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(http://seniorlearn.org/bookclubs/masterpiece/masterpiececlassic.jpg)
See the 2017 MASTERPIECE schedule (http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/masterpiece/schedule/index.html).
Let's talk about PBS programs that we enjoy.
UPCOMING
(http://seniorlearn.org/bookclubs/masterpiece/classic_2017/mymother.jpg)
My Mother and Other Strangers (http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/masterpiece/shows/my-mother-and-other-strangers/)
June 18, 2017
Set in Northern Ireland during World War Two, My Mother and Other Strangers follows the fortunes of the Coyne family and their neighbors as they struggle to maintain a normal life after a huge United States Army Air Force (USAAF) airfield, with 4,000 service men and women, lands in the middle of their rural parish.
(http://seniorlearn.org/bookclubs/masterpiece/classic_2017/grantchester3.jpg)
Grantchester, Season 3 (http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/masterpiece/shows/grantchester/)
June 18, 2017
James Norton (Happy Valley) stars as the handsome, jazz-loving vicar Sidney Chambers, with Robson Green as his law-enforcement ally, Inspector Geordie Keating, in Grantchester, a mystery series based on the acclaimed novels by James Runcie. When we last left the sleepy village, Sidney faced a moral dilemma: be with the woman he loves, or take the moral high road.
(http://seniorlearn.org/bookclubs/masterpiece/classic_2017/primesuspect.jpg)
Prime Suspect: Tennison (http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/masterpiece/shows/grantchester/)
June 25, 2017
MASTERPIECE dials back the clock to spotlight the influences that turned 22-year-old rookie policewoman Jane Tennison into the savvy, single-minded crime fighter beloved by Prime Suspect viewers. Starring Stefanie Martini (Doctor Thorne) in the iconic role immortalized by Helen Mirren, Prime Suspect: Tennison airs in three riveting 90-minute episodes.
ALREADY DISCUSSED
(http://seniorlearn.org/bookclubs/masterpiece/classic_2017/kingcharlesiii.jpg)
King Charles III (http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/masterpiece/shows/king-charles-iii/)
May 14, 2017
The hit Broadway show King Charles III, starring Tim Pigott-Smith, adapted for television, imagines Prince Charles’ ascension to the throne following Queen Elizabeth’s death.
(http://seniorlearn.org/bookclubs/masterpiece/classic_2017/darkangel.jpg)
Dark Angel (http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/masterpiece/episodes/dark-angel/)
May 21, 2017
Starring Downton Abbey‘s Joanne Froggatt, Dark Angel tells the story of Mary Ann Cotton: loving wife, mother, and serial murderer. Faced with abject poverty and an ailing husband, Mary Ann is ruthlessly determined to pursue a better life.
(http://seniorlearn.org/bookclubs/masterpiece/classic_2017/homefires2.jpg)
Home Fires, Season 2 - Final Season (http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/masterpiece/shows/home-fires/)
April 2 - May 7, 2017
The Final Season of Home Fires follows the women of an English rural village as they are separated from their husbands, fathers, sons and brothers during World War 1 and must forge alliances among their diverse community.
(http://seniorlearn.org/bookclubs/masterpiece/classic_2017/wolfhall.jpg)
Wolf Hall - Encore Presentation (http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/masterpiece/shows/wolf-hall/)
April 2 - May 7, 2017
An encore presentation of Season 1 from 2015 of Wolf Hall. Adapted from Hilary Mantel’s best-selling Booker Prize-winning novels Wolf Hall and its sequel, Bring Up the Bodies, Wolf Hall follows the complex machinations and back room dealings of accomplished power broker Thomas Cromwell, who must serve king and country while dealing with deadly political intrigue, Henry VIII’s tempestuous relationship with Anne Boleyn, and the religious upheavals of the Protestant reformation.
(http://seniorlearn.org/bookclubs/masterpiece/classic_2017/brontesisters.jpg)
To Walk Invisible The Bronte Sisters (http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/masterpiece/episodes/to-walk-invisible-the-bronte-sisters/)
March 26, 2017 (2 hours)
Written and directed by Sally Wainwright (Happy Valley, Last Tango in Halifax), To Walk Invisible depicts the evolution of secluded, dutiful clergyman’s daughters into authors of the most controversial fiction of the 1840s.
(http://seniorlearn.org/bookclubs/masterpiece/victoria/victoria1.jpg)
Victoria (http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/masterpiece/programs/series/victoria-s1/), Season 1
January 15 - March 5, 2017
A diminutive, neglected teenager is crowned Queen Victoria, who navigates the scandal, corruption, and political intrigues of the Court, and soon rises to become the most powerful woman in the world.
