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"Would you say that my actions were justified?" Vertigo Releasing has unveiled an official trailer for a film called Sew Torn, an intriguing crime comedy + psychological thriller with Run Lola Run-esque vibes. This first premiered at the 2024 SXSW Film Festival last year, and it also played at the Locarno, Sitges, and Camerimage Film Festivals. Eve Connolly stars as Barbara Duggen, a mobile seamstress, who gets tangled in her own thread after stealing a briefcase from a drug deal gone bad. In an escalating, frightening game of cat and mouse, her different choices lead her to drastically different outcomes along the way. The narrative presents the repercussions of all three of her decisions, and the deadly confrontations that result from each as she gets entangled with the case's owner. Using thread to free herself, Duggen stops at nothing to save her store. The film also stars Calum Worthy, John Lynch,...

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The Devil’s Hour is a British supernatural thriller drama series created by Tom Moran. The Prime Video series follows Lucy, a social worker who mysteriously wakes up every night at exactly 3:33 am in the middle of the so-called devil’s hour and after having some terrifying visions she soon finds herself connected to a series of brutal murders in the area. The Devil’s Hour stars Jessica Raine, Peter Capaldi, Nikesh Patel, Alex Ferns, Meera Syal, Barbara Marten, Phil Dunster, Benjamin Chivers, and Brandon Bendell. So, if you loved the thrilling mystery, complex story, and compelling characters in The Devil’s Hour here are some similar shows you should check out next.

Shining Girls (Apple TV+) Credit – Apple TV+

Shining Girls is a psychological thriller drama series created by Silka Luisa. Based on the 2013 novel The Shining Girls by author Lauren Beukes,...

A new month brings new BritBox arrivals for British TV lovers!

Before “Taskmaster” returns to Channel 4 on Thursday, Sept. 12, starting binging new arrival “Man Down,” created/written by and starring Greg Davies. The full series will come to the streamer throughout the month, with each season of the four-season series premiering on Mondays beginning Sept. 2.

Crawl into the criminal underbelly with the International Emmy Award-winning three-part crime thriller “Des,” starring David Tennant as infamous Scottish serial killer Dennis Nilsen. Also new this month are Season 5 of crime drama “The Bay” and Season 3 of police procedural “The Tower,” which will begin streaming new weekly episodes this month.

Ready to watch? Find out The Streamable’s top picks for what’s new, and find out everything coming to BritBox throughout September!

7-Day Free Trial $8.99+ / month BritBox.com What are the 3 Best Shows, Movies, and Specials Coming to BritBox in September 2024? “Man Down” Seasons 1–4 | Mondays,...

“Choices, choices…,” says the narrator, a young seamstress, in this strange and striking debut from Freddy Macdonald. A neo-noir in the early Coens tradition, Sew Torn also features a bold tri-part structure in which the heroine, Barbara (Eve Connolly) — like Lola before her in Tom Tykwer’s Run Lola Run — gets three standalone chances to pursue a different destiny after stumbling on the bloody aftermath of a drug deal gone wrong on a quiet country road.

It begins with image of a reel of red cotton, a briefcase and a dead body. This is Barbara, who wonders what we’ll make of her story. Macdonald’s film then loops back to explain who Barbara got here, a tale of chance and coincidence that reshuffles its characters in a way that always surprises,...

Fly on the wall? Pah! The wall is all the way over there! These days, viewers want to be flies buzzing right around the noses of the people making the headlines, close enough to tell what they had for breakfast. And thanks to true story TV dramas, they can.

It’s been a long time since ropey Lifetime Movies were as good as it got for true story TV. In recent years, British production companies have stepped up in a big way to serve a growing appetite for fact-based drama, but all too often the real-life TV dramas of today focus on haunting tales of history’s most gruesome murders. If you’re sick of serial killers, there are plenty of non-murder true stories to enjoy in drama form, from very public scandals to ordinary people doing extraordinary things, to the kinds of tragedies it’s important that we never forget.

I don’t know when they filmed this extra show, which is billed as the last ever episode of Doc Martin, but it’s landed on our screens just at a time when the NHS is in a state of near collapse.

