything because I really wanted to steer clear of this party political thing, because then it just became about that. But this is what I would say – I watched Prince William’s wedding on television and in the Abbey the camera was going round, it was settling on Gordon Brown and so on, and it settled on those two. I had already started writing this. And Yvette was talking and he was looking at her. And he looked at her with sheer love. It was like a Bergman moment in a movie. It was so unexpectedly touching because he’s so thuggish in his persona often in the Commons. But there was such extraordinary tenderness and it re-inforced, as I was writing, what it was I was trying to do.”

BBC The Politician’s Husband

Paula Milne

Ian Wylie on Twitter

“THEY don’t know him. But he knows them.”

The Fall is one of the most compelling drama series I’ve seen in recent years.

A top class script matched by superb cast performances, direction by Jakob Verbruggen, editing, soundtrack and anything else you’d care to pick from the end credits.

I attended the London press launch last month and wrote the below story the next morning – used the day after as a TV centre spread in The Sun.

For some reason it didn’t also go online – so let’s put that right now.

With a few extras from the Q&A under the story.

The Fall starts on BBC2 at 9pm tomorrow (Monday May 13).

Gillian Anderson is Det Supt Stella Gibson and Jamie Dornan co-stars as serial killer Paul Spector.

Both hunters in their own way.

I’ve now seen all five episodes and believe all concerned, including writer Allan Cubitt, deserve to be in the running when TV awards panels sit down to deliberate.

Gillian plays the enigmatic Stella with just the right amount of cool, forensic detachment.

While Jamie is a revelation – chillingly believable both as the horribly twisted, cunning, ritualistic killer and the loving father and family man everyone believes him to be.

There are also wider layers to this Belfast story that begin to unfold in episode two.

The dark nightmare of what Paul Spector will do next always flickering away in your mind as you watch.

As Stella explains: “It about power and control and the thrill.”

And what of the killer who could be a friend and neighbour in any street?

As he points out:

“No-one knows what goes on in someone else’s head.”

*****************************************************************

GILLIAN Anderson has warned viewers will be shocked by her new X-rated TV drama.

The former X-Files star hunts a serial killer who stalks his young female victims before murdering them in their homes.

BBC2 bosses will broadcast a warning before each episode of disturbing five-part drama The Fall, on screen next month. (May 13)

Filmed and set in Belfast, Gillian plays Det Supt Stella Gibson who is brought in from London’s Met Police to review the investigation and hunt for the perverted monster.

With Once Upon A Time actor Jamie Dornan – who once dated Keira Knightley – as psychopath Paul Spector, a married father-of-two young children and grief counsellor.

Gillian, 44, agreed the tense psychological thriller could be particularly frightening for women living on their own.

“It’s pretty shocking,” said the London-based actress who played alien investigator Dana Scully in The X-Files and was a fan of Helen Mirren as Jane Tennison in Prime Suspect.

Enigmatic Stella could turn into a long-running role, with creator and writer Allan Cubitt already working on scripts for a second series.

“I was always a fan of Prime Suspect and had read other attempts at re-creating that and always found them lacking,” explained Gillian.

“And there was something about this that felt like it had the depth and complexity – and yet simplicity – of that series.

“I really liked her – I love how we don’t really get to know who she is or what makes her tick.

“I’ve played other law enforcement officials before. In good scripts a character comes off the page and that was certainly the case with this. I could taste her from the first few pages.”

Asked if she could see Stella as a returning character, Gillian replied: “Definitely.”

Gillian filmed a sex scene as part of the drama as Stella summons local Belfast police detective James Olson, played by Ben Peel, to her room at the Hilton Hotel.

The Great Expectations and Bleak House star lived like a “hermit” during filming with Gillian and Jamie mainly kept apart from each other during the project.

“I am a bit of a hermit anyway. But I become more of a hermit when I’m working than when I’m not.

“Even if I have a few days off, I generally just stay in my hotel room.

“That’s not keeping in character. It’s just keeping my mind on it and working on it.

“I’ve worked with actors who keep in character all the time. I don’t do that.”

The truth is out there from the very start with the killer’s identity unmasked as he plans the sexually-motivated murder of a young solicitor.

Creeping into her bedroom while she is out to arrange her underwear and a sex toy on her bed.

Later stalking her in Belfast’s Botanic Gardens while out with his eight-year-old daughter.

Jamie, 30, said he found it hard to reconcile loving family man Paul with his twisted other side, including keeping detailed drawings of his victims.

He apologised to the young actresses involved in scenes where their tied-up terrified characters are strangled as the killer acts out his fantasies.

Arranging their naked bodies is careful poses before making his escape.

“It’s not easy to have ligatures round some young actresses mouth and watch her eyes bulge out of her head and sweat and try to look like you’re getting an element of satisfaction from it,” said Jamie.

“It’s a very strange place to put your head in for three months. There’s horrible aspects.

“But it’s an amazing character. They’re the best scripts I’ve ever read.”

Allan – whose previous credits include Prime Suspect – studied American serial killer Dennis Rader as part of his research.

Known as The BTK – Bind, Torture, Kill – Strangler, Rader murdered 10 people in Kansas between 1974 and 1991.

The drama follows the two hunters – police and killer – at the same time and explores the psychology of the murderer as well as giving the audience time to get to know the victims.

“I wanted to avoid having a faceless victim at the start of the drama. I wanted the audience to make some connection with the victim,” said Allan.

BBC drama boss Ben Stephenson confirmed a warning would be broadcast before the episodes aired.

He added: “BBC2 is about pushing the boundaries and telling stories in a different way and has done a huge amount of challenging material over the last few years.

“It’s a powerful, compelling piece. You feel the actual reality of the situation and get to know the victims as people. Which invevitably makes it more emotionally difficult in places.”

******************************************************************

Creator and writer Allan Cubitt on getting to know Spector’s victim in the first episode:

“I hope that we will have made some emotional investment in her and her family. And the way in which the killer is capable of compartmentalising his life. These people are incredibly difficult to catch.”

Jamie Dornan on playing a serial killer:

“I’ve read lots of horrible stuff. A lot of these guys live very normal lives, have girlfriends or wives and solid jobs and are able to separate the rotten stuff from who they really are. People are none the wiser to what they’re getting up to at night.”

Jamie on co-starring with Gillian Anderson:

“This is about the fourth time we’ve ever met. We met at the read through, bumped into each other in the make-up trailer a couple of times and done some press together. And that’s it. It wouldn’t have made any sense to hang out.”

Gillian Anderson on how the arrogant killer takes risks before he takes a life:

“Practically revealing himself before the deed, many times over. That’s intriguing to watch.”

Gillian Anderson on Stella’s swimming pool scenes – her way of releasing tension and thinking about the killer:

“I’m actually not a swimmer. I don’t like water very much. The swimming pools add to the creepieness of it.”

As part of her research for the role she bought The Senior Investigating Officer’s Handbook – a book published for police use.

Producer Gub Neal: “It’s very rare that you get an opportunity to spend five hours in the company of someone like Paul Spector – a grief counsellor and monster at the same time.”

The Fall BBC Media – including a Behind The Scenes video featuring Gillian Anderson in the American version of her accent

BBC The Fall

Allan Cubitt

Artists Studio

The Senior Investigating Officer’s Handbook

Ian Wylie on Twitter

John Lynch as Assistant Chief Constable Jim Burns.

Niamh McGrady as Danielle Ferrington.

Bronagh Waugh as Sally-Ann Spector.

Laura Donnelly as Sarah Kay and Gerard McCarthy as Kevin McSwain.

Stuart Graham as DCI Matthew Eastwood.

Aisling Franciosi as Kate.

DCI Matthew Eastwood (Stuart Graham), PC Dani Ferrington (Niamh McGrady), ACC Jim Burns (John Lynch) and DCI Jerry McElroy (Simon Delaney).

Glen Martin (Emmett Scanlan) and DS Mary McCurdy (Siobhan McSweeney)

“THE world is my patient.”

Meet Frankie, played by Eve Myles.

District nurse, small town heroine and Ken Bruce addict.

Who loves to boogie at any time of the day or night.

The tracks of her years begin on BBC1 at 9pm tomorrow (Tuesday May 14) in a new six-part drama series written by Lucy Gannon.

I was invited to the London press launch last month and reckon Frankie has the potential to be a big hit.

As BBC Drama boss Ben Stephenson told us:

“This is a really great populist mainstream drama.

“They are some of the hardest pieces to make work. To make them smart, popular, intelligent.

“Eve gives such a wonderfully life-filled performance.”

In truth, I was hooked after the first two minutes.

Frankie Maddox is a one woman tonic who loves chips and cream cakes.

Defiant in the face of an impossible NHS workload.

“I laugh at cutbacks. I sneer at them,” she exclaims.

Lucy Gannon has her typing fingers on the pulse of real life, real people and real problems.

With some wicked flashes of humour.

Just listen out for a particular ringtone on Frankie’s mobile phone.

Below is the story I wrote on the day of the press launch.

Followed by a few extras from the main Q&A.

***************************************************************

The office disco.

FORMER Torchwood star Eve Myles has spoken of her heartbreak while filming emotional scenes for a new TV drama.

The award-winning Welsh actress plays dedicated district nurse Frankie in a six-part BBC1 series of the same name.

A scene in the opening episode sees Frankie battling to save the life of an eight-year-old girl who stops breathing after suffering a cardiac arrest in a traffic jam.

Eve said she found the storyline upsetting. “I’m a mum. So anything to do with children, it affects you.

“Even when you’re just performing and you’re acting and you’ve got a script, there’s still something you’ve got to connect to. It’s quite heartbreaking.”

The quirky nurse, who puts her patients before her personal life, misses her own birthday party to help a woman give birth.

“As a mum myself I was giving advice. A lot of it hasn’t been used because we can’t air that kind of language!”

While Frankie is also left battered and bruised when a dementia patient hits her in the face and she falls into a door.

But she has her own prescription to release work pressures, with Eve busting a series of dance moves throughout the series.

“At 34 you don’t get the chance to shake your booty on BBC telly – and I got a chance to do it,” she laughed.

“Kenneth The Bruce”

Frankie has an “addiction” to Radio Two’s Ken Bruce Show and treats her car as the office disco.

Seen head-banging and singing at the wheel, Eve added: “She is a firework to play. You just have to go for it. Because if you don’t you’re going to look ridiculous.

“She’s crammed every day with patients. They all are. There’s a tremendous amount of pressure – they’ve got to release somewhere. Me and Ken are like that!

“That’s a real big side of Frankie that I love playing – though it is horrendous to watch myself. But it’s fun and I hope people smile and enjoy it.”

Writer Lucy Gannon said Eve embraced performing to songs like T Rex’s I Love To Boogie, Pixie Lott’s All About Tonight and Should I Stay Or Should I Go by The Clash.

“It was a little bit like writing Soldier Soldier and trying to keep Robson and Jermome away from singing,” she added.

Ex-Merlin actress Eve, who is set to marry long-time partner Brad Freegard, father of her three-year-old daughter Matilda, made sure she was fully prepared for the part.

“My husband-to-be’s auntie was a district nurse and I’ve also got medical people living next door to me. So they’re sick to the back teeth of me because I pluck their brains about everything.

“We had a fantastic district nurse and medic on set with us. And the guy who did the props was an ex-nurse.”

Frankie (Eve Myles) and Ian (Dean Lennox Kelly).

On screen next month (Tuesday May 14), Frankie was developed by the BBC at the same time as Call The Midwife and co-stars Dean Lennox Kelly, Jemma Redgrave and Derek Riddell.

The first episode includes a Doctor Who in-joke as Frankie and policeman partner Ian, played by Dean, discuss sleeping with a Time Lord.

“In bed with Doctor Who? Well I suppose it would depend on which one,” comments Frankie.

“It was fun and that’s a nice little thing to be in there,” said Eve.

Still known to millions as Torchwood’s Gwen Cooper, the actress said she originally thought there might not be a role for her in the drama.

“As soon as I heard about Frankie, I said, ‘Who’s playing him?’ And they said, ‘No. The lead character is a female.”

Asked about her own work-life balance, Eve joked: “Matilda does think that I work in a trailer now in a car park.”

And she told of her daughter’s reaction when she caught a glimpse of her mother in bed with Dean, when Eve was watching a preview DVD of the first episode – thinking Matilda was asleep on the sofa.

“She said, ‘Oh mummy, you’re kissing a Prince!’ I said, ‘Don’t tell your father!’”

****************************************************************

Eve Myles on District / Community Nurses:

“It’s the entire family that they help. But they don’t like being made to look like heroines. They’re incredible.

“We had some fantastic advice on set – and we went through exactly how it would be. We made sure that we did everything correctly.”

Eve Myles on her dancing and singing scenes:

“When Lucy writes it down, the description of it is fantastic. You get a character like that, you can’t help but just wring it for all it’s worth. And go for it. Because if you don’t go for it you’re going to look ridiculous. So go for it, have fun and hopefully you’ll have fun watching it. There’s a lot more to come.

“She loves music. She’s crammed every day with patients. They all are. And there’s a tremendous amount of pressure on them every day. They’re on the road all the time, they’re giving advice, they’re listening every day, they’re doing their job, they’ve got to release somewhere.”

Lucy Gannon on District / Community Nurses:

“The community nurse or the district nurse is the unsung heroine or hero who is out in the community keeping people away from hospitals, keeping them in their own homes. There are lots and lots of stories to be told. They’re anti-heroic.”

Lucy Gannon on Ken Bruce:

“Ken Bruce was my saviour. When my husband died – my husband was Scottish and I really missed that male presence and the Scottish accent. And Ken Bruce was that for me. I put him on every morning at half past nine and he would carry me through the morning. So that’s why I gave Frankie Ken Bruce.

“He’s a babe. He’s lovely. He’s done a few voice overs for me in previous films. He’s never any trouble. I’ve listened to him so much I could write his dialogue for him.”

Derek Riddell as Andy.

BBC Frankie

Lucy Gannon

Ken Bruce

Ian Wylie on Twitter

“DO not go gentle into that good night.”

There’s no drifting away in new TV drama series Love And Marriage.

The six part serial follows three generations of the Paradise family and has every chance of becoming another drama hit for ITV.

Written by Stewart Harcourt and directed by Debbie Isitt and Roger Goldby, it begins with Pauline Paradise (Alison Steadman) retiring from her job as a school lollipop lady.

She’s married to ‘Silent Ken’ (Duncan Preston) – a man of few words and, it appears, even fewer to say to his wife after 41 years of marriage.

As Alison Steadman explained at the press launch: “They forget to look and see the other person.”

Both Ken and their grown up children take her for granted.