(http://seniorlearn.org/bookclubs/masterpiece/sherlockholmes4/sherlock4.jpg)
Sherlock (http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/masterpiece/programs/series/sherlock-s4/), Season 4
January 1 - 15, 2017
Sherlock (with Benedict Cumberbatch and Martin Freeman) returns with three brand-new episodes that promise laughter, tears, shocks, surprises and extraordinary adventures.
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Happy New Year!!
Tonight, January 1, SHerlock, Season 4, returns with "The Six Thatchers." Sherlock waits to see where Moriarty will make his posthumous move. One mysterious case in particular baffles Scotland Yard, but Sherlock is more interested in a seemingly trivial detail. Why is someone destroying images of the late Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher? Is there a madman on the loose? Or is there a much darker purpose at work? Something with its roots deep in Mary Watson's past…
I look forward to watching and talking about the new series.
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Looking forward to Victoria - saw the Christmas special last night of the Midwife group in Africa - a delight - the change of scenery was perfect.
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Marking
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Haven't watched any TV other than a couple of movies for 2 weeks. I can't say I missed it, but I'll check out PBS when I can. Tonight, though, we will watch football.
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Marking my spot. Happy New Year, everyone.
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OMG!
One of the things I always enjoyed about the British police mysteries was the lack of violence! Well! I'm watching -maybe- Sherlock.............so far they've had at least FOUR shoot-em-up scenes with high powered automatic weapons and killed about 3 dozen people!
I think I'm going to work on my research for my library presentation on Women Artists, it's much less stressful, actually fun! 👏🏻🎉👍
Jean
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Well, I did it again. I fell asleep long enough to miss the first half hour of Sherlock. Decided to wait until the 10:30pm rerun and, again, fell asleep on my reading and missed it completely. I'll have to catch up with it online, I think, if i am going to keep falling asleep on things.
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Watson has lost weight and is very dishy - but the storyline is so far beyond the traditional story. I had the programs, one after the other as background after watching bits of the first - can't tell if Watson's wife is a good guy or not - she appears to have been shot dead and yet, she makes videos, watched supposedly after her death that suggest she really does not die - the whole thing is another story simply using the Holmes and Watson names and some of their characterizations. Not my favorite - it is like the discussion we had the other day of the mine field laid by many historical fiction writers -
When you fictionalize history what is true and what is not and the work to find out and then knowing how many including at times ourselves are not up on the period of history fictionalized so we believe as fact all the wrong things - this fictionalization of fiction bringing Holmes and Watson into the twenty-first century is doing the same thing as I watch to find like a detectorist bits of what is the story of Sherlock Holmes - enough...! I do not have to like a series just because it was shown on PBS!
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I thought it was brilliant. Very James Bond. Darker than the others but the plots have to go somewhere and Sherlock himself came to be very much disliked by his creator, Arthur Conan Doyle, who only brought him back after the Reichenbach Falls death because Doyle's mother loved the character. I want to reread The Adventure of the Six Napoleons now.
Much too scary to watch at night, and since I had read something happens to Mary, I watched it in the day time through fingers across my face, but I needn't have. If I watch it again I'll watch it without the fingers.
I did dislike the interrogation of the spy or whatever he was but sped thru it, that's just my personal preference.
I really liked it, I can see that's not the prevailing opinion so far, but I did. I never swallowed Mary, a difficult character to play, I think, and here she takes on an entire new persona, and career, which I didn't really buy into, but it's interesting.
I don't know why viewers are carrying on about John, he did the right thing in the end.
I really like Mark Gatiss, (Mycroft) who is also the writer of the show and has been all along. This one is dark but very James Bondish and that building which they keep showing in London with the Ferris wheel in front of it, the old County Hall, where the London Aquarium is, is also the hotel where I am staying in May, if nothing happens. Hopefully there will not be any secret agents in it meeting antagonistically while I am there.
I especially loved Latin as the defining clue. Well done, Gatiss! Thing keeps you guessing at every turn.
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Miss Fisher's Murder Mystery was on one of our alternate PBS channels last night - impressive - not sure if it will be a regular since they showed buying the DVD series but is was a 'real' story not just a costume mystery set in the 1920s.
Also restarted is Whitechapel - another impressive put together mystery with the unlikely pairing of Rupert Penry-Jones, and Phil Davis - this set of stories is about a copycat Jack the Ripper murderer - wow - on the edge of you seat and well done with costume and filming and writing.
Looks like we are going to have a Monday night featuring mysteries plus my very favorite sitcom the Detectorists - love the quirky personalities and looks of these guys. love it...
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I quite enjoyed the latest Sherlock and I have to say I was only too pleased to see the back of Mary - that character was really going nowhere. Now, however, I will be interested to see how they cope with the baby - who was handily taken over by Molly this week. Was just saying to my husband how any man that is ever left with a small child always seems to have women falling at his feet, whereas a woman in a similar situation just has to get on with it - so will someone come along for John, or will Una Stubbs become the surrogate granny?