To be fair to them, the producers wouldn’t have known about the forthcoming strikes, but the fact remains that in Dr Martin Ellingham’s idyllic Cornwall patch of “Portwenn”, no one ever gets all that sick, to the point of absurdity. I’m no expert on health outcomes in the South West, but this particular corner of the region has an unusually high incidence of comically mild ailments, and somehow Covid passed it by entirely.

I do get the point of comfort viewing, and ITV has long relied on such staples as Doc Martin as a dependable tonic for any signs of weakness in the evening ratings,...

Catching his breath after a rush to get to the ballroom in time for a post-screening Q&a for “Empire of Light” at the Middleburg Film Festival, star Micheal Ward was further thrown as he sat down in his director’s chair and noticed a woman crying in the audience, having been moved by the Sam Mendes film’s conclusion. “It’s such an amazing feeling to know that someone’s grasped something from the film,” he told the audience.

Though he’s garnered fans worldwide by leading the Netflix relaunch of the groundbreaking UK crime series “Top Boy” in 2019, and even won a BAFTA Rising Star Award in 2020, the 25-year-old Ward is fully aware that starring opposite Best Actress winner Olivia Colman in a romantic drama written and directed by Oscar winner Mendes has introduced him to an entirely new audience, and he can’t help but feel grateful.

As festival flicks finally make their way to big screens, romance drama “Empire of Light” is a must-see this holiday season.

Hailing from Oscar-winning “American Beauty” and “Skyfall” director Sam Mendes, the film centers on the Empire, a movie palace that lights up a quiet British coastal town. The Empire employs Hilary (Olivia Colman) and her boss, Mr. Ellis (Colin Firth) who have been having an illicit affair.

While Hilary’s struggles with mental health — which has not been helped by her relationship with Mr. Ellis — a refreshing outsider enters the picture and promises hope for the future.

If the film’s nostalgia getting you excited about the moviegoing experience, here’s everything you need to know about how to watch “Empire of Light.”

Is “Empire of Light” streaming or in theaters?

“Empire of Light” opens exclusively in theaters on Dec. 9, but only in select theaters. Check your local listings.

Empire of Light Review — Empire of Light (2022) Film Review, a movie written and directed by Sam Mendes and starring Olivia Colman, Colin Firth, Micheal Ward, Toby Jones, Tom Brooke, Tanya Moodie, Hannah Onslow, Crystal Clarke, Monica Dolan, Ron Cook, Sara Stewart, Justin Edwards, Roman Hayeck-Green, Dougie Boyall and Spike Leighton. Sam Mendes [...]

Continue reading: Film Review: Empire Of Light (2022): Sam Mendes Creates a Thoughtful but Slow-Moving Look at Ordinary Characters...

Searchlight Pictures has released a trailer for its new film “Empire of Light” from writer/director/producer Sam Mendes ahead of its December 9 theatrical release. The heartfelt charmer tells the story of a fledgling English cinema during the 1980s that aspires to reach the greatest of its early years. “This whole place is for people who want to escape, people who don’t belong anywhere else,” declares Toby Jones‘ Norman, the theater’s perfectionist projectionist, as the camera settles on Olivia Colman‘s Hilary, an introverted front-of-house manager longing for so much more in life than to sell stale popcorn. Watch the “Empire of Light” trailer above.

Of course, awards prognosticators have been wondering since the Telluride Film Festival whether “Empire of Light” will be the vehicle that brings Colman back to the Oscars. The English performer staged a massive upset four years ago when she won the 2018 Best Actress...

Inside No. 9, one of the best anthology series in recent years, returns with a seventh installment. Creators and co-stars Reece Shearsmith and Steve Pemberton are back to make audiences laugh and shiver with these six diverse tales of various genres. And fans of the eerie and unexplained will surely enjoy this new batch of stories.

The season opens with “Merrily, Merrily”, which features one of the show’s most unconventional settings. After having not seen one another for some time, friends reunite at a lake, where they must paddle on a pedalo to reach their destination. As to be expected among friends who’ve lost touch over the years, arguments erupt. However, the worst of their reunion has yet to come — now their paddle boat is stuck in the middle of the lake. From there Inside No. 9 toys with the audience, playing on their expectations in the best way possible.

