A random thread for small entertainment things not warranting their own thread..

[Kim]

Thinking back, the only television drama I ever actually watched, as opposed to sat in the same room as and mostly ignored, was Pride and Prejudice. My older daughter would have been in her early teens when that was on, I think. She is now 38.

The BBC sexy Mr Darcy one?  That was '95 I think; I remember discussing it in GCSE English.

ETA: Googlepedia confirms it.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pride_and_Prejudice_(1995_TV_series)

[citoyen]

Thinking back, the only television drama I ever actually watched, as opposed to sat in the same room as and mostly ignored

Jennifer Ehle was hard to ignore. (See also: The Camomile Lawn)

[Manotea]

Looking forward to the next series of Altered Carbon, but fearful of reports that it will focus more on 'gender fluidity'

Bearing in mind that Ortega's Grandma showed up for the "Night of the Dead" as a tattoed (male) thug and Lizzie's mother was likewise sleeved into a male body I'd have thought that angle had been covered.  Unlike everybody else though, they didn't get much on-screen sex so I guess it will focus on that...

[Manotea]

Thinking back, the only television drama I ever actually watched, as opposed to sat in the same room as and mostly ignored

Jennifer Ehle was hard to ignore. (See also: The Camomile Lawn)

Ah, Darcy and Lizzie. Like they used to say of singers in rock bands; if they're doing their job properly you either want to be them or shag them...

[citoyen]

if they're doing their job properly you either want to be them or shag them...

Or both!

[Wowbagger]

Thinking back, the only television drama I ever actually watched, as opposed to sat in the same room as and mostly ignored

Jennifer Ehle was hard to ignore. (See also: The Camomile Lawn)

I have no recollection whatever of the Camomile Lawn.

[Jaded]

Thinking back, the only television drama I ever actually watched, as opposed to sat in the same room as and mostly ignored

Jennifer Ehle was hard to ignore. (See also: The Camomile Lawn)

I have no recollection whatever of the Camomile Lawn.

You didn’t see the bush in the mirror?

[Jaded]

I am sitting in Mrs Wow’s sister’s lounge. The television is on. It must be many years since I have been in attendance when a television drama has been broadcast. I really can’t remember it has been so long - maybe as much as 20 years. The one thing I have noticed is how sweary  they have become.

You can easily tell if it's 20 years or more by whether you're wondering what's happened to the cameraperson's tripod.

At some point in the late 90s, molishers of British television drama became obsessed with using handheld cameras for 'intimate' wobbly footage, in a manner akin to USAnian series Jaded refers to (I don't think I ever saw it).  This Life came out in 1996, and the effect was striking.  Within a couple of years they were all doing it.

The trend has since died down, with tripods returning to more 'serious' drama, though it's frequently used for dramatic effect, and remains popular on lower budget productions.

HSB was ‘81 to ‘87.

Let’s be careful out there.

[rafletcher]

Thinking back, the only television drama I ever actually watched, as opposed to sat in the same room as and mostly ignored

Jennifer Ehle was hard to ignore. (See also: The Camomile Lawn)

I have no recollection whatever of the Camomile Lawn.

You didn’t see the bush in the mirror?

I remember that for Felicity Kendal

[rafletcher]

I am sitting in Mrs Wow’s sister’s lounge. The television is on. It must be many years since I have been in attendance when a television drama has been broadcast. I really can’t remember it has been so long - maybe as much as 20 years. The one thing I have noticed is how sweary  they have become.

You can easily tell if it's 20 years or more by whether you're wondering what's happened to the cameraperson's tripod.

At some point in the late 90s, molishers of British television drama became obsessed with using handheld cameras for 'intimate' wobbly footage, in a manner akin to USAnian series Jaded refers to (I don't think I ever saw it).  This Life came out in 1996, and the effect was striking.  Within a couple of years they were all doing it.

The trend has since died down, with tripods returning to more 'serious' drama, though it's frequently used for dramatic effect, and remains popular on lower budget productions.

HSB was ‘81 to ‘87.

Let’s be careful out there.

I loved that show, and around the same time, St Elsewhere.

[citoyen]

I have no recollection whatever of the Camomile Lawn.

Tbh, I have no recollection of the story but one or two scenes stick in the mind...

I watched it in the house where they filmed it - a B&B in Cornwall.