Until Pauline – having reached her 60th birthday – takes stock and decides it’s time for her to stop being a wife, mother, grandmother and all round family personal assistant.

And the moment for her to take charge and simply live her own life.

The drama also features Celia Imrie as Pauline’s three-times married sister Rowan and Larry Lamb as her lover Tommy, who happens to be married to, and live with, someone else.

Stewart Wright and Ashley Jensen co-star as Kevin and Sarah Paradise.

Niky Wardley and James McArdle are Heather and Charlie.

With former Coronation Street star Graeme Hawley and Zoe Telford as Martin and Michelle.

These sort of drama series are really difficult to get right.

But not least thanks to a superb script and sparkling cast, Love And Marriage feels totally believable…with just the right mix of drama and comedy.

Last week ITV screened the opening episode for the media, followed by two Q&A sessions and then other interviews.

My transcript of the first Q&A is below, edited to remove any major spoilers.

Including some articulate thoughts about life, love, marriage, acting and…Coventry.

I’ll post my transcript of the second Q&A closer to the first episode TX.

Love And Marriage begins on ITV at 9pm on Wednesday June 5.

***************************************************************

The Not So Oldies.

Q&A with Alison Steadman (Pauline Paradise) / Duncan Preston (Ken Paradise) / Celia Imrie (Rowan) / Larry Lamb (Tommy) / Stewart Harcourt (Writer) / Debbie Isitt (Director)

Q: (From me, as it happens) Obviously this is a drama that cuts across all the generations but, of course, it tells a story – as Anne Reid said at the BAFTAs – about people over 35 as well. Why do you think that is important and are you encouraged by this kind of script writing?

Alison Steadman: “Up until a few years ago it really felt as though everything on television, or indeed films…it seemed like life stopped at 35. That no-one carried on living until they were 70, 80, 90 or whatever. And so over the last couple of years it’s just so nice that people like Stewart have suddenly gone, ‘Do you know, people do have an interesting life beyond 35 and it is important to chart that.’ And so I just think we’ve woken up a bit and said, ‘We’re all here from the age of nought until whenever we die and let’s do drama about it.’ And it’s great that that’s happening.”

Celia Imrie: “And also, I think, more often than not it would be the audience staying at home and watching, rather than the 35-year-olds who are out down at the disco, if they’ve got any sense.”

Alison Steadman: “The discotheque.”

Larry Lamb: “I think they call it clubbing now…” (laughter)

Q: Was that really a picture of you, Alison and Celia, in a younger time? (Family photo seen in ep one)

Alison Steadman: “Are you doubting our integrity? Is this going to go to court?” (laughter) “Yes. We all brought photos in from our teens and whatever…”

Duncan Preston: “Put wigs on them…”

Alison Steadman: “…made a montage.”

Q: This is the first time you’ve seen this episode. I just wondered what your reactions were to it?

Celia Imrie: “It’s fabulous.”

Larry Lamb: “Well, it’s always the weirdest thing, and one has done this so many times…to have turned up and see something there before you that you’ve spent so much time on and put so much into, and frankly been so disappointed – when this is absolutely 180 degrees the other way around. I am beyond thrilled and I think we all feel the same way. (Murmurs of agreement from the rest of the cast) It’s so frustrating when something doesn’t turn out, when you see it on the page and then you follow through, you do the work and at the end you’re sitting in one of these things and thinking. ‘Oh my, what happened to it?’”

Duncan Preston: “And we had such a good time doing it. And that is not always a good sign, is it? (laughter) It isn’t. We met every night after work…”

Alison Steadman: “The thing I loved about watching it just now was that we did feel like a real family. And it felt like that when we were filming. There was no strain. It’s very difficult…a couple, you’re supposed to have…me and Celia playing sisters and the kids, those little kids…it’s very hard sometimes working with little children because they don’t know you and they’re all kind of a bit…and you’re supposed to look as though you’re a loving grandma and all that. But I just felt that when we were filming…and it’s to do with the script as well and Debbie just saying, ‘Go for it! Come on, you’re a family.’ And we felt like a real family. I was very pleased watching it. That’s how it feels when you watch it.”

Larry Lamb: “It’s so important – the positive energy of a director, supporting you and drawing you on, is exactly the same as a conductor with an orchestra. You give him an orchestra…the orchestra will give him everything they’ve got if it’s there. It’s such a credit to you (Debbie). It’s just extraordinary to see it.”

Debbie Isitt: “Shucks!” (laughter)

Q: Obviously you’ve worked together before but we’re used to seeing you in the opposite partnerships. Did it feel like wife-swapping at any point? Did you get confused?

Duncan Preston: “Er…yeah. (laughter) Yeah it did. It was weird. It was pointed out to me that these two (Alison and Larry) in another show (Gavin & Stacey) and then we’d (Celia) been together in another show. It was a bit weird, I must say. But we soon forgot about that, didn’t we?”

Larry Lamb: “Yeah, you do.”

Celia Imrie: “But of course it did help that we were familiar with each other. Because it’s a sort of peculiar magic that you don’t have to then play on the screen…”

Duncan Preston: “It’s a shorthand. You have a shorthand, don’t you?”

Celia Imrie: “…and that husbands and wives or people that know each other very well don’t necessarily look at each other all the time. Little things like that I noticed. I’m absolutely thrilled and I’m so proud to be in it.”

Alison Steadman: “Me too.”

Larry Lamb: Absolutely. And it’s really strange because people have asked me – and I’m sure they’ve asked you as well Alison – about the whole Gavin & Stacey thing, about the way that evolved. And that was so similar in the fact that in Gavin & Stacey and in this, everybody lived together in a hotel and every evening after work we would meet as a family and sit around and talk about whatever was going on in everybody’s lives and it just formed this family.”

Debbie Isitt: “It is one of the joys of location…”

Larry Lamb: “And, of course, if it’s cast right and everybody has this sort of sense that, ‘Yes, this could be my brother and this could be my sister or my mum or my aunt or whatever,’ then the care has been taken beforehand. So you’re not constantly trying to fit yourself into it.”

Alison Steadman: “You always kind of know a good job, like when we finished Gavin & Stacey and the same when I finished this and got back home…you long to get back home because you think, ‘Oh, my own bed and I’ll be able to rest,’ and all the rest of it. And then you sit there, the first morning at breakfast and think, ‘Actually I’m missing everybody.’ And there’s a little bit of me would like to be getting the train back to Coventry to all be together again. So you always know it’s been a good job when you get that feeling.”

Celia Imrie: “But if we’d filmed it in London, that sort of togtherness wouldn’t have happened. So that was a piece of magic too.”

Q: I was just wondering what your signs of a good marriage are?

Celia Imrie: “I wouldn’t know. Haven’t got a clue.”

Larry Lamb: “Don’t ask me!” (laughter)

Duncan Preston: “Or me.” (laughter)

Stewart Harcourt: “I think it’s about change. There’s one point later on where Zoe Telford’s character says to Graeme Hawley’s character, ‘You’re supposed to be married to three different people.’ And he gets a bit panicky about this. And she says, ‘Or you’re married to the same person but you have three different marriages to the same person.’ Because you’re together for a long time, 41 years, Ken and Pauline, and you change as individuals, you change as people, you have different things going on in your life – kids or your job or whatever it is. And if you can’t change together and allow the other person to change then you hit the buffers.”

Alison Streadman: “Or it’s just that thing, perhaps, with Ken and Pauline that they kind of…I’m including Pauline but it’s mainly Ken…they forget to look and see the other person. They just forget. And it becomes such a routine, normal life. You just don’t look or see the person or hear them anymore. And so the other person feels really lonely because they haven’t got that togetherness. And I think that’s what’s happened with these two. They have forgotten – he’s forgotten that she’s there. And, of course, the kids take her for granted and she’s working her socks off and they love their mum to bits. But they’ve forgotten as well that they’re giving her all this work. And it happens with kids. ‘Oh mum, can you do this? Mum pick up the kids? Can you do this?’ And, of course, she always says, ‘Yes I can.’ And inside she’s getting more and more tired, although she loves her family. I think retiring and death do make us, as human beings, re-evaluate our lives. And when we do, sometimes we change. And that’s what Pauline’s done.”

Stewart Harcourt: “It’s the episode where she gets her head up…”

Alison Steadman: “She thinks ‘me’ time.”

Celia Imrie: “I think that lots of people are going to really relate to one or other of us in this. I can’t believe they’re not. They’re all going to be thinking, ‘That’s me.’ And what I also think is absolutely phenomenal is that Stewart is a man and writes so heavenly for women. How does he do it?”

Stewart Harcourt: “Going back to the first question – what Alison said about writing for actresses and especially actresses over a certain age, it’s just fascinating. And it feels a slightly untapped area. Actresses’ parts do tend to dry up in the late thirties and they become different. Men’s change as well but in a slightly different way. They can still maintain a dynamism. So to try and find dynamic characters, it’s just exciting to write for.”

Debbie Isitt: “You’re the new Willy Russell.”

Duncan Preston: “You do think about women a lot as a man anyway, don’t you?”

Stewart Harcourt: “You do.”

Q: Having been in successful comedies before, do you feel there’s a pressure going into something like this? Do you think, ‘Will this live up to what I’ve done before?’

Duncan Preston: “I don’t think of it as a comedy, to be honest.”

Larry Lamb: “No, I don’t.”

Alison Steadman: “No, I don’t.”

Duncan Preston: “I never do think of anything as a comedy or serial. I just think you play the part and if it’s funny, great, but…”

Larry Lamb: “It’s all about the writing. You judge it from the writing. From the minute you open the first page, that’s it. You know you’re on a winner.”

Celia Imrie: “But also it’s got the two (comedy and drama) going together which is just bliss.”

Duncan Preston: “That’s right. And there’s always that juxtaposition. The comedy comes out of the tragedy and the tragedy comes out of the comedy. And that’s what is so clever about Stuart. One minute everything in the garden is lovely and the next minute…”

Larry Lamb: “And totally, totally believable.”

Q: Do you think people today give up on marriage too easily?

Alison Steadman: “Things have changed, of course. Say from my parents’ generation. I can remember when I was at school there was one girl in my whole class and her parents were divorced. It was shocking. We, as kids, felt really sorry for her because she was the girl who had an odd mix-match – her mother had married again…it felt really odd. I think now it seems to be the norm for kids that their parents don’t stay together, sadly. But yeah, times change. And, hopefully, maybe my son’s generation, that’ll be a switch again. Maybe they’ll think again. Because divorce is so easy now and it wasn’t years ago. You had to go through all sorts of hoops and pretend and get evidence and all this. It was incredibly complicated. Now it’s just a question of saying, ‘Oh, that’s it.’ So perhaps we don’t put the value on it that we did. I don’t know.”

Stewart Harcourt: “There’s certainly not as much religious teaching about it. It’s more of a secular society. I remember the first divorce in my family – I come from a similar family to the Paraside family, I suppose…it’s not based on them, honest. It really isn’t. (laughter) But the first person who got divorced…one of my brothers got divorced about 10 years ago and he was married to an American woman. And there was all that thing, like, ‘We don’t get divorced in our family.’ And she said, ‘Well maybe some of you should have done!’” (laughter)

Q: Why is it set in Coventry and what was the policy towards having accents in this?

Debbie Isitt: “That was our first challenge – what is the Coventry accent? I live in Coventry, which is one of the reasons it’s there. The other reason is that Stewart’s family hails from Coventry. So between us we were delighted to set it in Coventry. But it is an unusual accent because it’s not a Birmingham accent. It’s right in the middle of the country. It’s got lots of influences from London, it’s quite semi-rural, it’s a bit of north. It’s the most extraordinarily difficult accent to get. So some of the actors had more experience of the region than others. In the end we just went for the truth, really. Get as neutral and truthful – an accent that doesn’t get in the way for you (cast) all. So that you all sound pretty similar, you all come from the same neck of the woods, not Birmingham but somewhere Midlandy – and then forget about it, so that you can play the truth of the situation. There’s nothing worse than an actor concentrating on an accent and it getting in the way of their performance. I don’t think that’s happened in this and that’s a great thing. Coventry is an under-represented city, it’s right in the middle of the country. It’s a place that’s full of working class people who have great aspirations for themselves and for their city and we both have genuine experience of it from a location point of view and from a heart point of view. And we know people. I was immediately able to say, ‘There’s a family just like the Paraside family, they all live on one street in Coventry. I’ll take you to them.’ Immediately. And we could start sourcing the locations based on the truth that Stuart had written about.”

Stewart Harcourt: “I think everything should be set in Coventry…”

Debbie Isitt: “Me too.” (laughter)

Stewart Harcourt: “I saw Star Trek the other day. And I thought, genuinely, that would benefit from being set at the Binley Road Fire Station. (laughter) But also it never felt like a London family, because it hasn’t got that Metropolitan beat or edge to it or whatever. You could set it in Manchester, Leeds, Bristol, Liverpool but hundreds of shows have come from there. And it felt fresh to go somewhere new. And it’s a great place. And it is about Middle England in many ways. It is right in the centre of England. In terms of accents as well, it’s always been a boom town Coventry. People have come from all over the place over the last 200 years for work. So there are a range of accents in there. It’s a very good question though because it is a hard one to pin down. It’s very easy to go Brummie or quite northern. But the fact is that people live on the same street and they have different accents. I’ve got a different accent to my brothers because I’ve lived away for a while. That’s what families are like nowadays as well.”

Q: (Me again) Alison described ‘Silent Ken’ very well earlier on. Can I ask Duncan for your take on the character and perhaps give us a glimpse of how he reacts in future episodes to his situation?

Duncan Preston: “Well, he doesn’t know what he’s done wrong. But he knows he’s done something wrong. (laughter) My dad was like that. I’ve got first hand experience. He finds out that he’s got to do something about it, in the end. He does nothing for three episodes. He just thinks it’s her fault.”

Stewart Harcourt: “You (Ken) start ignoring Pauline and then you feign illness for an episode with heart palpitations…”

Duncan Preston: “He knows he should be alright there. But he’s not. And it takes up two or three episodes to find out that he’s actually in the wrong.”

Debbie Isitt: “But he wants her back always…”

Duncan Preston: “Always wants her back. But he hasn’t got a clue how to do it. And that’s where the kids come in and they tell him how to do it. The wonderful thing about this show – there are no great big egos on it. And that’s why we had such a great time. So you can actually talk to other people about your character and they can talk to you about theirs. It wasn’t all, me, me, me, me me. All that.”

Q: (Me yet again – sorry) Did I read somewhere that there’s a scene later in the series on a trampoline?

Duncan Preston: “Yeah. I don’t want to talk about it.” (laughter)

Alison Steadman: “Luckily, you were in a circus as a kid, weren’t you?”