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With only his second produced screenplay, after 1917, Sam Mendes delves into the territory of his formative years and a mood of nostalgia. The story he tells in Empire of Light isn’t strictly autobiographical, but it draws upon the music and movies and political climate that informed his coming-of-age — the movies especially. It’s not cinema with a capital “C” that Mendes is celebrating, but the kinds of popular features that shape memories and are indelibly associated with life passages. A valentine to celluloid that doesn’t entirely avoid self-consciousness, it’s a handsome film set mainly in a vintage gem of a movie palace on England’s southeastern coast. In the role of the troubled, dazzlingly resilient, poetry-loving manager of the theater, Olivia Colman delivers a stirring performance and some of her most affecting screen work to date.

As the story opens,...

Warning: this Inside No. 9 review contains spoilers.

Sometimes Inside No. 9 is funny, sometimes it’s thrilling, sometimes it’s touching and sometimes it’s a bit scary. The series seven finale ‘Wise Owl’ has gone for borderline harrowing. Satirizing 1970s and 80s-style public information videos, the episode is intercut with animations that resemble the ‘Charlie Says’ series which supposedly taught kids how to stay out of danger but many decades later proved to be Gen-x nightmare fodder.

The host is Wise Owl, who must always be trusted and listened to, who teaches kids that pylons are dangerous (the actual public information video this particular short is aping was live action and involved a kid flying a kite near electricity pylons and getting fried. It’s still troubling today.) Don’t be a ‘twit-you’ runs Owl’s catch phrase. But as the show progresses it becomes increasingly apparent there...

Warning: contains spoilers for Inside No. 9 series six.

In series six, Inside No. 9 pulled off a diamond heist, explored obsessive geek fandom, framed a cuckold in an international conspiracy, let a grotesque true crime bleed from reality to fiction and back again, made a deal with the devil, and killed Jesus. Where, one might well ask, next?

Anywhere it wants, is the answer to that question. The BBC Two anthology series can float from location to location, story to story, unhampered by the need to put down roots in any one place. Series seven brings half a dozen brand new films to screen, scored by composer Christian Henson, and each one as different as the last.

The official synopsis describes the new episodes as taking us “from the Welsh valleys to an abandoned house, from kidnappers to detectives, and from a day trip out in a pedalo to a public information film.

This article contains The King’s Man spoilers.

Matthew Vaughn’s The King’s Man is on streaming now. That’s a quick turnaround since its Christmastime release last year, but perhaps it’s for the best. With the largely underappreciated (and under-seen) Kingsman prequel making its debut on HBO Max and Hulu, there’s a chance the strange action mash-up may finally find its audience.

Indeed, the film’s pitch always seemed a bit niche, even for this franchise. By eschewing the modern class conflict of the first two Kingsman movies, which created a dynamic of “street” versus posh spy, the World War I-set The King’s Man travels back in time more than a hundred years to tell a story that has more in common with Rudyard Kipling novels than Ian Fleming. The King’s Man is about the last gasps of the Empire, and a global conflict that destroyed the 19th century world order,...

Director Mike Leigh’s social-personal observations of life as it is lived in the U.K. always get to me — this one may simply be a more realistic soap opera, but it’s so good that one pays no attention to technical matters, who the actors are or when they are ‘acting’ … it just ‘is,’ and it’s so involving that one becomes anxious over the smallest thing. Leigh’s most acclaimed picture is the perfect antidote for bloated event filmmaking. And unlike some of his pictures, you walk out with a smile on your face.

Secrets and Lies

Blu-ray

The Criterion Collection 1070

1996 / Color / 1:85 widescreen / 142 min. / available through The Criterion Collection / Street Date March 30, 2021 / 39.95

Starring: Timothy Spall, Phyllis Logan, Brenda Blethyn, Claire Rushbrook, Marianne Jean-Baptiste, Elizabeth Berrington, Michelle Austin, Lee Ross, Lesley Manville, Ron Cook, Emma Amos.

Cinematography: Dick Pope

Film Editor: Jon Gregory

Production Design: Alison Chitty

Original...

Good Omens star David Tennant is to play infamous Scottish serial killer Dennis Nilsen in an ITV drama from the makers of Sky and HBO’s Catherine The Great.