[Tim Hall]

I'm watching "The Man Who Never Was" on BBC2 this afternoon.  IMDB tells me that Peter Sellers plays Winston Churchill's voice although he wasn't credited.

Trivia. I heart it.

[Kim]

HSB was ‘81 to ‘87.

Let’s be careful out there.

Well that explains it.  It would have been on way after my bedtime.  In those days I had special dispensation only for Tomorrow's World.

[Ham]

Just discovered NPR Music Tiny Desk concert series ... https://www.youtube.com/user/nprmusic/videos something for everyone there, some pretty awesome

ETA, there is so much there, finding stuff can be a challenge, here are some noteworthy ones I've found

the Tedeschi Trucks Band https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RRipadkd6wk
Pete Frampton https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9GLIZrSwFWk
Yusuf/Cat https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FoPoI1IwcTw
John Prine https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sOg7mAkrKJw

[citoyen]

Just discovered NPR Music Tiny Desk concert series ...

DKUATB!

Probably my favourite of those is the King Creosote & John Hopkins one -
https://youtu.be/ej8vMh28SJY

But that's hardly surprising since Diamond Mine is one of my top 5 favourite albums of the last 10 years.

[Ham]

Just discovered NPR Music Tiny Desk concert series ...

DKUATB!

Probably my favourite of those is the King Creosote & John Hopkins one -
https://youtu.be/ej8vMh28SJY

But that's hardly surprising since Diamond Mine is one of my top 5 favourite albums of the last 10 years.

Well I'm late to most parties. I hope, to my own funeral, too.

[citoyen]

Late as in the late Dentarthurdent?

[Ham]

Got me a dressing gown anna towel

[Ham]

Entertainment meets POBI .... I'm putting my name down for this https://www.theguardian.com/books/2019/sep/07/exclusive-john-le-carre-new-novel-brexit-intrigue-agent-running-in-the-field

[T42]

Good old Squarejohn. Looks worth a read.

[Andrij]

Blake's 7 episodes are available on yewtoob.

In the past, a number of forumites have sung the praises of Servalan.  Having never seen even a single episode, I looked her up.  Meh - I thought.

Having now watched two seasons worth of Blake's 7 - yes, I can understand the attraction.

The special effects in the programme are quite 'special', and the acting - especially fight scenes - is noteworthy.   Yeah, I'm enjoying this.  At this stage I'm wondering if a serious, quality, remake of Blake's 7 could be brilliant - or a disaster.

[spesh]

It would be a good fit for the current zeitgeist - it was ahead of its time in that the nominal protagonists were, when it comes down to, somewhat unsympathetic.

[spesh]

The BBC has announced the leading cast members for a forthcoming adaptation of PTerry's Night Watch books.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/mediacentre/bbcstudios/2019/the-watch-cast-richard-dormer

Varying mileage has ensued: https://twitter.com/BBCAMERICA/status/1171786597504888833

Some of the casting is spot-on, but I do wonder just how loose an adaptation it's going to be when the BBC post stuff like this:

Marama Corlett will play the mysterious Corporal Angua who is tasked with Carrot’s training and keeping the rookie alive.

Is there another edition of Guards! Guards! that I don't know about? And then there is this... interpretation of Carcer:

Sam Adewunmi will play the wounded, wronged Carcer Dun, out to hijack destiny itself, take control of the city and exact a terrible revenge on an unjust reality.

"Wronged" is not a word I would have associated with Carcer, not from what I can recall of reading Night Watch.

TBH, I am not hugely optimistic about this. 

[Kim]

My comment on the twitterwebs was that I expected them to cast Scarlett Johansson as Nobby.

A nonbinary Cheery *might* work as a new interpretation of Dwarf Feminism, but Lara Rossi as Lady Sibyl is just plain baffling: She's supposed to be the same age as Vimes, and is canonically large.  I can only assume a misguided attempt to avoid a racial sterotype or something.

Carrot will always be Paul Gross in my mind.


I'm quietly hoping for a repeat of the BBC America take on Dirk Gently, which was a perfectly good series if you dissolved yourself of the notion that it was anything to do with Douglas Adams' books of the same name.

[Ham]

The comparison to Good Omens is inevitable. I suspect that Good Omens works because it is all about the story, but Night Watch is about the characters. I suspect program makers just can't help themselves and it will disappear into that vat of mediocrity that is TV.