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Over Christmas we also saw a new Agatha Christie one-off on the BBC, Witness for the Prosecution. It was very dark compared to all the usual Miss Marples and Poirots. The main character was played by the inimitable Toby Jones, with Kim Cattrall and Andrea Riseborough also taking major parts. I think I enjoyed it, but we're still discussing it here - I suppose that's a good sign. It certainly wasn't as cosy as the usual Christie TV adaptations. I read an interview with Toby Jones, who said that whilst the viewing public may have been happy with the cosy stuff 20 years ago, they now want more to 'get their teeth into'. I'm undecided as to whether or not he's right - I think what i want to see depends entirely on my mood at the time, and I do enjoy a good Miss Marple when I need something comforting.
Rosemary
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Me, too, Rosemary. In my case, I have never been satisfied with anybody but Joan
Hicks Hickson (thank you, Ann), as Miss Marple, and your writing that made me wonder IF in fact she was as good as I remember her. I must see the new ones to see if they fit my picture of Miss Marple, nobody else has. What an incredible woman she was!!! Left off doing Miss Marple (when Agatha Christie herself said she must write one for her) because she didn't want to be typecast!! I can hear her fluting voice right now. I think I'll watch one of her old ones and see again before checking out the new...they've remastered the series and the result is quite good.
On Mary, I agree. I kept thinking the real life divorce between the two was the cause of the plot development but apparently they are still very much in love anyway. They did make her look quite unattractive this time, I thought, perhaps in aid of her secret occupation? Strange. Loved the plot twists at the end.
I also really like the WWII broadcasts of Sherlock Holmes which are available on audio CD, starring Basil Rathbone and Nigel Bruce. They have the old time commercials from the 40's, and Bruce admonishing all of us to save our kitchen soap and to buy war bonds. They are priceless. It's something to ride along in the car in 2016 and listen to 1940's on the radio.
Those are not strictly by Doyle's books, either, they were written by Anthony Boucher and Denis Greene, (the same Boucher of the Boucher... Awards for Mystery) but they are exceedingly clever and well done. I've also got all the movies of Rathbone and Bruce's Sherlock Holmes and how the critics ravaged Nigel Bruce as Dr. Watson!! I loved him in that series, he was a perfect foil and he and Rathbone were great friends. I did not realize Rathbone became typecast by Sherlock and that he was born in Africa, wonderful biography out on him years ago, he apparently was a wonderful man.
I understand he did a Scrooge, people used to listen to it on the radio, he'd read A Christmas Carol. I haven't heard it in years.
But I came IN to say, having taken down the huge tome of all of Sherlock Holmes stories (so much for my right rotator cuff) to see the original Adventure of the Six Napoleons, I found a much lighter one online and I love the typeface:
https://sherlock-holm.es/stories/pdf/a4/1-sided/sixn.pdf
I am still a little bit confused over the tale of the Merchant and the Market and the joke about Death Waiting, I get the joke, but is there a greater significance? In other words Mary was there all the time? But it wasn't just Mary, right? So what's with the Latin clue? The code name? So if that's the answer, why did they suspect the wrong person?
I don't want to spoil it for those who have not watched it, but those bits are eluding me. Can you answer it without giving away any of the plot? I hate people who spoil surprises and this one's got a ton of them.
I think it's because I watched the thing between the speed forward button and the fingers, but how did that actually fit in? Or do I have it?
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Who remembers Witness for the Prosecution with Charles Laughton and Marlene Deitrich and.....?...., another guy,........saw it as a kid in the local flea pit with my parents I think, still remember it, quite a shocker when you didn't know the end, and certainly not the usual cosy Christie. story.
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Ginny - no good asking me about all the complicated bits in Sherlock, I haven't got a clue what they were on about! When I keep interrupting to ask questions my daughters just say 'oh nobody understands it all, just go with the flow'! ::)
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I have to watch the latest Sherlock again then we can compare notes. I kept waiting for Moriarity to come back so I think I was distracted :-)
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Oh I so wish he would come back - I love Andrew Scott - but Mark Gatiss has said categorically that there will be no more Moriarty (unless, of course, that's a red herring...)
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i really don't care for Sherlock but I do like Elementery which is a more gentle in bringing Sherlock into the 21st century. My favorite Sherlock was Jeremy Brett who stayed in the Victorian age. I see no reason for dragging them into the 21st century.
If anyone has been watching "The Crown" have you heard when the series will return?
About Joan Hicks, am I wrong in my remembrance of a different actress playing Miss Marple when the show the show first on? I know, Google it, Ann! Doing it now!
Ginny, where did you find CD about WWII? We used to listen to books when traveling but never saw anything offered like that!