New Pictures’ three-part miniseries, Des, is based on the Brian Masters book Killing For Company, in which the author cooperated with Nilsen to get inside the mind of a man who murdered at least 15 men and boys between 1978 and 1983. Nilsen died in jail last year.

Joining Tennant is The Crown star Jason Watkins, who will play Masters, and Line Of Duty actor Daniel Mays, who features as Detective Chief Inspector Peter Jay. The story charts Nilsen’s arrest and trial, through the prism of the three men.

Des was developed by Luke Neal and Lewis Arnold, with Neal writing the first two episodes and Kelly Jones penning the third. Willow Grylls, Kim Varvell, Charlie Pattinson, Elaine Pyke, Neal, Lewis Arnold and Tennant are the executive producers.

The War of the Worlds star Rafe Spall and His Dark Materials actress Anne-Marie Duff have been cast in BBC Two’s dramatization of the Novichok poisonings in the historic British city of Salisbury in March 2018.

Also joining the cast of Dancing Ledge Productions’ Salisbury are Game Of Thrones actor Mark Addy and Ripper Street‘s MyAnna Buring, as well as Annabel Scholey and Johnny Harris.

Filming has begun on the three-part miniseries, which is written by McMafia writers Adam Patterson and Declan Lawn. It will tell the story of how ordinary people reacted to the crisis as their city became the focus of an unprecedented national emergency when Sergei and Yulia Skripal were poisoned by Russian operatives.

Salisbury is executive produced by Les Miserables producer Chris Carey and Dancing Ledge CEO Laurence Bowen along with Patterson and Lawn and the BBC’s Lucy Richer.

Every year, the featured acting races at the Tony Awards prove to be the most daunting to predict. Whereas the lead races rarely have more than a dozen possibilities, there is a true embarrassment of riches to sift through when it comes to the supporting players. Before you make your 2018 Tony predictions in advance of the May 1 announcement read our breakdown of these four tough categories based on our official Tony Awards odds.

Featured Actor in a Play

Nathan Lane should send the Tony Administration Committee gift bags for placing him in the Featured category. His towering portrayal of Roy Cohn is likely to win. Lane’s co-star James McArdle should also find a spot for his neurotic Louis. The other sure bet is Anthony Boyle’s heart-wrenching and Olivier winning performance in “Harry Potter and the Cursed Child.”

We could simply fill out the category with the other “Angels...

Apocalyptic wastelands aren’t often presented on Broadway stages, but Lucky Kirkwood’s “The Children” presents audiences with life in the countryside after a nuclear fallout. Unlike most end-of-the-world dramas, this play stays indoors and focuses on the inhabitants of a seaside cottage. It’s the intense focus on character that provide Deborah Findlay the opportunity to score a Tony Award nomination for Featured Actress in a Play.

Findlay portrays Hazel, a retired nuclear physicist. She lives with her husband Robin (Ron Cook) in a run down cottage just outside the “exclusion zone,” the area ravaged by earthquakes, tidal waves, and radiation after the power plant which employed the couple experienced a Fukushima like disaster. She has settled nicely into a hippie-fied retired life, full of yoga and living off the land, when an old friend and co-worker Rose (Francesca Annis) appears after a 38-year absence.

Rose’s sudden resurgence shakes Hazel.

WWE Hall of Famer Bruno Sammartino has died at the age of 82. The news was first revealed by Pittsburgh journalist Ron Cook, who described him as “one of Pittsburgh’s all-time great sportsmen and great people.” Sad news. Bruno Sammartino has passed at 82. One of Pittsburgh’s all-time great sportsmen and great people. Rest In Peace, Bruno. — Ron Cook (@RonCookPG) April 18, 2018 Sammartino’s wife Carol, and sons, Darryl and Dan were said to have been by his side when he passed away. He died peacefully after suffering from health issues for the past few months. WWE and a string […]

The post How did Bruno Sammartino die? WWE Hall of Famer had been battling health issues appeared first on Monsters and Critics.