Debbie Isitt: “It’s always great when the writer writes, ‘And Ken does a somersault over the garden fence off a trampoline…’ And then Duncan’s like, ‘Errr?’”

Duncan Preston: “I only read the first three eps, and I thought, ‘Oh, I’m just playing a docile old grandfather again. Not at all. I’ve never run as far, never climbed as many stairs, climbing up diving boards – I’ve never worked so hard in my life, physically.”

Stewart Harcourt: “Ken’s story in this series is about him finding his voice…”

Q: Alison – it’s a tough call at 60 to suddenly walk out on your home and family. Could you do it? Is it something that women at that age can find that strength of character to do it?

Alison Steadman: “Yes. Given the circumstances, of course. As I say, sometimes life and marriages do just tick along for years and years and years and it takes something to make that person go, ‘I want to change things.’ Also, when you get to be a pensioner, as it were, you start to reflect on your life a lot more. And you suddenly look forward and think, ‘God, maybe I’ve only got 20 years at the most? 15 even. Suddenly you see the end in sight, which when you’re in your twenties, thirties and forties, you don’t think about dying and all that because you’re so busy living. But it is a time, I think, for a lot of people to reflect. And that makes them perhaps say, ‘Look, I’ve got to do something before it’s too late.’ And so it does happen. I’m not saying, obviously, that it happens to every couple. But it’s perfectly believable and was so easy to play once you got under the skin of that women and we found our relationship. It felt absolutely right. Occasionally you’re in the middle of a script and you think, ‘I don’t know whether she’d do that?’ But with this script there was never a moment when any of us went, ‘I don’t quite believe that,’ or, ‘I’ve got to force myself to do that.’ It was easy. Easy to be under the skin of that woman.”

Q: Do you think there will be women out there, then, that watch this and think, ‘Actually, I could do this and I’m going to do this?

Duncan Preston: “There could be a lot of reconciliations come about out of all this, if they all watch. You never know.”

Alison Steadman: “Yes. There could be people who actually are watching it and go, ‘God, that might happen? It’s a wake up call. Come on, I’ve got to bring her a bunch of flowers. I’ve got to say, actually I love you. Or thanks for that meal that was brilliant, instead of just eating and saying – right, I’m off to bed.’ It might not necessarily split couples up but make couples think. You should appreciate each other and actually not take each other for granted anymore.”

ITV Drama

Tiger Aspect

Coventry

Ian Wylie on Twitter

Graeme Hawley and Zoe Telford as Martin and Michelle.

IT starts on ITV at 9pm tonight (Wed June 5).

And comes recommended.

Presuming you have already read the background at:

Love And Marriage: Q&A 1

…here, as promised, is my transcript of the second Q&A at the London press launch.

With all the remaining main cast members, aside from Ashley Jensen (Sarah) who did not attend.

****************************************************************

James McArdle and Niky Wardley as Charlie and Heather.

Q&A 2:

Graeme Hawley (Martin) / Zoe Telford (Michelle) / Niky Wardley (Heather) / James McArdle (Charlie) / Stewart Wright (Kevin)

Graeme Hawley: “Can we just say before we start, none of us are prepared to answer questions about James McArdle’s moustache today…” (laughter)

Q: Niky – how’s your Flamenco and do you have to do a bit more in the series? Did you have to learn much? (Re dancing scenes later in series)

Niky Wardley: “Ooh yeah. There is more.”

Ashley Jensen and Stewart Wright as Sarah and Kevin.

Q: Were you quite nifty on your feet already?

Niky Wardley: “No. We didn’t really have that much time. We were trying to fit in a bit of time with this amazing choreographer but it was all a little bit nuts. So we probably only had a couple of sessions. So I think it was just very cleverly filmed to make us not look…but we had to do this big set piece on this day and we turned up and the other people that we were competing against were all professional dancers. So John (Heffernan) and I…we were a bit nervous. But, yeah, it turned out all right. Smoke and mirrors, you know.”

James McArdle: “No, they were brilliant, weren’t they?”

Graeme Hawley: “They were. It was brilliant. It was fantastic. They were the best. They were better than the professional dancers. Honestly.” (laughter)

Q: James – do you get roped into any dancing at all?

James McArdle: “There’s one scene where we do a dance, isn’t there? But not very well. I was trying but I didn’t have to do anything like what Niky and John did. I just get to watch.”

Q: So we might see you (Niky) on Strictly soon?

Niky Wardley: “Oh good God, no.”

Niky Wardley as Heather.

Q: Were there any Flamenco-related injuries?

James McArdle: “Yeah. She stood on my foot…”(reveals injured foot)

Zoe Telford: “He actually did that at the wrap party…”

James McArdle: “Because of Niky…”

Niky Wardley: “It’s so not my fault. It was your fault.”

Zoe Telford: “It was that a good a party that James broke his foot in two places.”

Graeme Hawley: “James was showing off..”

James McArdle: “No. Niky got stuck on a wall…”

Niky Wardley: “OK. I wasn’t stuck on a wall. I was on a wall, I was going to get off but James decided he wanted to pick me down from the wall, which he did. And then he wouldn’t put me down and carried me…”

James McArdle as Charlie.

James McArdle: “There was a kerb to get into the taxi and I thought it was a normal kerb. But it was actually a raised kerb…”

Niky Wardley: “We both fell and James broke his foot.”

James McArdle: “That’s it.”

Zoe Telford: “It’s really embarrassing.”

Graeme Hawley: “In completely unrelated circumstances, we had also been drinking…”

Zoe Telford: “But you (James) weren’t even drunk…”

James McArdle: “I wasn’t…”

Zoe Telford: “…you’ve got absolutely no excuse.”

Graeme Hawley as Martin.

Q: Graeme – can I ask, is it nice to play a family man after your experiences in Corrie as a killer?

Graeme Hawley: “Was it nice not to kill people? (laughter) It was very nice. It was lovely to play. Because I’ve got two kids and I’m tired most of the time. So it was very nice to play a person that was tired all of the time. That made it a lot easier. He’s far too tired to kill people, this guy. But in a strange kind of way, there’s kind of similarities with the whole Coronation Street thing because it is a big cast. We spent so much time together. We spent three-and-a-half months together. That’s what you do on Coronation Street as well. You spend more time with them than you do with your own family. So you become very close with that group. So I suppose there are similarities with that side of things. But yes, it is nice not to be a killer for a bit.”

Q: What was it like acting with all the children?

Graeme Hawley: “There is a baby-throwing up incident. There were lots of incidents with them. They were the most brilliant bunch of kids. They were really amazing. They were all from the same family. Debbie Isitt (director) managed to find the only family in Coventry that has five kids. They were brilliant to work with because they were all brothers and sisters and they all looked after each other. The baby, she did throw up on me. Only once. But I was in swimming trunks at the time. Caitlin, who is the eldest, has been in a couple of Debbie’s films and so she’d done a lot of acting before. But none of the rest of them had ever done anything before. And they come into the series more and more as it goes along.”

James McArdle: “They were really great to act with because they really believe that it’s happening. There’s some amazing moments where we’d go off script because they were improvising. Some of the best bits that we ever did was with the kids, just believing it.”

Stewart Wright as Kevin.

Q: Can I ask Stewart about all the eating you appear to have to do in this series?

Stewart: “All the eating? I didn’t pick up on that?” (laughter) “I did have a bad day eating very cold quiche. I think that might be what you’re referring to…”

Q: Did it become a regular feature, because your character seems to like his food?

Stewart: “Thanks.” (laughter) “Are you calling me chubby?” (laughter) “Yes. Does he like his food? Yes. He does eat some quiche. What else did he eat?”

Graeme Hawley: “Lemon curd…”

Stewart: “Lemon curd. Yeah, you got me. He associates it with family, I think. And it was round his mother’s house so food is quite a big part of family life and that’s maybe…it was a very good question.”

Zoe Telford as Michelle.

Q: What was the highlight for each of you of filming?

Graeme Hawley: “It’s always a difficult one to answer. In that we did genuinely have such a brilliant time together. Like they were saying, the last lot that were up here, you’re in a hotel for those few months together and it becomes a real social thing. The highlight of filming for me was not at set, probably. It would be the night when it was getting towards the end of filming and we’d been in this hotel for months. So somebody came up with the idea…we thought we’d do a treasure hunt. So we had the girls versus the boys and George, who plays their eldest son, he came up with a treasure hunt which was all done by text messages. So we spent a whole night at the Ramada Hotel in Coventry…I don’t really want to think too much about what everybody else who was staying in the hotel would think of this…but we spent the whole night running around the hotel on a massive treasure hunt. Which the boys won with a landslide. That was a pretty fantastic evening.”

Niky Wardley: “It was good. The competitive side of me was furious. I was so angry because we were rubbish. We were really bad. We just ended up bumping into each other and screaming a lot. It was quite embarrassing.”

Graeme Hawley: “That relationship that was there between us, I think is very important. I think you can really tell it in that first episode. Hopefully that will very much come across throughout the whole series. Because if this series works, it works on the idea that you believe that these people are a family. And it works on the idea that you believe that they love each other and care about each other. And I think we do probably care about each other. So hopefully that comes across.”

James McArdle: “The highlight for me…I can’t think of a specific moment but there were loads of days when we were all together filming and I’d always go, ‘I love it when we’re all together.’ Because I did.”

Graeme Hawley: “The reality is, it’s a nightmare when we’re all together because it takes hours to do it.”

James McArdle: “But that is the feeling of the show – that is hopefully what comes across. Debbie helped create that atmosphere where we felt quite free with each other and improvised a wee bit and did whatever.”

Niky Wardley: “The camping was a highlight for me.”

Graeme Hawley: “Episode four, we’re all camping together for most of the episode and we basically shot over a week – we were out doing night shoots on this camp site all week. That was good fun.”

Stewart Wright: “A highlight for me…one of the last jobs I did was touring a theatre show, living in a camper van touring round the UK. And I got in this job and I haven’t been working in TV for quite a long time and all of a sudden there’s a four star hotel, there’s being driven to set. It feels really nice. If anyone has ever lived in a camper van for five month – and if you have you’d appreciate a four star hotel.” (laughter) “And working with this lot. Joking aside – Alison Steadman, Celia Imrie…those big guys, is pretty special getting on a film or TV set with people like that.”

Q: One of the pivotal moments of the first episode is Pauline reading that fine poem by Dylan Thomas. Is there anything that you’d ever read or seen that had put a new slant, a new perspective, on something?

Stewart Wright: “Well, I did come out of it thinking it is quite a genuine look at marriage. In terms of it does raise some quite big thoughts and questions. It does look at it under a bit of a microscope…”

Zoe Telford: “That wasn’t the question…” (laughter)

Ashley Jensen as Sarah.

Graeme Hawley: “When I graduated from drama school our head of school gave us an extract from The Prophet by Khalil Gibran. The section where he talks about when he’s leaving this city and it’s all about him leaving the place and it being so hard to leave one place and go to another. He said that it’s like shedding a skin and it’s not without fear and regret that you leave a place. And that, as a young actor who had been in such a safe environment for three years and going out into what seemed like a very big and bad world, that had a huge effect on me. I still have the piece that she gave us. And whenever I go into the next big project or leave somewhere else…it’s something that I constantly go back to and read. Because I do think it very much sums up what it’s like to leave a safe place and go to somewhere new and exciting and dangerous. Like Coventry.” (laughter)

Q: (From me, as it happens) Just on that Graeme, how was it for you filming back in Coventry? Did you bump into any ghosts or people from your past?

Graeme Hawley: “Yes. I’m from the area. I’ve not worked there for years and years and I’ve never done television there before. But it was absolutely brilliant to work there. It was so amazing to film in a city where you…although I was from Hinkley, which is about 10, 15 minutes away but I spent most of my childhood in Coventry and I’m a huge Coventry City fan as well. The best thing for me, the reason why this is the best job I’ve ever done in my life, ever, is because I shot a scene at the Ricoh Arena. I think I could probably die a happy person now, to know that I’ve filmed a television programme at the home of Coventry City. Which might not be the home of Coventry City for much longer because they’re being kicked out. Which you should investigate! They (other cast) filmed in the Arena and they saw matches and everything. But the stuff that we did, sitting on the sofa stuff, all of our stuff was filmed in the Ricoh Arena. The Coventry City mascot is a big, blue elephant called Sky Blue Sam. And I have chased Sky Blue Sam through the streets of Coventry, which we did in episode six. Which is another of probably the highlights of my life. That maybe tells you something about my life.” (laughter)

Q: If there’s a second series, what would you like to happen to your characters?

Stewart Wright: “Maybe a trip abroad. Take the Paradise family abroad. A big budget second series. Somewhere warm, possibly.”

Graeme Hawley: “I think maybe two episodes in Vegas so we could really explore all the ideas. I think that Martin should maybe start playing up front for Coventry City football club. He suddenly develops a huge football talent and ends up playing for England, maybe.”

Zoe Telford: “Well Michelle goes back to work later on in the series so I suppose I would quite like for that to be explored a bit more. The whole thing about women going back to work and being working mothers. Just because I think it’s very interesting for a lot of people. So that would be mine.”

Stewart Wright: “A painful divorce? Could be interesting? You can’t do a show about love and marriage without a painful divorce, can you?”

Niky Wardley: “I’m quite excited to see what Heather would be if she gets the chance to be a mother. And what that means for their marriage and everything else. What that would throw up.”

Graeme Hawley: “Not that that necessarily is going to happen.”

James McArdle: “I want people to want Heather and Charlie to be together.”

Q: (Me again) And the answer to that moustache question?

James McArdle: “I’m filming something where I need a moustache. It’s a film about the Troubles in Northern Ireland in 1971 and I’m a sergeant in the Army. We’re shooting all my talking bits up here (re broken foot) and then hopefully in a couple of weeks I’ll be able to run.”


ITV Drama

Love And Marriage: Q&A 1

The Prophet

Coventry

Ian Wylie on Twitter

JOURNALIST and broadcasting legend Alan Whicker has died at the age of 87.

In his later years he lived quietly on the beautiful island of Jersey and often entertained journalists seeking to interview him.

All were plied with his charm…and champagne.

None left sober.

His passing reminded me of the last piece I wrote about him – for the Manchester Evening News in August 2004.

Which I thought some might like to read below.

**********************************************************

THE trademark glasses, blazer and voice say it all. Alan Whicker is a TV icon who brought the world into millions of homes.

Recently seen in a series of classic Travelocity television commercials, his smooth style led to the founding of an Alan Whicker Appreciation Society.

Whicker’s World dominated the schedules for five decades. But his career actually began amid the horrors of the Second World War.