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yeeeeessss! Miss Marple has been played by four or more actresses not just Joan Hickson! One of them was in Cranford! I still haven't discovered how to put a link up using my iPhone but I do have iPad for Dummies so will look in there. Later 'gator!
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Oh of course it's Hickson, not Hicks, thank you Ann. I am hoping to get off this awful Metropolol in the next couple of days and retain what's left of my mind, that's 2 (count 'em) mistakes already this morning, and it appears to be only 9:00.
Rosemary, I love that, your daughters are in it for the experience, that's the way we u sed to listen to rock and roll lyrics, who cares what the singer is saying, it's the experience. It worked for us, didn't it. Louie Louie, Bob Dylan, nobody knew what the heck they were singing. Sounded good, though.
Ann it's Radio Spirits I order from, they've got them all. It's possible, tho that Cracker Barrel stores if you have any near you, have the same CD's.
Ann, I don't know when The Crown will return, but, like you, I am ready to see it.
Marcie, I kept waiting for Moriarty too, and I also love the actor in that part. I will be interested in what you can make of the Merchant and the Plot Line, it was repeated at least twice, in the beginning, at the end and I thought perhaps (through the fingers) in the middle once too.
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There's a wonderful article some of you may like this morning on the BBC about the creator of Sherlock, Mark Gattis, and his response to a critic who complained that this last Sherlock was too Bond.
Gattis responded to him in verse, which is what Arthur Conan Doyle did in 1912 to a similar complaint about his own Sherlock. I thought you might like to see it if you haven't:
http://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-38516886
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aha - and the other side of the coin ;) - some Brits are unhappy with the new Sherlock for some of the same reasons I am unhappy and then for a few more reasons I had not even thought through...
https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2017/jan/03/sherlock-slowly-perversely-morphing-into-james-bond-benedict-cumberbatch
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Oh ho!!! I am not the only one who doesn't care for Sherlock!! The Brits say it's too
James Bondish!! It reminded me of Dr Who! Guess what??? Both are written by the same person.
The coat that Sherlock wears was copied from Dr Who's coat. Both actors even walk the same wa
way!
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I caught the last half hour of the first Sherlock and only watched about 40 minutes of the second. I am not at all interested in watching stuff about serial killers. Also, the scene with John at the therapist seemed flat.
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Our PBS had the 2014 version of Mapp and Lucia last night which of-course I enjoyed but it set my husband off looking for his tapes of the previous version, which I think he found (hope they have not faded away). I thought the new actors just copied the original ones but were not as good, I liked the way some of the stories were combined,though.The new Georgie and Lucia especially could not match up to Hawthorne and Geraldine ?. Netflix used to have the original series.
Afterwards there was a fascinating program about Helena Rubenstein and Elizabeth Arden and the rise of the cosmetic industry. I saw Rubenstein's home in Krakow a couple years ago,which was also where Roman Polanski grew up, and both her and Arden's story just show such drive and ingenuity....it sounded from this program as if they practically invented the cosmetics industry.
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Racking my brains and all of a sudden "then came the dawn" - part of the Elizabeth Arden story was included in the PBS series on Harry Selfridge with one of the characters choosing between a husband who had disappointed her and going to NY with Arden.
Ha you also with squirreling away old tapes etc. - my kids shake their head since I still have 78s and yes, in the closet broken but can be fixed phonograph to play them and old tapes with a tape deck to play them on a TV that I kept that will not without all sorts of boxes and antennas play the current TV signal and an old boom box that plays audio tapes that were on tiny reels. And yep, I too have the original Geraldine and Hawthorne - just loved that series - with nothing on TV except angry pundits and voters I should get them out and enjoy the past ;)
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Barb, yes you should!!! TV has gone off the cliff! I, too, still have quite a few of those records but mine are 33's and a few years ago my husband gave me a brand new record player. My grans were amazed by it. They still are amazed! I play the records when I walk on our treadmill. My CD player isn't working but he never had a chance to fix it. Recently, he suggested I get a small one so could listen to it in bed while going to sleep. Of course, I have a player in my old MacPro, but that's a little arkward to use in bed.😊😊
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I watched that "Victoria". It wasn't very good, too slow, which is a shame because she is fascinating. There's a super biography by Christopher Hibbert...she wrote the most hilarious letters which he quotes in some detail (the interesting bits!) I highly recommend the biography, but not the show. Pity.
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Dana, I was also disappointed the first episode of "Victoria". The scenes seemed "chopped up".
Thought it might have been because I just finished watching "The Crown" series on Netflix. IMO, it moved at a smooth pace and the viewer always knew where various scenes were taking place.
I've now started the "Monarch of the Glen" series on Netflix and am enjoying it.
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Marking my place.
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I have not watched Victoria, but I have just recorded an interview with John Berger, the recently deceased author of Ways of Seeing. People say that Berger's book, published in 1972, changed the way they looked at art. I haven't read the book yet (has anyone on here?), but I am looking forward to hearing what he had to say.