“The Cows” would have made a better title. The poster for Lucy Kirkwood’s new play features its three actors suited up for what looks like a tour of a nuclear power plant, and emblazoned across their bundled-up bodies is her chosen title, “The Children.” This very scary, cautionary drama opened Tuesday at Mtc’s Samuel J. Friedman Theatre, and there’s no doubt about it. Splashed across all that protective gear, “The Cows” would have been more provocative. In “The Children,” Robin (Ron Cook) and Hazel (Deborah Findlay) talk about their cows as much as they do their four adult children.

A friendly reminder that performances begin tomorrow Tuesday, November 28 for the Manhattan Theatre Club's American premiere of The Royal Court Theatre's production of The Children, the new play by Olivier Award winner Lucy Kirkwood Chimerica, directed by James Macdonald Top Girls at Mtc starring acclaimed London cast members BAFTA Award winner Francesca Annis BBC's Cranford , Olivier Award nominee Ron Cook Juno and the Paycock at The Donmar, and Olivier Award winner Deborah Findlay The National Theatre's Stanley.

Rob Leane Apr 24, 2017

China Miéville’s fantasy crime novel The City & The City is coming to BBC Two, with David Morrissey starring...

China Miéville’s The City & The City is a novel that blends crime procedural with high concept fantasy. It focuses on a detective, a murder investigation, two overlapping locales, and an ancient legend.

BBC Two announced a four-part TV adaptation not that long ago, with Red Riding and The Young Pope's Tony Grisoni writing the scripts, and House Of Cards/The Missing alum Thom Shankland on directorial duties. Today, the cast has been announced.

David Morrissey (who's still best known as The Governor from The Walking Dead, although he's since starred in The Missing and Extant) will play the central investigator, Inspector Tyador Borlú.

"I am delighted to be working with the brilliant Tony Grisoni again on this exciting project," Mr Morrisey said. He previously worked with...

Mr Selfridge has added cast for the fourth season, which is expected to return next year. The ITV period drama stars Jeremy Piven as the titular department store impresario with Katherine Kelly, Tom Goodman-Hill, Ron Cook, Amanda Abbington, Amy Beth Hayes, Trystan Gravelle, Sacha Parkinson and Samuel West all coming back. New cast members include Sacha Dhawan (Line Of Duty), Lottie Tolhurst and Mimi Ndiweni (Cinderella). Joining them are Emma Hamilton (The Tudors) and Zoe…...

Jeremy Piven is currently all over the big screen, from starring as the infamous Ari Gold in the “Entourage” movie to currently filming the highly-critiqued Spike Lee movie, “Chiraq.” However, Piven has also been busy filming the PBS drama, “Mr. Selfridge,” for three seasons. The show follows the real-life story of the flamboyant and visionary American founder (played by Piven) of London’s famous department store, Selfridge’s. “Mr. Selfridge” also stars Ron Cook, Amy Beth Hayes, Tom Goodman-Hill, Amanda Abbington, and Samuel West. In March, U.K. network ITV announced that the show was renewed for a fourth season,...

Since it began, ITV's (and a few months later, PBS's) Mr. Selfridge has been like Downton Abbey's spunky, half-American cousin. It's not quite as gorgeously costumed or as sweepingly scored, but it's fun and it's plucky. The show's myriad, swirling subplots keep the hours jam-packed, yet plots don't get burned through particularly quickly. Time jumps (like the one that starts Season 3) are purposeful, and serve the story -- one which picks up this year stronger than any other. Selfridge's third season starts in 1919, skipping over World War I, but not forgetting it. Unlike Downton Abbey (it's impossible not to compare the two, especially since they are treading along the same timeline), Mr. Selfridge doesn't want to forget about the war as a pesky thing that dampened country life for a few years. The ghosts of Verdun and the Somme haunt Selfridge's London streets, both in the form of unemployed and maimed soldiers,...

ITV confirmed today that Mister Selfridge, starring Jeremy Piven (Entourage), will return for a fourth series with Piven reprising his role as troubled department store founder Harry Selfridge. Katherine Kelly (Coronation Street) is also set to return as the alluring socialite, Lady Mae Loxley. Series regulars Tom Goodman-Hill, Ron Cook, Amanda Abbington, Amy Beth Hayes and Trystan Gravelle, Sacha Parkinson & Samuel West remain, while the latest series will also feature a…...

Mr Selfridge has been recommissioned for a fourth series by ITV.