Sixty years on, Whicker’s War (Channel 4, 9pm tonight) finds Alan retracing his steps as a teenage director of the Army Film and Photo Unit, which followed the Allied advance through Italy, from Sicily to Venice.

On leave after his training in 1943 and preparing to go to war with the infantry, he went to lunch with an uncle in London. Another guest at the table asked him if he’d like to joing the AFPU instead.

“At least it got me out of the infantry, which was miserable. Although, of course, I saw far more action with the film unit that I ever would have done with the infantry,” he recalls.

“I soon discovered that if you had to be in the Army, the film unit was the place to be. It offered travel, variety, meeting interesting foreigners and trying to stop them killing you, and as much excitement as you could have – sometimes more.”

Many of the historic photos used in the two-part documentary were taken by Whicker himself and reflect the nightmare of war. Chasing the action for newsreels and newspapers back home, eight of his 40 cameramen were killed and 13 seriously injured.

Whicker, now 79, didn’t expect to live. “You always thought something terrible was going to happen.” He recalls visiting a field hospital amid the carnage of Anzio. “One gravely injured young officer had been lying all day on a stretcher waiting for treatment, and as a doctor hurried by, asked quietly if his injuries could be treated.

“The doctor saw instantly that there was no hope for him, so said gently, ‘I’m afraid we’re not quite ready for you yet.’ The young officer nodded. ‘I quite understand,’ he said, and closed his eyes. In wartime, brilliant fragments of courage and nobility pass by unnoticed.”

Whicker admits his remarkable Italian journey, which concludes next week, was an emotional and very personal experience. He talks movingly of seeing some of his colleagues blown up right in front of him. “It’s two hours of me explaining what happened and why I’m still alive. I remembered almost everything, including the houses where we were billeted.

“Making the programmes brought back to me how lucky I’d been. When I saw where we’d been and what we’d had to do, I realised how amazing it was that I’d survived, and survived without injury. I lived through the most horrible, and in some ways the most happy, days of my life.”

Blessed by the Pope after the liberation of Rome, Whicker later raced ahead of British and American troops. Finding himself one of the first allied officers into German occupied Milan, he received the surrender of the local SS headquarters, surrounded at the time by an Italian mob out for blood.

The prisoners then presented him with the key to a treasure chest filled with millions of pounds in currency of all sorts. He toyed for a moment with the thought of placing the trunk in the boot of his unmarked civilian car and driving away, but later handed it over to an American tank regiment.

Whicker ended his war in Venice, editing a forces’ newspaper. He eventually returned home to embark on a career in print – and then television – journalism. Today, few of his wartime colleagues are still alive.

He notes that his “brother officer”, who died in that field hospital at Anzio, had some 60 years of his life taken away from him.

“I’ve been very lucky in my life, and my luck was underlined for me when I walked through all these assault landings without shedding any blood – when so many of my friends paid a terrible price.”

BBC News: Broadcaster Alan Whicker dies at 87

“WE’RE addicts Elizabeth, you and I.”

It begins in the New York of early 1983.

And then flashes back to London seven months before.

Richard Burton walks into Elizabeth Taylor’s 50th birthday party wearing a mink coat…

The next year they are rehearsing together for her American stage production of Noel Coward’s Private Lives.

The world’s most famous couple – married to each other twice and divorced twice – yet again at the centre of a media circus.

Burton and Taylor is a film worthy of both screen legends, generally agreed to be two of the finest actors ever.

With Taylor regarded as the world’s most beautiful woman and Burton the gloriously-voiced hellraiser every female wanted to tame.

This diamond of a 90-minute drama is broadcast on BBC4 at 9pm next Monday (July 22).

Dominic West and Helena Bonham Carter sparkle as Burton and Taylor.

Not least due to one of William Ivory’s best ever scripts and the direction of Richard Laxton.

I was lucky enough to see a preview screening at BAFTA in London last night (Monday) followed by a Q&A – my full transcript is below.

It was all but standing room only for this very special film, the last in a series of often acclaimed BBC4 acclaimed “biopics”.

Like most of those previous dramas, it focuses on one significant period in the lives of its subjects.

Co-produced with BBC America, Burton and Taylor captures the essence of their magnetic mutual attraction and addiction.

While leaving you with, perhaps, a smile on your face and tear in the eye.

If you’re too young to remember much about Burton and Taylor, check out the links at the bottom of this blog and take a look at them in their golden days.

My Q&A transcript will also, hopefully, give you a better idea of why you should not miss this drama.

A few tasters:

Dominic West: “I just thought it was a beautiful story and all the more poignant. It seemed to me so much about passing of time and of youth and of beauty and fame and therefore all the more poignant that it was these two huge figures that it was about.”

Helena Bonham Carter: “We were definitely trepidatious and anxious. We were terrified. But you know it’s funny because I just said that I didn’t want to get distracted. I often felt that they were upstaged by their own fame. And I don’t want this to be upstaged by their fame either. I think it’s a beautiful script and I did it because of the script. And it was incidental that it’s called Burton and Taylor.”

Director Richard Laxton: “This is just a story about the calamity of being a human being.”

Executive producer Jessica Pope: “You can’t be as beautiful as Liz, you can’t be as extraordinary an actor as Burton. But you can go through a relationship that causes you great pain and you don’t quite understand why and you still keep going back…so that’s universal. That’s something everybody can experience.”

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Q&A with writer William (Billy) Ivory / Director Richard Laxton / Dominic West / Helena Bonham Carter / Executive Producer Jessica Pope and chaired by James Rampton.

In typical Elizabeth Taylor style, Helena was fashionably late joining the panel on stage. In her absence, an audience member asked about typecasting.

Dominic West: (Smiling) “Because I didn’t know Helena before, I’m never quite sure how much was Elizabeth and how much was Helena.” (laughter)

Q: The genesis of the project?

Jessica Pope: “We were aware that the last BBC4 film was due and we wanted to make a splash with it. I think the original idea for doing a piece about Burton and Taylor came from Catherine Moulton, our script editor, who had read about the Private Lives run. We talked about it and came up with the idea of bringing it to Billy. There was no better person in my mind to write it, to examine this extraordinary relationship and bring some real universality and humanity to it. So I spoke to Billy about a year and a half ago, and you (Billy) actually grabbed it, didn’t you? Strangely enough it was something that Billy had already been thinking about because he was a huge fan of Richard Burton. Which I didn’t know when we first spoke. So, luckily you were free at the time…”

Helena then arrived on stage to applause.

Helena Bonham Carter (in character as Elizabeth): “I’m so sorry…” And as Helena: “I can be late now. A license to be late for the rest of my life.”

Q: So Billy, it was something that was in your mind already, a story about Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor?

William Ivory: “Yeah. Probably more, if I’m honest, about Richard Burton. Not only because my father was from south Wales, from very close to where Burton was born and was also of that generation. My mum used to talk about hell raisers, that group of men who used to live and play hard, which was very true of my dad. But really what brought me to it, I’ve not had a drink now for about 11 years but I’ve liked a drink myself in the past, as my dad did. And so I was just interested in that world of Welsh men, to be quite honest. Then when it opened it up, to find out more about Elizabeth and that particular period of that run, it was just such an extraordinary time. And I thought the chance to examine their relationship and the nature of addiction as well.”

Q: Helena – when you were offered it, what appealed about this role?

Helena Bonham Carter: “Well, I loved the script. At first it was like, ‘Elizabeth Taylor! Run a mile.’ My mum’s here. She won’t appreciate this but she just said, ‘Don’t touch it with a barge pole. It’s a movie icon. Are you stupid or what?’ And I met Richard (Laxton). But I loved the script. The script was great and it was very moving and touching and it was a love story. And it was almost to me incidental that it was about these two most famous people and most famous lovers. But I met Richard and he seemed very nice and very clever, the script was wonderful. And then I tussled with myself. ‘I’m so never going to look like her. She was inimitable. So this is just a misconceived idea.’ And then I suddenly thought, ‘Well actually, let’s just forget about what she looked like, let’s look at the woman.’ And then through various different areas I has, strangely, some mutual friends and reading biographies. I kind of researched it before I said yes. And then I thought, ‘I’ve got to do this.’ Because she was such a phenomenal woman. Her inside bits were…I mean, not the bits but just her character was as extraordinary as her exterior. Which is saying something because she was so beautiful. So as a character there was such an inspiration. And sometimes you feel like…you don’t know why, you just have to do something. It’s a compulsion. So there you go. And I just wanted to work with him (Dominic). (Laughter)

Q: Dominic – what drew you to Richard Burton?

Dominic West: “Well I’d always loved him, so I was obviously straight away interested and obviously the danger was he was such an amazing, sexy, charismatic man with the best voice of all time. So it was only after reading the script that I realised it was do-able in the part of his career that it was focusing on and in the part of their love that it was focusing on. Although he’s a lot older than me, Richard Laxton told me that wasn’t going to be a problem. (laughter) So I just thought it was a beautiful story and all the more poignant. It seemed to me so much about passing of time and of youth and of beauty and fame and therefore all the more poignant that it was these two huge figures that it was about. And Richard came and saw me in two plays that I was doing, so I was incredibly chuffed by that. And he was lovely. So I wanted it. And also I wanted to work with Helena.” (laughter)

Q: Richard – what made you think that these two actors would be so right for these roles?

Richard Laxton: “Well, it goes back a stage, really. When I read the script…my glorious agent sent it to me and I thought, ‘I don’t want to make a film about Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor. It’s impossible.’ Then I read his script and went. ‘This is just a story about the calamity of being a human being.’ And so I was interested in a spirit of them. You take a piece like this and you get to the core of what it’s about. And you need an incredibly charismatic, intelligent and mischievous woman. She wasn’t available. (laughter) And then you need an extraordinary powerful male figure. And he wasn’t available. (laughter)”

Helena Bonham Carter: “Well, I wasn’t the first choice. Was I bitter…” (laughter)

Richard Laxton: “These things have a habit of working out so beautifully though. Anyway, so it was the essence. And seeing Dominic on stage and having seen his work and obviously knowing Helena, I just thought…I prayed at how they would actually get on and there would be a kind of chemistry…which I think, from where I sat by a monitor, I thought they managed to….”

Helena Bonham Carter: “…pretend.”

Richard Laxton: “…master.”

Q: Because they had terrific fun together, didn’t they, as much as everything else?

Richard Laxton: “Well the thing is, when you fall in love with someone you do have fun and it’s the bits that aren’t fun that everyone focuses on. But the essence of their spirit was that they got each other, more than anybody that each other had really met probably. And therefore you have to show that. Someone asked me earlier, ‘Is it a tragedy?’ And I said, ‘No, it’s a celebration of individuality and an essence of two people.’ It might not fundamentally work at this point in their lives but it had worked brilliantly. And that’s what you have to capture and try and get up there.”

Q: Dominic – didn’t you read a story in a 1971 issue of Vogue which captured their sense of fun?

Dominic West: “The fun they had? It was that scene at the end where they’re doing the keep fit while drinking Jack Daniels and smoking. On set there was a 1971 Vogue, by chance, just set dressing. And I was reading it and there was an article by Richard Burton – it was called One Day In My Life. It was Liz in Puerto Vallarta where they lived in Mexico and the circus had come to town. They went to the circus and the ringmaster spotted Liz Taylor and called her out and attached her to this big board and spun her round and started throwing knives at her. And Burton went crazy. He was trying to stop them. And she said, ‘Oh Richard leave him. You’re making him nervous.’ (laughter) She was such a star. She did it with such panache.”

Helena Bonham Carter: “I was ballsy. I mean, she was ballsy.”

Dominic West: “And then they tried to get Burton to do it and he said, ‘No ******* way.’ And then the article ended with them both getting back home and getting into bed and Liz turning out the light and going, ‘Well, another interesting day.’ It does strike you that they had an amazing time together. They had a great, great time. There’s a scene in Who’s Afraid Of Virginia Woolf?, I hadn’t spotted before, and they just go off on one, with him doing this sort of thing of, ‘Oh shucks, I’m so shy.’ And offering her flowers. And they had this incredible double act and they’re just brilliant together as actors as well. And you just realise that’s what was so magnetic about them. Anyway. They got on well.”

Q: And she had a great sense of humour as well, didn’t she?

Helena Bonham Carter: “I hear she was really, really funny. Very, very funny. And very, very witty and very, very clever and very wise. She was extraordinary. An amazing strength of character. She wasn’t a victim. To sustain that amount of fame and that beauty from such a young age. Like her peers…why am I still talking in an American accent? There’s Judy Garland, Marilyn Monroe – she lasted eight decades and she survived all those drugs, all that drink, all that fame, all those loves, all those deaths. She was extraordinary. I did consult this astrologer as part of my research and a lot of people think it’s really stupid…but I’ve got an amazing astrologer friend who is incredibly perceptive. And the first thing she said looking at her chart is, ‘This woman has the most extraordinary sense of humour.’ And that’s kind of what I did. She’s fun. She took great delight in life. She loved life and she ate everything and had a great appetite for everything. People don’t eat anymore. Women, actresses, don’t eat.”

Q: Why did they keep going back to each other? What was it that drew them together so often after being repelled?

Helena Bonham Carter: “I think they really didn’t find anybody else as interesting. I don’t think she did. And it wasn’t toxic, totally. They obviously had substance abuse issues but their relationship – there was a fundamentally nurturing…aspect to it. And they were both very supportive of each other. The respect between them never left. To the end they were always saying. ‘You’re the greatest actor I’ve ever seen.’ And they genuinely thought the world of each other.”

Q: But in the end he had to withdraw. Why do you think he did that?

Dominic West: “Well I suppose…he’d found the stability in his life (with Sally Burton) and he’d got off the booze. Very much the way this is written, it’s about addiction and about addiction to lots of things and his addiction to Liz. And him getting married there was like him locking up the booze cabinet and throwing away the key. She (Elizabeth) was the most exciting person in his life, I think. That’s why he did the play and he couldn’t resist it. And he was still hopelessly in love. But he couldn’t live with her. It’s all in the film. And it really struck me watching, because I hadn’t seen it before, just how poignant it is. He said, ‘If I’m with you, you’ll kill me.’ So they split and he died anyway.”

Helena Bonham Carter: “That’s the optimistic thing – by the end they find a way of being with each other and without each other. But at least they spoke the phone. So they had each other in one another’s lives.”

Q: How did you go about researching it, Billy? There’s masses of material on both these characters?

