And all of us, we have a great dynamic and wanted to continue that. So yeah, it s the second thing that my company has been involved with. It s still a little bit unusual to have an actor so involved in the development process. It s a hugely luxurious thing to have worked with Simon writing for me, more and more over the years. We did
The Durrells, and having been directed by Roger, to have those people writing with me in mind, and knowing my strengths and my weaknesses, it was just so exciting because my voice was there from the beginning, and that s quite unusual and very luxurious.
BBC News
By Rebecca Thomas
image copyrightJOSS BARRATT/ITV
image captionKeeley Hawes stars as Alice who finds it hard to know how to behave after her partner s death
It is rare for a fictional TV show or movie to capture real grief effectively and honestly, given the difficulty in striking a balance between over-sentimentality and abject gloom.
But taking on such a challenge was considered worthwhile by the producers of the six-part ITV drama series Finding Alice.
Alice is a young woman left suddenly floundering and trying to find herself after her partner Harry dies from apparently falling down the stairs of their flash dream smart home, which he devotedly built himself.
Gemma Jones in Bridget Jones s Diary
Credit: LANDMARK MEDIA / Alamy Stock Photo
Euphoria rings in her voice before Gemma Jones breaks off to explain why. “I’m feeling slightly hysterical this morning”, she admits. “I’ve had my first coronavirus inoculation and I’m so relieved. I live near the Royal Free Hospital in Hampstead and every time I left the house I felt I was playing Russian roulette. Now I can go to the corner shop without fear. I don’t have to jump out of the way if people jog by, puffing and blowing.”
Jones, a much-loved actor of the unstarry variety, is 78, a fact she finds astonishing. She made her name as Louisa Trotter, the Cockney cook-turned high-class hotelier in the Seventies television hit The Duchess of Duke Street but is best known now as Bridget’s meddling mother in the Bridget Jones films – or as Hogwarts’ hospital matron Poppy Pomfrey in three Harry Potters. For her performance in the unforgettable BBC television film Marvellous,
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TV Drama You ll Want To Watch This Winter
Image courtesy of the BBC
There s plenty of TV drama to get stuck in to while we re indoors this winter. Here s our list of what s on and when.
The Serpent
BBC: Sunday nights at 9pm. Catch up on BBC iPlayer.
Inspired by real events, The Serpent tells the remarkable story of how the conman and murderer Charles Sobhraj (Tahar Rahim) was brought to justice. Posing as a gem dealer, Sobhraj and his girlfriend Marie-Andrée Leclerc (Jenna Coleman) travelled across Thailand, Nepal and India in 1975 and 1976, carrying out a spree of crimes on the Asian ‘Hippie Trail’ and becoming the chief suspects in a series of murders of young Western travellers.