The period drama - which stars Jeremy Piven as the eponymous Harry Selfridge - will air ten new episodes in 2016.

The broadcaster has confirmed that Piven and Katherine Kelly will return to the show, alongside series regulars Tom Goodman-Hill, Ron Cook, Amanda Abbington, Amy Beth Hayes, Trystan Gravelle, Sacha Parkinson and Samuel West.

Line of Duty actor Sacha Dhawan will join the cast for the new series playing a major new character, while newcomers Lottie Tolhurst and Mimi Ndiweni have been cast in guest roles.

ITV's Director of Drama, Steve November, said: "We're delighted to commission a fourth series of Mr Selfridge.

"It's so pleasing to see the audience take the characters and storylines into their hearts. We're looking forward to seeing Jeremy reprise his role as the visionary yet deeply troubled Harry alongside simply stunning production values."

Meanwhile,...

Ron Cook Mr Selfridge, Henry V, King Lear, Hot Fuzz as Sir Charles Gurney, Kathryn Drysdale Suspects, Love's Labour's Lost, Tripping Over, Two Pints of Lager and a Packet of Crisps as Grace Shelley, Joshua McGuire Privacy, Posh, About Time, Mr Turner as Dinsdale Gurney and Anthony O'Donnell The Captain of Kopenick, Skyfall, Matchpoint as Daniel Tucker, join BAFTA winning James McAvoy, as Jack, the 14th Earl of Gurney, in the first West End revival of Peter Barnes' satirical comedy, The Ruling Class, directed by Jamie Lloyd, Artistic Director of Trafalgar Transformed. BroadwayWorld brings you photos from opening night below...

Ron Cook Mr Selfridge, Henry V, King Lear, Hot Fuzz as Sir Charles Gurney, Kathryn Drysdale Suspects, Love's Labour's Lost, Tripping Over, Two Pints of Lager and a Packet of Crisps as Grace Shelley, Joshua McGuire Privacy, Posh, About Time, Mr Turner as Dinsdale Gurney and Anthony O'Donnell The Captain of Kopenick, Skyfall, Matchpoint as Daniel Tucker, join BAFTA winning James McAvoy, as Jack, the 14th Earl of Gurney, in the first West End revival of Peter Barnes' satirical comedy, The Ruling Class, directed by Jamie Lloyd, Artistic Director of Trafalgar Transformed.

Feature Alex Westthorp 16 Apr 2014 - 07:00

Alex's trek through the film roles of actors who've played the Doctor reaches Peter Davison, Colin Baker and Sylvester McCoy...

Read the previous part in this series, Doctor Who: the film careers of Patrick Troughton and Tom Baker, here.

In March 1981, as he made his Doctor Who debut, Peter Davison was already one the best known faces on British television. Not only was he the star of both a BBC and an ITV sitcom - Sink Or Swim and Holding The Fort - but as the young and slightly reckless Tristan Farnon in All Creatures Great And Small, about the often humorous cases of Yorkshire vet James Herriot and his colleagues, he had cemented his stardom. The part led, indirectly, to his casting as the venerable Time Lord.

The recently installed Doctor Who producer, John Nathan-Turner, had been the Production Unit Manager on...

Masterpiece and PBS announced a second season for "Mr. Selfridge," starring Jeremy Piven as the flamboyant American entrepreneur who founded the famous Selfridge's department store. The first season garnered great success in the U.S. ratings, and the show was recently nominated for an Emmy for Outstanding Music Composition for a Series.The cast also features Frances O'Connor as Harry Selfridge's wife, Rose, Aisling Loftus as Agnes Towler, Katherine Kelly as Lady Mae, Grégory Fitoussi as Henri Leclair, Trystan Gravelle as Victor Colleano, Amanda Abbington as Miss Mardle, Tom Goodman-Hill as Roger Grove, and Ron Cook as Mr. Crabb. Joining the cast this season are Polly Walker ("John Carter"), Cal Macaninch ("Warriors," "Wild at Heart") as Mr Thackeray and Aidan McArdle ("Jane Eyre," "Einstein's Big Idea"). Currently filming in the UK, the second season picks up the story in 1914, as the store celebrates its fifth anniversary in business. However, with World.