William Ivory: “I read everything there was – all the books and all the online stuff and watched a lot of films again and a lot of films that I hadn’t seen in the first place. I’m very Lawrencian. He talks about lapsing out. You take stuff on and then you kind of just let it all go. Years before this, as well, before the work on this and then it was really just a question of making the material as I remembered it to fit that central conceit and then working with Richard, sifting out stuff we really needed. Because there was even more stuff in there than that, which ended up on the cutting room floor. Which was a really interesting process because…I learned a lot from this film. Which is with a really good director and really good actors, you don’t need very many words. You need fewer and fewer. And what was really interesting, because I had such a lot to say about them and Richard was obviously a very learned man and Elizabeth too…that’s what he loved about her. The greatest sin for him was being boring and she was such a match for him intellectually, which I think people didn’t quite get. They’d sit round the boozer with Dylan Thomas and she would be the life and soul, but also intellectually. And I stuffed all that in, in early drafts, and everything I’d researched, really. And then a lot of it was a process of just making room so that the emotion could come through.”

Richard Laxton: “I think it’s also as a writer, you’re telling us on a piece of paper what the story is. And then when, hopefully, if we do our jobs half decently you then can see what is then explicit without being said. And, in fact, allows the audience to bring their own projectional sense of the emotional understanding to the characters. I don’t want to make this into a…well we will because it’s brilliant…when I read the script I was so blown away. I couldn’t put it down and I just went, ‘I have to make this film. Somehow we have to do this.’ To write those scenes and capture in one event, the kind of full waveform of their relationship, both the fun, the terror, the pain and then the gratefulness, I think is extraordinary. And you’re only really as good as the text.”

Q: Jess – it’s 30 years now since Richard Burton died. Why are we still so fascinated by them as a couple? Why has it remained so iconic?

Jessica Pope: “I suppose because they were such ultimately glamorous people but there’s a flaw in each of them that you respond to so well. You can’t be as beautiful as Liz, you can’t be as extraordinary an actor as Burton. But you can go through a relationship that causes you great pain and you don’t quite understand why and you still keep going back. And you go back and you go back and eventually you have to analyse what it is that draws you together. So that’s universal. That’s something everybody can experience. And they were magnetic people. The charisma, even now when you go back and watch their old movies, is astonishing. You literally can’t take your eyes off them.”

Q: Would you see them in some ways as the first of the modern age celebrities? The Cleopatra Scandale that they talked about, it was a worldwide phenomenon. The Pope was commenting on it?

Jessica Pope: “Yeah, I suppose so. But I think they had more fun than people seem to now. Helena was just saying that nobody eats – I just think there’s an appreciation of excess of life, of just enjoyment, of being alive. I think that’s what it’s really about. And then finding out as you get older that some part of being alive can get too much. You have to analyse it and re-think. But the sheer life force in both of those is clearly compulsive now.”

Richard Laxton and Helena Bonham Carter.

Q: Richard – astonishing that you made such a great film in 18 days. Was that the biggest challenge for you as a director?

Richard Laxton: “No. I think every project has its own challenge. The time was terrifying because I couldn’t bear not to shoot the script. It wasn’t like there were bits of it where we were like, ‘We’ll gloss over that bit.’ I wanted to capture it all. These two, as soon as we started rehearsing and actually when we started the first day of shooting, you just went, ‘This is extraordinary. This has to be shot.’ So you end up in a strange zone. But you just try and grab all of it and capture it. But in a way you have to be incredibly decisive and incredibly confident when you’re working at that speed. And in a way that’s quite healthy because it doesn’t allow you to be over indulgent, I hope. So you have to try and be as sure as you can. I mean, you never know if you’ve completely ****** it up or not. So the time was stressful.”

Q: You said to me Helena earlier that it gave you a great sense of momentum. You were in the zone because you were having to make it so quickly?

Helena Bonham Carter: “There’s no doubt that the shorter the schedule…there are detriments to having a short time to shoot something but when it comes to acting, no. There’s no waiting. Momentum is exceedingly helpful. You get to a point that you’re acting more during the day than waiting and that never happens on film. Hardly ever occurs. So you’re doing it. It has an energy. So much of acting is about creating energy and you’re in a film on a film set and there’s a lot of people around, you’ve got to get the energy off the floor…but if you’re all racing around going it, it’s great. It doesn’t matter. And there’s not the self-consciousness of, ‘Now we’re turning on to you.’ And, ‘Let’s all go and stare at you now and you do your bit.’ Then again, it does mean that other people don’t get to do their job properly. So it’s hard.”

Q: You both look amazing in the role. How did you achieve that? Was it a long process to find those looks?

Helena Bonham Carter: “Well we had great hair and make-up. We had a great lighting man and we had the lenses. Yeah, it took me hours to get ready but…”

Richard Laxton: “We did some camera tests, which we don’t normally do. It was like, ‘Let’s just look at them on camera and see if it’s going to work.’ It helped find a look and nailed some of the issues.”

Helena Bonham Carter: “I will say one thing that does go…you don’t have time…which is very liberating, again for us, because there’s no time between set ups. They’re just straight in.”

Q: The other great authentic element of the film are the accents? They both have very protean accents. They seem to shift a lot. Did you find it hard to nail that?

Dominic West: “Yeah. I was always in danger of trying to be too Welsh. And Richard was always having to pull me back a bit on that. I sort of worked out that there’s Welsh and then it was over-layered with mainly Fifties Oxford University. And then I’ve suddenly realised he’s Olivier’s Richard III a lot of the time. Certainly when he’s in an interview or something, when he was nervous, there would be a lot of Olivier there. Anyway. I don’t know what happened.” (laughter)

Helena Bonham Carter: “I had a great voice coach, Neil Swain.”

Dominic West: “I did too…I insisted on Neil.” (laughter)

Helena Bonham Carter: “There’s no way I could do this without him…we just listened. She went all over the place because she was sort of liquid. She was born actually around the corner from me in Golders Green. Lived the first nine years of her life in Hampstead Garden Suburb and then moved to Hollywood and then came back. Depending on the situation, she had pretty much an American accent but it went all over the shop. So he just dissected it. It was fun…”

James then opened up questions to the audience.

Q: (From me, as it happens) Dominic – I gather you went back to Richard’s birthplace? Did you draw on anything in particular from that visit? And also have either you or Helena ever been applauded into a restaurant?

Dominic West: “I certainly haven’t.”

Helena Bonham Carter: “No. Nor me. Not yet.” (laughs)

Dominic West: “I spent about four or five days in Pontrhydyfen and Port Talbot and round there. And I don’t know what went in. I was just incredibly moved by the place because it’s incredibly beautiful and now all the slag heaps have grown over and there’s a mining museum up the road and that whole liveliehood has gone. It’s incredibly moving for that reason. But I was just moved by the romance of his story, that he’d come from this place and married the most famous, beautiful woman in the world and become the most famous actor in the world at one point. I think that’s a large part of his appeal and I really got the sense of that there. I didn’t meet any of his family but I saw the pub. Unfortunately it was closed. You get a smell, you get an atmosphere….osmosis.”

Q: Helena – you said that Elizabeth grew up around the corner from you. Apart from the tardiness which you have in common, would you say there’s anything else..?

Helena Bonham Carter: “I’m only tardy tonight. (laughter) Apart from Golders Green, we both were brought up in Golders Green…I do think…something that she did say, that she’s a bit of an escapist and went into acting, as a child, National Velvet, she said she loved horses and she always loved animals. And so when she was doing National Velvet, she said, ‘This is great because they’re paying me to ride a horse…it was great pretending to be somebody else.’ And she could understand that she was being paid to do it too. She was a dreamer and on some level I’m definitely like that. I definitely can identify with that. And apart from that…there are lots of things. We’re quite pragmatic on some levels. She was quite no-nonsense, actually. And I think sometimes I am no-nonsense…”

Dominic West: “Your humour and your mischief. She was the only woman in the world who could play her…”

Helena Bonham Carter (As Elizabeth, stroking Dominic): “Oh, Richard…” (laughter)

Q: Was there any trepidation about making this biopic, especially since Elizabeth Taylor hasn’t been very long deceased?

Helena Bonham Carter: “Yes. We were definitely trepidatious and anxious. We were terrified. But you know it’s funny because I just said that I didn’t want to get distracted. I often felt that they were upstaged by their own fame. And I don’t want this to be upstaged by their fame either. I think it’s a beautiful script and I did it because of the script. And it was incidental that it’s called Burton and Taylor.”

Richard Laxton: “Also we took the responsibility of telling this story about them. You have to be very compassionate and thoughtful about people’s relationship with them. But at some point you have to leave that over here and go, ‘This is a version of a story about two people based on those two iconic figures.’ It is nerve-wracking but you just have to be responsible, I think.”

Q: Helena – you mentioned briefly the self-consciousness of having a camera come on to you. It’s very difficult to imagine you ever being self-conscious. Are you really and how do you deal with that?

Helena Bonham Carter: “Of course I get spasms. Of course we get self-conscious. I’m self-conscious now. I think the biggest thing is with acting you always listen, you always focus on something outside yourself. Self-consciousness is a sort of narcissism. So when it comes to film acting, hopefully I’m not aware…well, obviously I’m aware of the camera staring at you…but you’re in a scene and you’re listening to this person helping out with it, because you’re focusing on the person opposite. And in your head, hopefully, no-one else exists…ideally I’m listening to this one (Dominic) and reacting. And it’s Richard Burton. When you’re self-conscious it’s usually because you’re not there. It’s all about suspension of disbelief. And it’s on your own disbelief. I know you’ve got to suspend the audience’s disbelief but first and foremost you’ve got to suspend your own disbelief, which is colossal most of the time. You think, ‘Jesus, what am I trying to be?’ And then you look again and he’s (Dominic) doing such a good job of Richard Burton, I thought, ‘Well I must be Elizabeth Taylor! That’s Richard Burton!” (laughter)

Q: The King Lear references? It seemed to resonate through the piece and I wondered what kingdom Richard was giving up? Was it Liz or were you intending more than that?

William Ivory: “I’ve always been obsessed with Lear as a play. Also I read years and years ago a criticism of it, saying it was the most terrifying of Shakespeare’s plays…this essay was all about, if you strip away the crutches that we all need, what are we ultimately? I think, for me certainly, the question I asked myself when I wrote it was, ‘Why did Richard take on this play?’ Because it didn’t really make a great deal of sense in terms of where he was in his career and what he stood to gain and what he stood to lose. In fact we talked about calling it Love Is The Drug at one stage. Because, for me, that was the issue. He was clean but he hadn’t rid himself of certain patterns of behaviour. So in terms of the Lear reference, it was to try, to get to that point – in terms of Richard’s journey – getting to that point of understanding that he had now become that ‘unaccommodated man’. That he was absolutely looking at himself, stripped bare, and recognising that without Elizabeth he was like a creature that couldn’t quite function. So, for me, the whole of the film was kind of a construct to exlore that, in order to explore their bigger relationship.”

Q: So she was the King?

William Ivory: “Yeah.”

Q: William – I had heard that Elizabeth never actually wanted a biopic done. Did you have any problems with the existing family and were you as honest as you wanted to be?

William Ivory: “Yeah. I was certainly as honest as I wanted to be. We made all of the surviving members aware of the fact that the film was being written. I know it’s part of the biopic season but, for me, it wasn’t ever really a biopic. It was a film about very famous people who were actually experiencing a love affair that we might all recognise at whatever level. So really it was…you let everybody know, you make sure that your facts are right. But it’s like building a house in terms of those factual things are the walls and the foundations but once I’m inside the room after that, I’m not too fussed, really. Because it’s about trying to understand. And you can’t create a drama if all the time you’re absolutely wedded to every single detail. But there was no point at which I actually felt that I had to hold back in any way at all. Which was terrific.”

Helena Bonham Carter: “Also, it was a bit based on one of the bios, The Furious Love, which is pretty out there. And that definitely had her permission. In fact it was positively encouraged to be written. Because also, which was funny for me, I was reading it and I got to the end and started laughing. I was in bed with Tim Burton (Helena’s long term partner) at that point…and I said, ‘It’s funny. I’ve just got to the end and Elizabeth wanted this to be written because the authors went to UCLA and were talking about it, saying, ‘We’re writing a biography of the Burton and Taylor love, their whole relationship.’ And the response of most of the students was, ‘I didn’t know that Elizabeth Taylor is married to Tim Burton?’ She was so horrified that she said, ‘The name must be reclaimed. This is terrible! Please write it.’ So they did. They had her blessing. I’m friendly now with her friends and I really think she had such a sense of humour, and such a huge humanity to her, that I don’t think she would have disapproved.”

Q: I read somewhere that she said, ‘No-one can play me.’?

Helena Bonham Carter: “No, I think you’re absolutely right. No-one can play her. But this is a drama. There’s no point in doing it. She was inimitable. There will be no-one like her. Or him. But that’s not what we were pretending…well I guess we are, literally, pretending to be them. But you get what I mean.”

William Ivory: “My favourite moment in the film is the little bit where they’re in Rock Hudson’s apartment and the family come in. I adore that moment for the way Elizabeth is with the baby and saying, ‘This is just an apartment.’”

Helena Bonham Carter: “Yeah. A rock set of values. Absolutely. That’s what I mean – a pragmatism. The fame thing…she completely knew what life was about ultimately. Which is love and connecting with your loved ones….and diamonds (laughter), money, drink, mashed potato, chocolate…”

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This very occasional Life of Wylie TV blog recently recorded over one million page views since it moved to a new platform under four years ago. A drop in the ocean in the scheme of things but I’d like to thank everyone who has ever taken the time to read something here.

BBC Burton and Taylor

Official Richard Burton Site

Elizabeth Taylor

William Ivory

Private Lives

Furious Love

The Guardian: Being Burton and Taylor

BAFTA

Ian Wylie on Twitter

Lenora Crichlow as publicist Chen Sam.

Stanley Townsend as Private Lives director Milton Katselas.

THE big house is in pitch black gloomy darkness.

Aside from one solitary light in a top floor window.

Downton Abbey series four, episode one.

It is 1922 and six months on from the death of Matthew Crawley (Dan Stevens).

His baby son George is crying in the nursery.

Somewhere else in the house Lady Mary (Michelle Dockery) lies awake in bed.

Night turns to day and an early morning mist cloaks the trees on the Downton estate.

As a specially composed variation of Downton Abbey’s opening titles music heralds the new 2013 series.

Or the 2014 season – from January 5 – if you’re watching in America.

Stony-faced Mary remains a woman in black, struggling to move on from the fatal accident that left both her and millions of UK Christmas Days devastated.

A return to the frosty young woman of Downton days gone by.

This week I was lucky enough to be among journalists invited to the London launch of series four at the Mayfair Hotel.

Set to begin on ITV next month (September).

The five-hour plus event started with a premiere screening of that first feature length episode plus a showreel of highlights to come.

Followed by a surprise guest appearance, on-stage Q&A and then an intensive session of round table interviews with cast members.