Rosemary
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I'm very pleased to hear that Hibbert'a Queen Victoria is a super bio. I dug it up after the show last night and started on it. I've had it on my shelf, meaning to read it for years. I enjoyed the drama. Especially the politics. A young queen taking the measure of royal prerogative. Something like a guy suddenly finding himself president in the Oval Office.
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Hibbert's book is fascinating although I struggled to begin with to make sense of all the relatives--it helped when I finally succumbed and looked at the family tree so helpfully provided (rather like, when all else fails-read the instructions!)
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My email delivered these links to me and thought you might like to read them:
http://history1800s.about.com/od/1800sglossary/a/1800stimeline.htm
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http://history1800s.about.com/od/leaders/ss/Queen-Victoria-Facts.htm
I enjoyed "Victoria" and I looked to find out about her life.
I also rewatched "The Crown" Episodes 9 & 10.
Does anyone know when they are going to put up more about Queen Elizabeth's life? She has been on the throne longer than Victoria as of 2015.
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Years ago I read an interesting book about Queen Victoria titled Grandmama of Europe by Theo Aronson. It is amazing how many European royalty she was related to.
I enjoyed Victoria as a "fictional story." I don't know how much of it, especially the personal conversations, we can believe. The settings and costumes are fun to see.
I couldn't believe that John Lithgow didn't win the Golden Globe for his "Winston". I don't know anything about The Night Manager, whose lead actor won, but Lithgow was wonderful , and over all the episodes. It seemed to me to be a much tougher role than the one that won.
Jean
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I haven't seen Winston, Jean, but The Night Manager was fantastic. It's an adaptation of a John Le Carre book (he of Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy) and Tom Hiddleston and Hugh Laurie were both outstanding in it. it was compulsive Sunday night viewing for everyone I know when it was on.
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I didn't care for The Night Manager. Took it off my watch-list after the first episode.
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Lithgow played Churchill on The Crown.
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And he was wonderful. There is a LOT of great competition this year, have never seen such strong contenders.
The Emmys are coming up for TV and hopefully by carefully entering the categories entered, some of our favorites might have a chance to win in a very strong field.
The ratings for Sherlock fell for the last one, I think due to the unpleasant nature of the 2nd one. I guess it's our generation but the nasty guy with the IV thing was a major turn off to me. The rest of the show I enjoyed; it was Sherlock as we know him, but they came on very strong with those IV's and the drug thing which I guess people have an aversion to. I don't think I'll watch the 2nd one again, it was not plausible to me.
I really liked what I saw, however, of the last one, the Final Problem. I'm not through yet (it was too scary to watch at night), but in looking ahead, what fun, what a tease they are. I won't say why but it was good to see one of the characters return, or possibly not. Very clever. I kind of wish they had not done that second one, I don't think Mark Gatiss wrote that one, did he?
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(http://seniorlearn.org/bookclubs/masterpiece/masterpiececlassic.jpg)
See the 2017 MASTERPIECE schedule (http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/masterpiece/schedule/index.html).
Let's talk about PBS programs that we enjoy.
UPCOMING
(http://seniorlearn.org/bookclubs/masterpiece/classic_2017/mymother.jpg)
My Mother and Other Strangers (http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/masterpiece/shows/my-mother-and-other-strangers/)
June 18, 2017
Set in Northern Ireland during World War Two, My Mother and Other Strangers follows the fortunes of the Coyne family and their neighbors as they struggle to maintain a normal life after a huge United States Army Air Force (USAAF) airfield, with 4,000 service men and women, lands in the middle of their rural parish.
(http://seniorlearn.org/bookclubs/masterpiece/classic_2017/grantchester3.jpg)
Grantchester, Season 3 (http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/masterpiece/shows/grantchester/)
June 18, 2017
James Norton (Happy Valley) stars as the handsome, jazz-loving vicar Sidney Chambers, with Robson Green as his law-enforcement ally, Inspector Geordie Keating, in Grantchester, a mystery series based on the acclaimed novels by James Runcie. When we last left the sleepy village, Sidney faced a moral dilemma: be with the woman he loves, or take the moral high road.
(http://seniorlearn.org/bookclubs/masterpiece/classic_2017/primesuspect.jpg)
Prime Suspect: Tennison (http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/masterpiece/shows/grantchester/)
June 25, 2017
MASTERPIECE dials back the clock to spotlight the influences that turned 22-year-old rookie policewoman Jane Tennison into the savvy, single-minded crime fighter beloved by Prime Suspect viewers. Starring Stefanie Martini (Doctor Thorne) in the iconic role immortalized by Helen Mirren, Prime Suspect: Tennison airs in three riveting 90-minute episodes.
