television
BBC1 vs. ITV1 in Christmas Smackdown 2011
Will 2011 be the year that ITV unseats the 600 pound giant in the room, BBC One, for Christmas Day ratings dominance? Cue Michael Buffer….Let’s get ready to rumble! The infamous long-awaited Christmas Day schedules for both BBC One and ITV1 have been set, sort of, (as of today, anyway) and war has officially been [...]
BBC's 2012 Shakespeare Olympiad
A long-time tradition of BBC programming will be ramped up a notch in 2012 as part of the BBC’s contribution to the Cultural Olympiad and Festival. Television adaptations of the works of William Shakespeare have been announced that include both documentaries and plays. BBC viewers will be treated to the likes of Richard II, Henry [...]
Dear Santa: One Dalek please, maybe two
Move over, Tickle-me Elmo, there could, someday, be a new Christmas-time, have-to-have, toy sheriff in town. Leave it to BBC R&D to come up with something that takes television to an active level that we’ve never seen before, further connecting television broadcast programming with the home environment. No other word for it. This is just [...]
Spamducken, anyone?
As we tumble headlong into Thanksgiving Thursday and the traditional day-long feast of turkey and all the trimmings, let us not forget the one food that helped put British comedy on the map a mere 42 years ago. Monty Python’s Flying Circus immortalized SPAM, the quintessential ‘mystery meat’ that now boasts its own museum in [...]
It's a Doctor Who Christmas – The Doctor, The Widow & the Wardrobe
It’s never too early to begin thinking about the holidays. Unfortunately, with only 35 days to go before Christmas, this now becomes a VERY valid statement no matter where you are. Part of the UK Christmas tradition is to begin to piece together the Christmas Day telly battles and offerings between the BBC, ITV and [...]
A Downton Abbey Christmas
As avid U.S. viewers of Downton Abbey are acutely aware, lucky UK telly watchers have already been treated to an early Christmas with the recent completion of the second series of the hit ITV series. But wait. There’s one more present to unwrap. Even though the Downton Abbey Christmas Special broadcast schedule has not yet [...]
Harry Potter director to develop Doctor Who feature
Conventional wisdom dictates that I’m not too sure I’m excited about this. As announced yesterday in Variety, there is a Doctor Who feature film in the works. I say this solely based on the fact that this isn’t a new idea. There have been a couple of big screen adaptations of the exploits of the [...]
Downton Abbey 2: 62 days and counting
As telly watchers in the UK wake up to the realization that last night was the final episode of Downton Abbey 2 until Christmas, separation anxiety will soon kick in as they await the season finale. Not much sympathy, I’m afraid, from long-standing U.S. members of the worldwide chapter of the DA2 support group who continue [...]
The producer who thought he'd killed David Attenborough
Ever wonder what it would be like to go through life known as ‘the person that killed Sir David Attenborough’? Probably not, unless you’re Alastair Fothergill, the producer of Sir David’s newest series, Frozen Planet. As he says, not really something you want on your CV. While Fothergill and Attenborough have worked together on numerous [...]
Kryten wins "Best TV Robot" competition – Duh!
Old news, but worth celebrating by the members of the Red Dwarf Nation everywhere. After all, who doesn’t love the affable Series 4000 service mechanoid whose given name is Kryten 2X4B-523P. As reported on by the folks over at Red Dwarf, Gary Pinches from The Digital Fix has, at great personal sacrifice, researched countless hours of [...]