The latter are embargoed until next month while we were urged, as ever, not to give too much detail away about the contents of the episode.

My full transcript of the non-embargoed Q&A is below, along with that little surprise for Her Majesty’s Press.

Jim Carter as Mr Carson.

There is no doubt that Matthew’s death at the end of the 2012 Christmas special infuriated many fans.

Even though writer Jullian Fellowes was left with little choice once Dan Stevens had made his decision to leave.

Episode 4.1 will do much to soothe hurt feelings.

Like relaxing in a warm bath with a large box of chocolates.

Forrest Gump’s momma always said, “You never know what you’re gonna get.”

Except in Downton’s case, you do actually know that it will be a mixture of champagne truffles, double nut delights and a bitter lemon crunch.

As usual, you’ll get no major spoilers from me in this blog.

Except to say that Downton remains in rude health, unlike poor Matthew and Sybil in series three.

Michelle Dockery and Jim Carter (Mr Carson) are just two of the outstanding performances in the opening 90 minutes.

There are some beautifully tender moments, scenes of real laugh out loud comedy and the enduring magic of Dame Maggie Smith as Dowager Countess Violet.

The arrival of a “Mixer-Beat” machine causes a rumpus below stairs, where one notable face is missing.

While that promotion of bowler-hatted Thomas Barrow to under butler gives Rob James-Collier a delicious platform to further develop his character’s naughty haughty ways.

An ever more daring Lady Edith, played with increasing relish by Laura Carmichael, is a regular on that steam train between Yorkshire and London.

Will she finally find happiness on the arm of newspaper editor Michael Gregson (Charles Edwards)?

Who, you will recall, has to somehow edit an insane wife out of his life before he can think of marrying the lovely Edith.

Isn’t that always the way?

Julian Fellowes, who seems to be taking a step back from publicity duties this year, continues his own “Mixer-Beat” approach to Downton.

All of the main characters are seen on screen in the first episode with the promise of something for each one in the story mix as the weeks go by.

That showreel of future highlights also promised plenty of twists and turns to talk about through the autumn.

Even so – having attended every Downton Abbey series launch since the very start, this was the most tight-lipped about what is to come.

There are some clues in my transcript below but nothing to spoil your enjoyment.

Which is just as it should be.

It’s always dangerous to judge any piece of television after seeing it on a big screen in a posh hotel.

But my instinct tells me that series four of Downton may well top anything we have seen before.

Now pass that box of chocolates…

*The UK version of Downton Abbey 4 will be eight episodes long, with the opening and closing episodes again feature length, plus an extended Christmas special.

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Daisy (Sophie McShera) in the Downton series 4 mix.

Downton Abbey Series Four Launch August 2013:

Steve November, ITV Director of Drama, spoke before the screening:

“It’s actually quite hard to imagine this is already series four. As having had the great pleasure and privilege of seeing some of this series already, I can tell you that it’s as fresh and vibrant and exciting as it was in the very first episode of the first series. Hopefully you’ll agree when you see it.

“But it’s equally hard to image, I think, that it’s only series four. Because in its relatively short life for us, Downton has become such an event and taken such an extraordinary place in the TV schedule. It feels like it’s been there forever for us. I find it quite hard to remember a time before Downton, to be honest. But I do know that it was a much less dramatic and engaging and witty and warm and tragic and romantic time – a lesser time before Downton. So thankfully we’re now post-Downton, or in the midst of Downton.”

Gareth Neame, executive producer:

“Thank you Steve. Any producer, though, would be slightly alarmed to hear that we’re in a life ‘post-Downton’. I’m going to have to run out afterwards and say, ‘Are you cancelling the show?’ (laughter)

“Somebody said there were about 15 photographers outside in the street and we haven’t had that before at a Downton launch.

“So many of you have been with us on this extraordinary journey over the last four years but I thought perhaps I’d just summarise some of the achievements to date. We’re now in more than 220 territories worldwide. I don’t know how people estimate the number of people that watch this show. I have no idea how that is worked out. But the number I’ve been given is in excess of 120 million people. It makes it the most successful of our home-grown British dramas that has travelled globally.

“As you know, not only are we a much loved show in our home territory, clearly there’s something of a phenomenon going on in the US. The show has recently received another 12 Emmy nominations for this year. So the total haul of Emmy nominations is 39. Some time ago the show became the most nominated non-US show in Emmy Award history.

Both widowed.

“We’re on PBS. Many of you will know that network in the US is the traditional home for British drama in America and I’m sure many of you will have read, or indeed reported, about the fact that we’re the highest rating drama that has ever run on PBS in its 40 year history. So we’re very pleased for PBS as we are for ITV, that for both of our main broadcasters the show has had such an impact.

“We didn’t quite beat the Superbowl in the ratings. We came second to the Superbowl. They had 99 million more viewers than us. But with the knowledge I have about season four I feel really confident that this could be the year where we eclipse that. (laughter)

“But the last episode, the finale, which you will all remember so well, was the highest rating show on American television that night. That means across all the network television, cable, the works. It’s a really phenomenal achievement for a British-written, acted…a show that was not designed for the American market at all. It was made for us here.”

Gareth added: “I really would ask you to continue to go with us on the Downton journey. Which is to know when it’s right to reveal story and to know when it’s not right. I really hope that everyone will resist the temptation to write out the synopsis. As has happened in the past. I really hope you enjoy the first episode and talk generally about its themes.

“By way of reminder, in case any of you forgotten, where we’re about to come back in…the last thing that we saw, some of you may have forgotten this, (laughter) Matthew Crawley was left dead on the road – that’s where we come back in, several months later.

“We’ve loved making this season. I am incredibly pleased with it and confident about it. I echo Steve’s comments that the show is in very very strong health.”

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My pic of Dame Kiri singing at the launch.

After the screening, Dame Kiri Te Kanawa was introduced on stage as the “surprise guest” along with her pianist Gary Matthewman. She plays Dame Nellie Melba – a real life Australian soprano – in episode three, hired to sing at a house party at Downton Abbey.

Before singing the aria O Mio Babbino Caro (Oh My Beloved Father) by Puccini and Songs My Mother Taught Me by Dvorak. It appears she sings both in Downton.

Dame Kiri said: “This has been a great pleasure for me, to have been chosen. There could have been thousands of other opera singers chosen to take this part of Dame Nellie Melba in Downton. But I happened to get the job. I think it was possibly influenced because I actually once met Julian (Fellowes).

“It was the most wonderful experience and to be with such incredibly special actors on a set is just quite unusual – and I keep on saying it was special. Both Gary and I kept on pinching ourselves, saying, ‘How did we get this job?’

“So this is one of the songs I sang during the episode. It’s O Mio Babino Caro. And also the other song that Dame Nellie Melba was very, very famous for was Songs My Mother Taught Me.”

After singing O Mio Babino Caro, she explained: “When we performed this, it was performed in the Great Hallway of Highclere Castle (Downton Abbey) and it was really quite a beautiful acoustic. So we were very spoilt by the acoustic there.”

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Mary, Cora and Edith.

Post-screening Q&A with:

Gareth Neame (Executive Producer) / Liz Trubridge (Executive Producer) / Historical Advisor Alastair Bruce / Allen Leech (Tom Branson) / Dame Kiri Te Kanawa.

It began with questions for Dame Kiri, who would have to leave after a short time:

Q: Kiri – how did you end up in Downton?

Dame Kiri Te Kanawa: “I felt sometimes it might have been because I met Julian (Fellowes) but I’m not sure. But what happened is I saw an email that came through and it said, ‘There has been an accident at Downton.’ And I looked and thought, ‘Well, why are they telling me this?’ But I didn’t have my glasses on. It was an ‘enquiry’. And I went, ‘Oh my God, My most favourite, favourite programme in the entire whole world and someone’s mentioned my name in Downton!’ And then I met with Julian and Liz and some others and they said, ‘Would I like to do it?’ Well I nearly choked. I couldn’t say yes fast enough. It was the most wonderful experience.”

Q: Kiri – what’s your favourite thing about Downton and why are you such a fan?

Dame Kiri Te Kanawa: “Well I think it’s obvious. The story is…it’s very special…I find delicate. Beautifully written with the most beautiful actors and actresses. A lot of them we haven’t seen and a lot we have seem. And some new wonderful faces on the stage now. These wonderful actors who are incredibly special. I sat next to Allen here through the whole thing and he said, ‘What will you do after?’ And I said, ‘I might go and play golf.’ And he said, ‘What do you think about the staff here?’ I said, ‘I’d fire the lot.’ (laughter) All of it was special.”

Q: How did you go about researching the role of Dame Nellie Melba?

Dame Kiri Te Kanawa: “I have somebody in New Zealand who knew quite a lot about her and I’ve got a lot of information that the Metropolitan Opera had. But I’d been very interested in her anyway. I got her log sheet of all the performances she did throughout the 1890s and the 1920s and saw how much she earned and how many roles she played throughout her life. And it was almost every second night she was doing another role in another town in America. Her wage for the one year of 18 something or other, I can’t remember exactly what it was, would have been about three million in today’s money. So I’ve got a lot of stuff on her…I was very interested in her.”

Gareth Neame: “We won’t go into how Robert Grantham manages to afford her, then.” (laughter)

Q: Did you choose the songs?

Dame Kiri Te Kanawa: “The person I happen to know…he said that Songs My Mother Taught Me was one of her most favourite songs and she sang it everywhere. And we’ve got a recording of her doing it. So we tried to copy it. It’s very beautifully done and the recording is very special. So we had to put that one in. And then Babino Caro was another and we decided she would also sing that. I was trying to stay true to the character because as Julian Fellowes said, she’s the only true character that actually lived during the whole of the Downton series, I think.”

Q: Would you like to do more acting?

Dame Kiri Te Kanawa: “I’m not sure if I was acting. (laughter) With that group of people. I’m not sure about that. They’re pretty special.”

Dame Kiri takes a bow – ITV pic.

Q: Do you have spoken lines of dialogue and which characters do you interact with?

Dame Kiri Te Kanawa: “I interact with Lord Grantham and Branson. We were sat talking. And I have a few lines, yes.”

Allen Leech: “She held her own.”

Gareth Neame: “The really enjoyable thing, though, was the day that we were all fortunate enough to hear you singing – and it was the sight of all these tough electricians and grips and all the people that you see on a film set with little tears in their eyes, wiping a tear away as they heard you. It was quite a special day.”

Dame Kiri Te Kanawa: “The most incredible thing was I took my two dogs along and Lady Carnarvon (mistress of Highclere Castle which doubles for Downton Abbey) didn’t want those anywhere near the place. But anyway…the thing is during the time I was expecting doggie number three and she’s called ‘Abbey’ as in Downton. She’s my little Downton prize.”

Q: Kiri – the costumes are obviously a huge party of Downton, so were you excited to see what you were going to be wearing?

Dame Kiri Te Kanawa: “Very much, yes. It’s exceptionally beautiful. I had a dress fitting in Vienna because that’s where I was at the time for the dress fitting. And then I saw it when I arrived on the set and it’s pretty stunning. I just love it.”

Q: Had you met any of the cast before?

Dame Kiri Te Kanawa: “No, none of them. But they were really nice.”

Q: Can you talk us through the day and how it felt walking on the set. And also how many takes you had to do?

Dame Kiri Te Kanawa: “The day started quite early because we stayed down in a hotel nearby. And you can’t sleep on something like this. So don’t tell me what time I got up but it was a long day. I made it longer by just staying awake most of the night. And I got there and I think my first line went…(she makes a garbled sound). And Lord Grantham looked at me in wonderment and thought, ‘I wonder if she is going to get anything out of her mouth?’ And the second time I sort of got it out but it was just the most exciting but frightening thing to do. Because you’re with people who really are incredibly comfortable at what they’re doing.”

Liz Trubridge: “She’s actually being very modest because what she did was, she sang everything live. Although we did do the recording in Vienna, she sang it all live, all morning. And it wasn’t until after lunch that we gave her any time off, where she was just miming to playback. But she was so good live we just kept doing it.”

Dame Kiri Te Kanawa: “I did make one request. I said, ‘Could I please start as early as possible?’ And so I started singing at 9:30. I think I finished about 12, 12:30, something like that.”

Allen Leech: “The buzz around the unit base for everyone, I’ve never seen excitement in four years of so many people suddenly rushing to set. Everyone. Hugh (Bonneville), Elizabeth (McGovern), a lot of us, all running down to make sure that we could hear you live. It was spectacular.”

Liz Trubridge: “It happened to be my birthday and I had said nothing. In fact my assistant was told not to tell anybody. Needless to say that was a disaster. Kiri, just before lunch, not only sang me an aria but led everyone to sing happy birthday. And it was the most amazing thing. Do I need to say that? It’s now on my laptop because we had behind the scenes footage rolling as well. I have to actually see it because I couldn’t remember a thing after it. I was so shocked.”

Dame Kiri then left the Q&A.

Alfred, Jimmy, Mr Carson and Thomas.

Q: Allen – now you’re the veteran, how does it feel when some of the big names leave the show and do new cast members coming in give it a new lease of life?

Allen Leech: “I think like any show, characters come and go. It definitely gives it a new lease of life and a new energy as well when people come in and they’re bringing something to their characters, something you haven’t seen before. So it definitely makes it very exciting, all these new faces we have. It’s been really interesting and I think the show really benefits from that in relation to…the intensity of the drama has definitely upped this year. It’s sad, (when people leave) you miss them but then for the story a lot of the time it works very well and your character continues to develop. You keep going. That’s showbiz.” (laughter)

Q: Alastair – did the servants often go into the bedroom when the lords and ladies were sleeping at that time?

Alastair Bruce: “Imagine you’re asleep and at five ‘o clock you hear a rustling in the bedroom. And it is a kitchen maid coming in to make up the fire. So that when you decide finally to wake up, maybe an hour or so later, the warmth of the room is satisfactory. I’m sure we’d all like that. But that would be stage one. So, yes, that would be perfectly normal. A male servant would never go into the room where Lady Grantham was. And, of course, Lord and Lady Grantham sleep side by side. So a male would always knock on the door before going in. But a housemaid can go in at any time. And you probably notice that Lord Grantham leaves his bedroom and goes into his dressing room where, of course, it’s all male and no female would ever go in there. So there is a politeness about it. But, yes, staff went in and out.”

Tom (Allen Leech) and little Sybbie.

Q: Allen – could you talk us through your character’s relationship with Lady Mary now and what it’s like for your character to really take over that role as the younger head of the house, after Lord Grantham?