ALREADY DISCUSSED
(http://seniorlearn.org/bookclubs/masterpiece/classic_2017/kingcharlesiii.jpg)
King Charles III (http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/masterpiece/shows/king-charles-iii/)
May 14, 2017
The hit Broadway show King Charles III, starring Tim Pigott-Smith, adapted for television, imagines Prince Charles’ ascension to the throne following Queen Elizabeth’s death.
(http://seniorlearn.org/bookclubs/masterpiece/classic_2017/darkangel.jpg)
Dark Angel (http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/masterpiece/episodes/dark-angel/)
May 21, 2017
Starring Downton Abbey‘s Joanne Froggatt, Dark Angel tells the story of Mary Ann Cotton: loving wife, mother, and serial murderer. Faced with abject poverty and an ailing husband, Mary Ann is ruthlessly determined to pursue a better life.
(http://seniorlearn.org/bookclubs/masterpiece/classic_2017/homefires2.jpg)
Home Fires, Season 2 - Final Season (http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/masterpiece/shows/home-fires/)
April 2 - May 7, 2017
The Final Season of Home Fires follows the women of an English rural village as they are separated from their husbands, fathers, sons and brothers during World War 1 and must forge alliances among their diverse community.
(http://seniorlearn.org/bookclubs/masterpiece/classic_2017/wolfhall.jpg)
Wolf Hall - Encore Presentation (http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/masterpiece/shows/wolf-hall/)
April 2 - May 7, 2017
An encore presentation of Season 1 from 2015 of Wolf Hall. Adapted from Hilary Mantel’s best-selling Booker Prize-winning novels Wolf Hall and its sequel, Bring Up the Bodies, Wolf Hall follows the complex machinations and back room dealings of accomplished power broker Thomas Cromwell, who must serve king and country while dealing with deadly political intrigue, Henry VIII’s tempestuous relationship with Anne Boleyn, and the religious upheavals of the Protestant reformation.
(http://seniorlearn.org/bookclubs/masterpiece/classic_2017/brontesisters.jpg)
To Walk Invisible The Bronte Sisters (http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/masterpiece/episodes/to-walk-invisible-the-bronte-sisters/)
March 26, 2017 (2 hours)
Written and directed by Sally Wainwright (Happy Valley, Last Tango in Halifax), To Walk Invisible depicts the evolution of secluded, dutiful clergyman’s daughters into authors of the most controversial fiction of the 1840s.
(http://seniorlearn.org/bookclubs/masterpiece/victoria/victoria1.jpg)
Victoria (http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/masterpiece/programs/series/victoria-s1/), Season 1
January 15 - March 5, 2017
A diminutive, neglected teenager is crowned Queen Victoria, who navigates the scandal, corruption, and political intrigues of the Court, and soon rises to become the most powerful woman in the world.
(http://seniorlearn.org/bookclubs/masterpiece/sherlockholmes4/sherlock4.jpg)
Sherlock (http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/masterpiece/programs/series/sherlock-s4/), Season 4
January 1 - 15, 2017
Sherlock (with Benedict Cumberbatch and Martin Freeman) returns with three brand-new episodes that promise laughter, tears, shocks, surprises and extraordinary adventures.
Ginny - the last one of Sherlock did not go down too well with many people here, but I thought it was excellent, and very scary. My daughter saw it as 'lazy' and said they borrowed too much from Dr Who, which they also write, but which i do not watch. And I loved the 'return' of that person (!) - the most brilliant actor of the entire cast IMO.
We are into the new series of Endeavour, and very much enjoying that too.
And Call the Midwife returns on Sunday - can't wait :)
Rosemary
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A new Endeavour? I hope we see it here eventually.
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I watched an episode of "Agatha Raisin" when it was on PBS here in Gahanna. I don't particularly like it because Agatha does not look like I thought she would and she is a bit of a flibbertgy Gidget. Blonde bombshell!
I don't like "'Miss Fisher's Mysterys" either. Same kind of stories which I think could have been better presented.
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I agree about Miss Fisher's Mysteries - so irritating! I haven't even watched the Agatha Raisin ones - saw a trailer and that was more than enough.
We have a new series of the Painting Challenge just starting. I really enjoy this - it's like Bake Off but with amateur artists. I can't paint anything, so I like to see how people do it. This week they'd to do a couple of still lifes, and it was amazing how different the results were from one another.
Rosemary
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I enjoy Miss Fisher's Mysteries. A good escape now and then from all the news and politics.
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I don't know if Broadchurch was shown in the US, but we have just begun a new series of it. Two episodes in and it is brilliant - though harrowing too.
