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The BBC has confirmed the full cast for Dear England, a four-part drama based on James Graham’s Olivier Award-winning play about Gareth Southgate and the England men’s football team. Dr. Who star Jodie Whittaker, The Crown alum Jason Watkins and British actor Daniel Ryan (The Bay) are new additions to the ensemble cast.

Shakespeare in Love and The Handmaid’s Tale actor Joseph Fiennes will reprise his stage role as Gareth Southgate, the England manager who took over a team with a historically poor record in penalty shoot-outs. Whittaker will play team psychologist Pippa Grange. Watkins will portray former Football Association chairman Greg Dyke. Ryan plays former assistant manager Steve Holland.

Several castmembers from the play will reprise their roles for TV, including John Hodgkinson, returning as former Fa chairman Greg Clarke, Adam Hugill playing Harry Maguire, Josh Barrow as Jordan Pickford and Lewis Shepherd as Dele Alli.

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The BBC has unveiled the full cast for its six-part drama Dear England, adapted from James Graham’s hit National Theatre play about Gareth Southgate and his campaign to turnaround the fortunes of the England men’s football team.

Jodie Whittaker joins the cast as Pippa Grange, the England men’s team psychologist, while Jason Watkins is former Fa chairman Greg Dyke and John Hodgkinson reprises his stage role as former Fa chairman Greg Clarke.

Daniel Ryan is Steve Holland, former assistant manager for the England men’s team. Sam Spruell will also star as fictional coach, Mike Webster.

The production has also unveiled the cast for the soccer players.

Adam Hugill (Sherwood), Josh Barrow (Hostage) and screen newcomer Lewis Shepherd reprise their respective stage roles as Harry Maguire, Jordan Pickford and Dele Alli.

The BBC has announced that its crime drama This City is Ours will return for a second season. The decision comes after strong viewer engagement and critical attention, with the show becoming the most-viewed new drama launch on BBC iPlayer this year.

Set in Liverpool, the series is centered around the operations of the Phelan family and their entanglement in a web of drug trafficking, betrayal, and fractured loyalties. It features James Nelson-Joyce as Michael Phelan, a rising figure in a criminal network whose close relationship with gang leader Ronnie, played by Sean Bean, is tested when their control over a key cocaine pipeline begins to fracture. The show’s backdrop includes both urban Liverpool and sun-drenched Marbella, reflecting the cross-border nature of their criminal enterprise.

The series has struck a chord with audiences, with BBC data showing that its opening figures tripled through streaming. Viewership per episode averaged 6.6 million...

Serving For The Match

Warner Bros. Discovery has extended its rights to show the U.S. Open in 45 markets across Europe, including exclusive access in 42 territories, after reaching a new five-year agreement with the United States Tennis Association (Usta). Territories excluded from the deal are Austria, France, Germany, Italy, Spain, the U.K. and Ireland.

The deal includes live and highlights rights with every match on every court available to stream on discovery+ and the Eurosport app in addition to live television coverage during the tournament on Eurosport 1 and 2.

Markets including the Nordics will also have the option to showcase the best matches on Warner Bros. Discovery’s free-to-air channels.

Warner Bros. Discovery reported record audience engagement in many major markets following the 2022 US Open. This includes the best ever streaming performance on its digital platforms, doubling its audience year-on-year on discovery+, and securing the highest ever viewership on Eurosport...

BBC Drama Director Lindsay Salt has assembled her commissioning team with a triple hire including the EP on Candice Carty-Williams’ Champion and a former Doctor Who script editor.

Danielle Scott-Haughton and Nick Lambon join as BBC Drama Commissioning Editors, while Sami El-Hadi becomes Head of Development, joining from Ackley Bridge producer The Forge.

The trio join a new-look team that has been hit by a raft of exits over the past few months since Drama Director Piers Wenger left to join A24, including Ben Irving, who moved to Fifth Season, Manda Levin, Tom Lazenby and Tommy Bulfin.

Levin is freelancing with the Netflix drama commissioning team and Lazenby has joined Wenger at A24.

Scott-Haughton joins the BBC from Balloon Entertainment, where she has most recently been EP on Champion, the BBC and Netflix’s upcoming musical drama series from Queenie author Carty-Williams.

Lambon is a freelance script editor whose past...

Exclusive: Hanna producer Working Title TV is adapting Inua Ellams’ play Black T-Shirt Collection into a TV series – marking the first television project for the rising playwright and poet.

The London-based producer, which is a joint venture with NBCUniversal International Studios, secured the rights to the play with Ellams, who recently created The National Theatre’s Barbershop Chronicles, adapting the series into a four-part series.

The play, which combines poetry, spoken word and graphic art, and the TV remake, are set across Nigeria, Egypt, England and China and follows two Nigerian foster brothers, Matthew and Muhammed, whose handmade t-shirts become a global streetwear brand. Against the backdrop of tragedy their success is tainted by blood as their personal lives and growing business empire cross the lines of globalised capitalism, sectarianism and homophobia.

The show begins in 1993 when the grieving widow of a Muslim family adopts a young Christian boy in...