Allen Leech: “The relationship with Tom and Mary – they’re unified in their grief and they’re the only people who really know what the other person is going through. They’re both now widowed, they both have a young child and they form a great friendship from that because they help each other. I think Tom really tries to help her through this mire of grief and sorrow. In relation to his new job, there’s a huge amount of responsibility for him and the show, for Tom this year, you definitely get a sense of trying to find ownership in who he is and his place in that society. Although he has a job it doesn’t necessarily mean that he’s comfortable with his surroundings. And that’s definitely something that Tom tries to find – his place within this household.”

Q: Any plans for romance for Tom?

Allen Leech: “I think the relationship that he had with Sybil was pretty special. In fact he crossed the class divide as well. I think it’s going to take some time to match that.”

Lily James as Lady Rose.

Q: (From me, as it happens) Julian has been quoted as saying this series has got a slightly more subtle pace to it. Can you talk us through and expand on that? And also perhaps tell us a little bit about some of the new incoming characters, something that we don’t know already?

Gareth Neame: “It’s by and large set in 1922 so it’s not spanning…some of the other seasons we spanned more years. But I think the energy and the rhythm of the show is exactly the same as it’s always been. Hopefully you’ve seen from the first episode. New characters coming in – we have some below stairs, we’ve seen some of that stuff happen in the first episode. More new servants come in. And also, of course, there are new family friends coming in above stairs, the house party that we were talking about that Dame Kiri’s in, the episode she’s in, a number of guests come there. And although, rather like Branson, Mary is not really open to moving on from Matthew at all, that doesn’t mean that there isn’t interest from other men in her. Even though she’s not really interested. She can’t see a life beyond Matthew. So it’s the usual dynamic where the core cast is the same, some have left and some new characters come in. It keeps the whole thing energised, as Allen was saying.”

Q: Highlights and challenges of filming series four?

Liz Trubridge: “With a show that’s been lucky enough to be this successful the challenge is always to keep the standards as high, and higher, if you possibly can. We always feel that responsibility very keenly and I think there’s no doubt we are getting bigger and bigger in terms of what we are…our ambition is growing. But the highlights…one of them is just sitting here. Every season we think, ‘Well this is the biggest thing we’ve done.’ And then the next one comes along. We’ve just done something which we never thought we could pull off in the way we have. Largely thanks to Alastair who helped us to this, which is going to come up later in the series. So it’s those things. It’s huge set pieces and characters and scenes – I think Allen would agree – with more people in them. Which, of course, takes longer to shoot and is more of a demand on the directors too.”

Rob James-Collier as Thomas Barrow.

Q: Allen – do you miss your character’s chauffeur duties?

Allen Leech: “Well, being an estate manager I now have to travel around lots. So Branson has his own car. I prefer not having the worry of Maggie Smith sitting in the back as you’re hurtling towards the house and being told to stop on a very specific mark. The fact that it’s just me up front driving around, I’m quite happy with that. But weirdly enough, the Renault that I drove is an absolute dream compared to the Ford Motel T that I have at the minute. It’s pretty tricky.”

Q: After the dramatic death at the end of the last series, do you need to worry about upsetting people and how dramatic it is?

Gareth Neame: “Well, I’m conscious of about eight, 10, 12 million Christmas Days having been brought to a sudden and abrupt end. (laughter) But I think we’d be pretty shocked if there hadn’t been a lot of noise about that overnight. It was the whole circumstance. At least with the death of Sybil, you had a sense – the episode was about this very complicated delivery. So you had a sense that something might be happening. But, of course, we did a complete reverse trick to that in the last episode where we almost indulged ourselves in the highest modes of happiness that Mary and Matthew ever had and then, suddenly, after what was actually a relatively light episode with that holiday in Scotland, suddenly there’s the sting in the tail. I just think these moments are the stuff of this kind of drama. Although it is very romantic and it is hopefully laugh out loud funny at times and it’s got big, sweeping dramatic stories, it is about those big twists and turns and surprises. It’s almost like watching a horror movie that scares you and therefore it stimulates your senses. But you come back for more and you enjoy it. So as shocking as all of that was, those big life and death situations will happen to any family from time to time and in a drama, that’s what we go for.

“There were rumours about Dan’s departure from the show, so that had been talked about and we did our best to keep fudging what was going on. But I think the one thing we were really astonished by was that Sybil’s death was genuinely kept a secret. And I’m so sorry that we couldn’t share that episode with previewers who were all wondering why the episode apparently wasn’t finished. But we just knew that we couldn’t show that to anyone. And, of course, in this day and age where there are…once again we’re seeing one or two of these big watercooler – awful expression I know…we are seeing a return to must see in the moment drama. And so those kind of episodes are really things that we have to protect and cherish to keep…with the stakes as they are…to keep this a show that everyone has to watch.”

Gary Carr – introduced later in the series as American jazz singer Jack Ross.

Q: Plot twists – there have been moments in the past that have been criticised as being slightly outlandish. I was thinking in particular of someone becoming paralysed and then actually not being paralysed at all and being able to walk afterwards. Have you felt the need to rein anything back in to make it still more realistic?

Gareth Neame: “Well, medically – you’d expect me to say this – that story is a convincing story. It was all looked into and researched. That an injury that is, in fact, severe bruising could be mis-diagnosed. I grant you, this show has got very heightened moments of drama. It has got big dramatic twists and turns. So I can see that some people would say that’s an outlandish moment. But I think it’s really in keeping with the spirit of the show. We have these big story dimensions, we have laugh out loud comedy sitting cheek by jowl within the same scene as grief and bereavement. So, for me, yes, there are more operatic moments than others. But I feel that they are all justified.

“We have never really set out to change the approach to the storytelling from what we did in the first season. Me and Liz and Julian work on these scripts and these story ideas and we haven’t at any point sat down and said we think we want to do this differently from what we’ve done before.”

Alastair Bruce: “Can I add something? In addition to the story. For instance today we’ve been filming and we’ve put as much care and thought into what the supporting actors are carrying in the background as we did on day one. And it’s that kind of almost ludicrous detail that matters to creating the sub-conscious satisfaction, I hope, that when carried on this journey into the past, to be entertained by the story, you feel that it’s legitimate. But that’s a challenge and something we really enjoy doing, and I love getting involved with.”

Tom Cullen – introduced later in the series as Lord Gillingham.

Downton Abbey ITV

Downton Abbey PBS

Dame Kiri Te Kanawa

Dame Nellie Melba

Downton Abbey: “Life Is Strange”

Downton Abbey Blogs

Ian Wylie on Twitter

Julian Ovenden – introduced later in the series as Charles Blake.

The first surprise about new BBC1 fantasy adventure drama Atlantis is that it begins in the modern day.

Our young hero Jason (Jack Donnelly) is about to dive in a one man submarine to find the wreckage of his father’s long lost sub.

Later finding himself naked on a beach with only the sand between his toes for company.

The 13-part Saturday night series continues to surprise as we venture into the mythical city of Atlantis and meet some legendary names.

Including brilliant but innocent Greek maths genius Pythagoras (Robert Emms) – “the triangle guy”.

And a different take on strong man Hercules, played by Mark Addy, who explains: “I’m not fat. I’m big boned.”

Atlantis is the BBC’s replacement for Merlin and comes, in part, from the team behind that show.

A mix of myths, legends and good old fashioned TV storytelling on a sometimes epic scale.

With the first episode including a two-headed lizard, hungry lions and a Minotaur, as well as some early chemistry between the three male leads.

In a city which you will notice is not actually underwater.

At least not yet.

“It’s like shooting a series of feature films back-to-back,” explained Mark Addy at the London premiere last week.

The content of which was embargoed until today. (Wednesday September 18)

“They each have their own quality and their own individual flavour,” added Mark.

“They’re linked but they’re so distinct, each one of them is different from the one before and the one that comes after it. So it’s fantastic.”

Atlantis hits the ground running with an excellent opening episode which feels much more confident than Merlin’s debut back in September 2008.

There was plenty of drama on and off camera – with Jack being taken to hospital after picking up the wrong knife for a scene and stabbing himself in the elbow.

A real knife as opposed to the rubber one which he should have used.

The cast – including Sarah Parish, Jemima Rooper and Aiysha Hart – seemed a little stunned after we had all watched the opening episode for the very first time.

It certainly didn’t disappoint.

So it was intriguing to then hear Jack say: “That’s pretty epic but it’s not a patch on what comes next – it’s insane what’s coming.”

Now that the embargo has expired, you can read my (slightly edited) transcript of the post-premiere Q&A below – along with some initial thoughts from the new Controller of BBC1.

Launching on the same weekend as the live series of Strictly Come Dancing 2013, it’s not yet known if Atlantis will be sent into regular battle with ITV’s The X Factor.

But as The Oracle (Juliet Stevenson) tells Jason:

“Only you can bring an end to the people’s fear and suffering.”

*Atlantis starts on BBC1 at 8:25pm on Saturday September 28 and on BBC America on Saturday November 23.

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New BBC 1 Controller Charlotte Moore introduced the premiere screening, with the final episode delivered just a few hours before:

“Atlantis is BBC1‘s new fantasy adventure drama series for all the family which I hope it will fill that Merlin-shaped hole that’s been in our Saturday nights this autumn.

“Set in a time of legendary heroes, mythical creatures and gods, it’s an action-packed 13-part series. It brings to life a whole host of Greek myths and legends, re-imagined for a whole new generation. It feels like an amazing treat that you can actually create every single moment of something because it wasn’t true, Atlantis. But I think that’s also quite a challenge.

“The fantastic cast is testament to the ambition and scale of the scripts. Some of the UK’s best loved actors joining our newest talent to take the BBC1 audience to a rich and wonderful world of adventure.

“The City of Atlantis is a mysterious ancient place. It’s a world of two-headed monsters, minotaurs, snake-head goddesses and palaces so vast it’s said they’ve been built by giants. And into this strange, complelling realm that the young Jason arrives and an amazing adventure begins. Little Monster films have brought this world alive in spectacular style.”

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Jack Donnelly as Jason.

Post-screening Q&A with Jack Donnelly (Jason) / Robert Emms (Pythagoras) / Mark Addy (Hercules) / Aiysha Hart (Ariadne) / Jemima Rooper (Medusa) / Sarah Parish (Pasiphae)

Chaired by Boyd Hilton:

Q: Sarah – that slap? (Pasiphae slaps daughter Ariadne in the first episode)

Sarah Parish: “It wasn’t real. I was not allowed to slap Aiysha, obviously, as much as I wanted to in the scene. (smiles) So it was stage slap which I hoped worked pretty well. I think it looked very effective on the screen.”

Aiysha Hart: “It was brilliant being slapped by Sarah Parish. Who doesn’t want to be slapped by Sarah? It was fine. It wasn’t a real slap. And, yeah, it looked good. I was impressed.”

Sarah Parish as Pasiphae.

Q: Possibly people might think this was going to be a kind of blokey, ‘boysey’ type of show. But there are a lot of interesting female characters. Was that important for you when you were offered the role?

Sarah Parish: “Yeah, absolutely. I think they’ve written some fantastic characters for women. Pasiphae obviously is…I think a lot of people would call her evil and scary and controlling. I would say she is vulnerable and misunderstood, obviously. (laughter) Then we’ve got Medusa, who is a fabulous character and interacts with the boys really well. I think you (Jemima Rooper) get to do some really great adventure stuff with them, don’t you?”

Jemima Rooper: “Yeah, maybe…” (smiles)

Sarah Parish: “Lots of running and looking round corners. And then we’ve got our beautiful princess who is…it’s a great part for you (Aiysha Hart) isn’t it?”

Aiysha Hart: “Yeah, I loved it. Because she wasn’t just a one dimensional princess character. She’s got a lot more depth. She’s very smart and intelligent. It’s a kind of coming of age for her throughout the series. And so we get to know her a lot more.”

Aiysha Hart as Ariadne.

Q: You (Aiysha) do seem to be lusting after Jason quite early on?

Aiysha Hart: “I do. I think he lusts after her too. So it was certainly requited. But she’s not just a love interest. She adds another dynamic to the palace and she’s a moral voice for a quite tyrannical palace.”

Q: Jemima – We didn’t see you, to be fair, in that episode. But we did see you in the clips at the end. I’m told by the creators of the show that you are very important from episode two onwards. Is this correct?

Jemima Rooper: “I don’t know. I think they’re filling everyone with lies. (smiles) I’m very important. I think the nice thing about Medusa and getting to play it is that when I was first approached with it, I immediately assumed, ‘Oh yeah, here we go, wheel out the bad guy.’ Which was great. But they switched it all on its head and Medusa is not as we know her. But the interesting thing will be how she becomes that person. But there’s romance, there’s adventure. There’s dough. There’s loads of dough. Baps. Floury baps.”

Q: Because you go way back with the creators?

Jemima Rooper: “Too, too far. I’ve been missing for a few years from their shows so it’s nice to be back. It’s nice to be home. They’re like my weird uncles.”

Jemima Rooper as Medusa.

Q: Jack – you’re the lead role in a huge Saturday night BBC1 show. How does it feel? Are you nervous about how it’s going to be received?

Jack Donnelly: “Yeah, I am. It’s still not sunk in. This (screening) has just made it weirder again. Yeah, nervous but exciting. This is the biggest thing I’ve done in my career. Ever. By a long, long way. My last job before this, I was in Misfits wearing a white rabbit head…dressed up as a white rabbit and I had no lines and no-one saw my face. And now this.”

Q: Did you have to audition multiple times?

Jack Donnelly: “I did, yeah. The first audition I went up for this year, back in January. And it went through to February. There were four or five rounds, I think. Then the penultimate one was two-and-a-half hours and the final round was three hours with the producers and the director from the second block and the casting director. We did about eight scenes. They brought Rob (Emms) in to do a chemistry read with me. To see how we went off each other…lots of kissing. (laughter) I was outside beforehand just trying to get myself in the zone, listening to Rocky and shadow boxing and crying, ‘You’re good enough to work. You could do this.’ Just trying to get myself there. I don’t know why I told you that either.” (laughter)

Q: You are obviously naked in pretty much the first scene (once Jason finds himself in Atlantis) – did you have to go on very strict regime of buffing up?

Jack Donnelly: “Well actually, Johnny Capps, the producer, is a big gym-goer and he set me up with his trainer Matt. So I trained with Matt for the first five weeks from when I got the part to when I started. But I’ve not been on a set that long before and they have free cakes and cookies and stuff. And I was like, ‘Yeah, I’ll have more.’ It was great and then my brothers had a word with me and were like, ‘Dude, what are you doing? You’re going to be topless.’ So I started doing the Insanity Programme after we came back shooting in Morroco. So I do various training. And there’s lots of scaffolding around the set so I try and do pull ups if I can. And again, I was eating all the catering, which is amazing on set. And then someone else came along and said, ‘You should just be on chicken and broccoli at lunchtime.’ So then they swapped me to that. So I’ve had chicken and broccoli for lunch for the last two months, which is really boring.”