It concerns not a murder (at least not so far) but a serious sexual assault (which we do not see - it's all about the aftermath) by an as yet unidentified assailant. The victim is played by Julie Hesmondhalgh, a fantastic actress. She's not in the least glamorous. We are starting to discover that she does not fit the typical role of victim at all, and the story therefore raises a lot of questions about what we expect of women, how we judge their behaviour, and why they are expected to be as pure as the driven snow when men are often just seen as 'lads' when they behave similarly. It's thought-provoking. In this week's episode the woman's daughter, aged 15, returned from a weekend trip to find out what had happened to her mother while she was away. It was an incredibly heartbreaking scene, and made me think about how I would cope with telling my own daughters something like that.
Olivia Coleman and David Tennant are back as the police officers. They are both outstanding, and the working relationship between them is so well done.
So far I have no idea who the perpetrator was - there are so many possibilities - but in a way it doesn't matter, the value of the story is the way in which it shows how a family, and a whole town, can be affected by such a thing.
There are 8 episodes in all, and this will be the last series as the writer has now been headhunted to write Dr Who. i will be on the edge of my sofa every Monday night.
Rosemary
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I saw the first Broadchurch. It was very good. Hope we get the new series.
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I too hope that we get the new Broadchurch in the US. I don't see a specific date yet.
Meanwhile, I'm interested in the 2-hour program about the Bronte sisters that PBS is showing on March 26. See info about TO WALK INVISIBLE THE BRONTE SISTERS at http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/masterpiece/episodes/to-walk-invisible-the-bronte-sisters/
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I found Broadchurch on Netflix and put it on my List. There are 2 seasons available.
However, between other things on my List, e-books waiting to be read and Life In General, the conversation here may have gone on to other things before I get to watch! ;D
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The most recent season of Call the Midwife ended last Sunday, though my daughter and I have still to see the final episode. The good news is that a new season of Vera starts this Sunday - for anyone who hasn't seen it before, it's based on the books by Ann Cleeves, set in Northumberland. The inimitable Brenda Blethyn plays Vera, a police detective with some unorthodox methods. I love it but my mother is not so keen - anyone else seen it? If you are American you will probably need subtitles, as the Geordie accent can be impenetrable even for us, but IMO it's worth persevering!
Ann Cleeves apparently started writing when she was living at a bird observatory, her husband being an avid bird watcher who had a job there. She's not into birds so she needed something else to do. I am not into my husband's interests in sport and music festivals, but somehow I don't seem to have produced any bestselling books as yet... ::)
Rosemary
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I enjoyed Series I of Vera but it is no longer on Netflix and they never added a Series II. I did need subtitles :).
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That's a shame - I do think it's got better and better (whereas Granchester, for example, seems to have deteriorated horribly in the most recent series).
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I just read about the Bronte sisters program. I didn't know it was going to be a series. That sounds interesting. I will put it on my calendar! I'm serious about this! On my wall calendar!!! I have never used my iPhone calendar.😢😢. Maybe I should!😋😋
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I wouldn't miss the series for anything. The lives of the Bronte sisters were so unique. I've been to Haworth and got caught up in the mood of the place. Their father, too, was an unusual character, I found, after reading a biography of him, A Man of Sorrow. He lived on after losing wife and children, one after the other.
He asked Elizabeth Gaskell to write a biography of Charlotte after she died. His own character came off rather badly in the book, and his feelings are reflected in a letter he wrote to Mrs Gaskell:
'I do not deny that I am somewhat eccentrick. Had I been numbered amongst the calm, sedate, concentric men of the world, I should not have been as I now am,, and I should in all probability never have had such children as mine have been.'
RIP, Patrick. Thoroughbreds, all of them.
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I very much enjoy the episodes of VERA whenever they are (infrequently) shown.
I believe that the new TO WALK INVISIBLE THE BRONTE SISTERS won't be a series but is a special 2-hour drama that will be broadcast next week. See http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/masterpiece/episodes/to-walk-invisible-the-bronte-sisters/
That's an interesting quote, Jonathan. I wonder if the program will include a perspective on the father.
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I think it was a one-off here Marcie, though I didn't see it.
First one of Vera tonight was brilliant!
Rosemary
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I am jealous, Rosemary! Well, I just checked my public library and they have all of the Vera seasons, including Season Six. I'm going to check which episodes I've missed, or at least don't sound familiar :-).
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Reminder: The 2-hour program,To Walk Invisible The Bronte Sisters, will be shown on most PBS stations this evening.
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Thanks, Marcie. I would have forgotten about it otherwise.
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To Walk Invisible was interesting. I had trouble understanding some of the speech, though. The accent wasn't a problem, but the fast, forced sounding speech was. Throughout the show Charlotte and Emily seemed to have to struggle to get out anything at all without sounding and looking like they were terrified of speaking or were holding back, not quite successfully, anger. Now I have an urge to read some of their works. The only one I ever read was Jane Eyre, and it left a powerful impression on me.