PBS will keep the British period drama train rolling into 2014 with a second season of "Mr. Selfridge."

The network announced Monday (July 22) that it's picked up a second season of the series for "Masterpiece Classic." The show, starring Jeremy Piven as an American entrepreneur who founded Selfridge's department store in early 20th century London, will be back in 2014.

"I'm absolutely delighted that 'Masterpiece' viewers welcomed Mr. Selfridge into their homes," Piven says in a statement. "'Mr. Selfridge' is a true ensemble piece, and audiences can look forward to seeing the return of their favorite characters and some intriguing new faces."

Season 2 is currently in production in the U.K. and will be set on the eve of World War I in 1914. Polly Walker ("Rome"), Cal Macaninch and Aidan McArdle will join the cast, and Frances O'Connor, Aisling Loftus, Katherine Kelly, Gregory Fitoussi, Tyrstan Gravelle, Amanda Abbington, Ron Cook...

Donmar Warehouse, London

Best known for movies such as Atonement and Anna Karenina, Joe Wright has finally got round to directing his first play, and, appropriately, he has chosen Pinero's warm-hearted tribute, written in 1898, to the theatrical medium itself. But, while it makes a perfectly amiable evening, Wright can't help pushing Pinero's faithful re-creation of a past theatrical age to the edge of caricature.

Pinero's play deals with class, change and the enduring power of theatre. It starts by showing Rose Trelawny, the darling of 1860s Sadler's Wells, quitting the stage to marry into the gentry. But once ensconced in Cavendish Square, where she's very much on trial with her fiance's grandfather and great-aunt, she's appalled by the stifling tyranny of upper-class life. Sacrificing her lover, she goes back to the boards only to find her talent has evaporated. Her one hope would seem to lie with an emerging playwright,...

An adaptation and completion of Charles Dickens’s last novel, Edwin Drood, left unfinished at the halfway mark at his death on 9 June 1870, comes to BBC2 on Tuesday 10th January 2012.

A strange, disturbing and modern tale about drugs, stalking and darkness visible, The Mystery of Edwin Drood by writer Gwyneth Hughes is a two-part psychological thriller about a provincial choirmaster’s obsession with 17-year-old Rosa Bud and the lengths he will go to to attain her.

Matthew Rhys stars as John Jasper, Tamzin Merchant (represented by Curtis Brown) as Rosa Bud, with 22 year old Freddie Fox (represented by Tavistock Wood) as Edwin Drood.

Tamzin, from Brighton, played Daenerys in the Game of Thrones pilot and starred as Katherine Howard in the series The Tudors. Freddie, graduated from Guildhall drama school in 2010, and was recently seen in Any Human Heart and The Shadow Line. Tamzin and Freddie are now dating, after...

Tamzin Merchant

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Were he alive today, Charles Dickens would be 199 years old which means that next year will be the bicentenary of his birth. The BBC are set to honor Britain’s greatest ever novelist by airing a series of programs related to the writer and his work during 2012. Festivities officially begin at the end of this year when BBC One will air a new adaptation of Great Expectations starring Gillian Anderson and David Suchet. Following that, Dickens fans can turn their attentions to BBC2 and a dramatization of Dickens’ last work The Mystery Of Edwin Drood. The writer died before he completed the story but Gwyneth Hughes has picked up where he left off and turned the unfinished book into a two part psychological thriller.

In the drama, Tudors star Tamzin Merchant takes...

TV – where would we be without it? Who would have thought that an electronic box of tricks could have the ability to instruct and entertain? Well, unless you tune into jaw-droppingly atrocious Oompa Loompa convention, The Only Way Is Essex. Without TV, we wouldn't have been able to see key events like the first man on the moon, the first ever Doctor Who story...

Oh, and I suppose some might say the coronation of Mrs Majesty way back in 1952. Judging by the 15 or so extras in the latest Doctor Who story, The Idiot's Lantern, interest must have been very high – a fact that will no doubt come home to roost next year when Mrs Maj celebrates 60 years on the throne in the only way that she knows how: with a gaudy, money-burning festival (Come on kids, we're all in this together, remember?) and that usual sour-faced expression that she always seems to pull.