Mark Addy as Hercules.

Q: The three of you (boys) – it’s like a three-way bromance. Is that a fair way of describing it? You had the chemistry but did you have to work at how you were going to bounce off each other?

Mark Addy: “Yeah. We’re lucky in that it’s there in the writing for us. But you don’t know until you get three actors together whether they’re going to be able to bring that to life and make that work. It’s great that we can. We had more of a laugh making it…”

Jack Donnelly: “We muck around a little bit too much, actually. I walked out of a lot of scenes off camera and Rob’s there with his bum out. Every time. So there’s a lot of that going on. We’ve had breakfast, lunch and dinner together every day for the last six months. We all live in the same place where we’re staying. So we’ve spent a lot of time together, which I think helps.”

Juliet Stevenson as The Oracle.

Q: Mark – this is obviously a different version of Hercules. It feels like an almost origin story and that at some point in the future you’ll end up like the Hercules we know?

Mark Addy: “Yeah, hopefully. Once I go on the Insanity Programme. (laughter) And I know the day that that’s going to happen. That’s the day hell freezes over. No…this version of Hercules – his father was Zeus, his mother was a mortal. He’s kind of taken on more of the human traits, if you like. He likes a drink and he likes women. He likes to gamble. Not the best traits but they’re the ones that he’s got. So, yeah, the god-like stuff is not really to the fore.”

Q: Is that what appealed to you – that it’s such an unusual take?

Mark Addy: “Yeah, absolutely. They sent me episode one, which surprised me in that you expect there to be a huge amount of setting up who’s who, what’s what. And you’re in there with the Minotaur in episode one. And you go, ‘Wow, that is amazing ambition.’ It showed what they wanted to do and where they wanted to go with it.”

Q: It’s very cinematic?

Mark Addy: “Absolutely, yeah. And to play a different take on Hercules. My kids were like, ‘You’re playing Hercules? Isn’t he like really muscley?’ I showed them Britain’s Strongest Man. Blokes my size. “These are the strong ones! Hercules doesn’t go to the gym every day. He’s strong because he’s the son of a god. That’s where his strength comes from.’ That’s my story and I’m sticking with it.”

Robert Emms as Pythagoras.

Q: Robert – you’re playing one of the foremost geniuses in history?

Robert Emms: “It’s weird because I am really rubbish at maths. And if I knew I was going to play Pythagoras I probably would have maybe focused in my maths class a bit more. But fortunately no-one as yet has asked me any mathematical questions.”

Q: You said the hair was very important?

Robert Emms: “I got a call three days before we started shooting and they said they wanted to put me in a wig, because there’s a little bit of receding going on here. And I was thinking, ‘I’ve signed up for this for a long time and a long time in Morocco, where we filmed, and do I really want to be in a wig?’ So I was protesting it quite a lot. At one point I said, ‘I’m not going to do it if I’m in a wig.’ Obviously hoping that they didn’t actually listen to that. But fortunately they didn’t put me in a wig and they just bouffed my hair up and made me look a bit like Art Garfunkel. Me and Jack actually talk a lot about hair because good actors maybe put a pair of shoes on and they work from the shoes, what they feel like. Me and Jack just work from the hair. What it looks like. I’m in make-up for quite a long time to make it look that good. (laughter) There’s some tonging that goes on.”

Minos – King of Atlantis.

Q: Mark – did it appeal that it’s a big primetime Saturday night BBC1 family viewing show?

Mark Addy: “Yeah. It strikes me that there are shows that I grew up watching that are still iconic in their own way. And this is something that belongs in that category. I’ve not seen anything quite like it on TV. You’ve seen a little bit of it here but some of the stunts and the amazing work that goes into something like this is stuff that you’d normally only see on a movie. Because it is very difficult to achieve. But these creators are the best in the business at doing this kind of stuff. So we’re in really safe hands. And they’re doing stuff, like I say, which you don’t see on television. It’s extraordinary.”

Q: Aiysha – there is a lot of CGI. How does that work? Are you acting with bits of wood with things on the end?

Aiysha Hart: “Actually not bits of wood. We have something more animated, called our 3rd ADs (Assistant Directors) who run around and pretend to be animals and stuff. We just have to react to them with the green screen, which is very fun. Then halfway through the day it’s just not funny anymore. That’s my experience of green screening CGI. I don’t get to do as much as the boys because they’ve got loads of action scenes. But hopefully I’ll be doing more.”

Robert Emms: “The very first day of filming was in the caves with the Minotaur. That was my first day. First thing I did. Nothing there. And our director Justin Molotnikov who was up there, from the first block, a Scottish guy, just came up to me and went, ‘I know you can’t see it but it just looks like me. OK? The Minotaur’s a bigger version of me.’ (laughter) And then he just stood there with two green sticks and went, ‘Raaaar!’ And that’s what you’ve got coming at you.”

Q: Where were those caves?

Robert Emms: “Bristol. It’s called Redcliffe Caves and we spent a lot of April in there. It was really cold, actually. And then we go back there on a regular basis. Sometimes just to remember.” (laughter)

Q: How was filming in Morocco?

Robert Emms: “It was really hot. I’m not allowed to tan in the show. These two (Jack and Mark) get a spray tan every Monday. And I don’t spray tan because I’m inside – although you see me outside quite a lot. So I couldn’t tan. These two were in the sun by the pool quite a lot and everyone else was. I was just miserable in my hotel room.” (laughter)

Aiysha Hart: “I got told off for tanning a bit, as well.”

Q: The rest is filmed in a big studio in Chepstow. So how did Chepstow compare to Morocco?

Sarah Parish: “As you can imagine, there is a slight difference between Morocco and Chepstow. But we found this incredible warehouse in Chepstow in which we have four different huge sets. It’s such an enormous space that some of the crew have bikes to get from one end to the other because it takes such a long time. And within that space we have all the royal sets where Aiysha and I hang out every day. Then there’s a huge market place and then a huge bull ring, gladiator ring. It’s enormous. And on site we have all the costume as well. It’s quite incredible. It’s like this huge machine that works every day. It’s very exciting going to work there.”

Ramos – the King’s General.

Boyd then threw open questions to the media in the audience:

Q: (From me as it happens) Two questions for the boys. How much, if anything, did you know about Atlantis before this project came along? And were there any mishaps in all of those action scenes?

Jack Donnelly: “I Googled ‘Man From Atlantis’ when I got the first audition. (laughter) And saw Patrick Duffy and went, ‘I’m in. I’m so in. He’s got my hair.’ (laughter) And I thought I could do a whole series underwater. This would be great. So before I’d read the scripts that was originally what I thought was happening.

‘And then in terms of mishaps in the action scenes, I stabbed myself in week three. Somehow doing a stunt sequence which you’ll see in episode two, I managed to pick up the wrong knife. I didn’t grab a rubber one, I grabbed a real one that was used for a close up and managed to stab through my elbow – through there and out the other side. We had to stop filming so I went to A&E. Luckily through the editing I look like I can handle a knife, and a sword.”

Robert Emms: “I thought I was going to have to play Jason.”

Jack Donnelly: “Yeah. It was real touch and go there for a second.”

Robert Emms: “I don’t do too much stunt work in it but I did have this thing where this kind of thing attacks me – like a harpie kind of thing. And I was running backwards and I basically just fell over and whacked the back of myself in the forest. But then I thought it was funny to pretend to be unconscious. But then it wasn’t so funny when the medic, who smokes about 50 cigarettes a day was running and almost having a heart attack.

“What did I know about Atlantis as a place? Just that it was an island and it sunk. I’ve done a bit more research since then but that was what I first knew about it.”

High Priest Melas.

Q: Were any of you Atlantis experts beforehand?

Mark Addy: “No. I don’t think anybody is.”

Jack Donnelly: “I might be wrong but the book that Howard Overman produces the work from, worked with some of Plato’s writing. I think Atlantis is only mentioned in one line in it. And the whole myth is taken from that one line.”

Sarah Parish: “But aren’t all the myths that we are using…we’re mixing everything up anyway.”

Jack Donnelly: “Oh yeah. We’d be stuck with just one line. We’ve taken a lot of other Greek myths and thrown it in there as well.”

Q: You are still shooting?

Mark Addy: “We’ve got another seven weeks to go. We have four more episodes to shoot. So, yeah, it’s busy. But the great thing is they’re all different and they’re all brilliant. It’s like shooting a series of feature films back-to-back. They each have their own quality and their own individual flavour. They tell their own story. They’re linked but they’re so distinct, each one of them is different from the one before and the one that comes after it. So it’s fantastic.”

Second sight of The Oracle.

Q: This is the first time you’ve seen it – was it how you imagined it was going to be?

Mark Addy: “Yeah, it’s the first time we’ve seen it. A lot of the stuff that we saw, we were shooting in April. We’ve done so much stuff since that you go, ‘Oh, I remember that!’ Seeing what they’ve done with it is just remarkable.”

Sarah Parish: “I think we’re all quite blown away by it.”

Mark Addy: “We only shot for three weeks in Morocco. There’s a fair bit of Morocco in that first episode but there’s also a fair bit of Chepstow in there. And I can’t see the join. I don’t know where you transition from one to the other. And that’s down to having brilliant directors and directors of photography who can make the light in the studio in Chepstow the same as the light in Morocco. And spray tanning those Welsh extras. We live in the Welsh quarter of Atlantis.”

Aiysha Hart: “It’s quite nice seeing it all come together as well and still be filming. Because obviously we just go on set and we don’t know how epic it actually looks when it’s all put together and all the green screen and the CGI is put together. You just get a bigger picture. And so we can go back and that’s quite exciting filming, knowing how it looks now.”

Jemima Rooper: “It’s a massive, massive jigsaw of little bits and doing multi episodes. It’s got to the point where there’s two units going on and simultaneous things. And the boys especially are running from first unit to second unit and doing completely different episodes and different scenes with different actors. Then to see it all be this nice fluid piece.”

Jack Donnelly: “To see that translated up there, it’s mammoth. But it gets bigger than that. Some of the stuff we’re doing now…I mean, that’s pretty epic but it’s not a patch on what comes next. We’ve done some stuff that is just mental, where they decide to take this. You read it and you think, ‘I just don’t know how it’s possible to do it.’ And then they do it. It’s insane what’s coming.”

Q: Most people will talk about Atlantis as a kingdom that has sunk to the bottom of the sea. Do you ever tackle the idea of this kingdom being inundated by water?

Jack Donnelly: “I read an interview the other day in Empire magazine. At the end of it I think there’s a quote from Julian the producer saying, ‘Ultimately we know the city is doomed. We’re not shying away from that. We’re just taking time to tell the story.’ Now with a lot of the stories, we’re not staying strictly true to all the Greek myths. We are chopping and changing. But I guess that is the idea that people have in their head. But whether that’s a story arc over five years, I don’t know. But I wouldn’t say it’s totally out of the question.”

Jemima Rooper: “There’s kind of the sense of impending doom over the whole city. It depends how many people watch it whether it’s going to get flooded sooner or later!(laughter) But that’s also what’s nice about playing some of the more recognisable named characters, is that you know that it’s going to get there. The interesting thing is how we all get there. And I think that’s probably the same for Atlantis’s fate.”

BBC Atlantis Site

BBC America Atlantis Site

Atlantis

Plato

The Man From Atlantis

Ian Wylie on Twitter

Perfect lives built on lies.

Breathless is a six-part ITV drama starting at 9pm this Thursday (October 10).

Set in 1961, it is stylish, compelling and one of the best new drama series you will see this year.

The cast – led by Jack Davenport – doing full justice to top class writing, directing and photography.

Not forgetting the production team behind some memorable costumes, sets, locations and all round attention to period detail and feel.

Or the Anne Dudley soundtrack and a collection of inspired episode music choices.

Drawing you into a pre-swinging sixties’ world where everything may not be as it first seems.

I was asked to write the interviews for ITV’s press pack / production notes.

So you might think I’m slightly biased. Which I hope I’m not.

Not even by the sight on screen in episode one of the same Scalextric set I was once given for a 1960s’ Christmas.

Jack Davenport as Otto and Catherine Steadman as Angela.

I had high expectations for Breathless after reading all six scripts and talking to the cast at length.

Having now seen the first three episodes, it does not disappoint.

Also knowing what is to come in the second half of the series.

Jack Davenport is the perfect choice for suave London surgeon Otto Powell on the eve of the sexual revolution, with a voice as smooth and reassuring as his purring Alvis car.

But also a man who has a secret in his past.

With superb performances from the rest of the ensemble cast, not least Catherine Steadman as enchanting nurse Angela Wilson.

If you think this is simply a medical drama or Mad Men meets Call The Midwife, then you’d be wrong.

Breathless will, hopefully, capture your imagination…and surprise.

A number of my cast interviews were conducted alongside the photo shoot for many of the Breathless photos you can see on this page.

Inside an eerily deserted south London tower block, once home to thousands of office workers.

Where some of the Breathless sets were built.

Jack Davenport as Otto Powell.

You can read my interviews with Jack Davenport (Otto Powell), Natasha Little (Elizabeth Powell), Shaun Dingwall (Charlie Enderbury), Joanna Page (Lily Enderbury), Zoe Boyle (Jean Meecher), Oliver Chris (Richard Truscott) and Catherine Steadman (Angela Wilson) by clicking on the link to the PDF document below.

Plus my interviews with creator, writer and director Paul Unwin and executive producer Kate Bartlett:

Breathless Wylie Interviews Part 1

My conversations with Iain Glen (Chief Inspector Ronald Mulligan) and Sarah Parish (Margaret Dalton) are best read a little later, so I will add those when the time is right.

Update: My Sarah Parish interview is here.

And my Iain Glen interview is here.

You can also watch a trailer for the series here.

Oliver Chris and Zoe Boyle as Richard and Jean.

Natasha Little as Elizabeth Powell.

Shaun Dingwall and Joanna Page as Charlie and Lily.

Jack Davenport as Otto Powell.

Zoe Boyle and Catherine Steadman as Jean and Angela.

Oliver Chris as Richard.

Joanna Page as Lily.

Iain Glen (Chief Inspector Ronald Mulligan), Natasha Little (Elizabeth), Jack Davenport (Otto).

Zoe Boyle as Jean.

Catherine Steadman as Angela.

Zoe Boyle (Jean), Joanna Page (Lily), Natasha Little (Elizabeth).

Catherine Steadman (Angela) and Zoe Boyle (Jean).

ITV Drama

So Far Productions

Ian Wylie on Twitter