I barely recognized Johnathan Pryce. He also did a TV Movie last year, called Aberfan: The Green Hollow, commemorating the Aberfan school disaster of 1966. I'd like very much to see that if it ever is shown on this side of the pond. My Mom was from Merthyr Tydfil, just up the valley a mile or so. We did not lose family in the disaster, but friends of the family did. I remember how sad it was to travel, a few years later, past the site with all the white crosses on the green hillside across the narrow valley from the train. The 50th anniversary of the disaster was on October 16, 2016.
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For those who might want to read Charlotte Bronte's comments on their pseudonyms, Project Gutenberg has obliged. I expect that, in making the TV movie, this was one of the sources consulted.
https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/771
For those curious about Patrick Bronte's poems, Gutenberg is also forthcoming.
https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/17081
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This is such a non sequitur I apologize, and you'll laugh at me with all these serious subjects going on, but we had a spring break last week and I have been binge watching Father Brown, the new one on PBS. I had no idea there were 5 seasons of it, and I've got the first 4 because the 5th is only still in British format.
I absolutely love it. I just finished the first year's shows (they have several disks in each season, I don't know how I missed any of them. I did not know any of the cast, so the names Sorcha Cusack and Nancy Carroll (of Call the Midwife) and the others noted meant nothing to me, but they do now.
I don't see how they could have found a better Father Brown than Mark Williams, he's perfect, and I don't remember him either from Harry Potter or any of the other credits. So nice for once to see a program with a positive message for a change. But plenty of mystery, too. Wonderful locations. Great series.
But I do recognize the Bishop and so would anybody who ever watched Doc Martin, he's Clive! Mrs. Tichell's husband! He's a prickly Bishop unlike his clumsy Clive counterpart.
I've signed up for Vera on Netflix because I really liked the trailer I saw of it.
Speaking of Doc Martin it's now filming in Cornwall (Port Isaac) its 8th season of 9. Penhale is back! If we all run we can all see them in the process of filming hahahaa. The house next door to his is for sale in real life, here's the ad, and the price:
Ever fancied living next door to Doc Martin? Well now you can...
The three-bedroom home in Port Isaac, next door to where they film the ITV phenomenon starring Martin Clunes, is on the market and you could own it.
Built in the 17th century, the grade-two listed cottage is in a prime, slightly elevated, location on Roscarrock Hill with one of the best views looking out to the harbour, over the old village and out to sea.
This beautiful white-washed cottage oozes character and charm, retaining many of its original features and has been cherished by the same family for over 400 years.
Merging fiction with reality, the picturesque Port Isaac property is currently owned by a real life GP. Although he doesn't live in the home himself – he lets it out as a Cornish holiday cottage.
What a view...
(http://www.cornwalllive.com/images/localworld/ugc-images/276391/binaries/The%20White%20House%202.jpg)
"I only lived there for one summer as a GP in 1974 but my grandmother lived there until she was 93," said Dr Hambly.
"Since the 16th century it's been home to doctors and coastguards and nearby there is a tunnel where people used to smuggle.
"It's one of the oldest houses in the village and it's in a wonderful spot.
The cute cottage is fittingly named The White House and it's on the market with John Bray & Partners for £795,000.
Read more at http://www.cornwalllive.com/house-next-door-to-doc-martin-is-for-sale-in-port-isaac-but-it-will-not-come-cheap/story-29734384-detail/story.html#By3wuz46g1Efr1dr.99
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Ginny - I LOVE Father Brown - it is my daughter's and my go-to programme when we want something comforting! I agree, Mark Williams is brilliant (he was excellent in H Potter too, and I'm not even a JK Rowling fan). There are endless repeats of FB episodes on our TV so we record them all and dip in when we want to.
Almost £800,000 for a house in Cornwall! In my childhood it was a remote and cheap place to live. Now it's the same old story - all the good property has been bought up by London bankers and locals can't afford it, villages are ghost towns most of the year and services are non-existent because there aren't enough all year residents to justify them. The same thing has happened in many of the more attractive coastal villages in East Lothian and the East Neuk of Fife. Property prices are an obsession in this country - I get the impression that is not so much the case in the US?
Rosemary
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Comforting! That's the word! Comforting it sure is.
Everything in the way of house prices in the UK seems inflated to me, but I am pretty sure people coming here might think the same. It depends on where you live, I think. Sometimes I watch those real estate shows and the one based in NYC is out of this world, the properties and the costs, but possibly, somebody correct me, San Francisco has the most exorbitant prices tho there are more billionaires in NYC than any other city in the US. I am not sure.
I once had the dream (and that's all it was) of having a house in the UK, because I have so enjoyed my trips there, just love those rental cottages the National Trust does, but was instantly disabused of the very notion by looking in the real estate agent's windows. I thought I wasn't reading the signs correctly. hahahaa I was.
I love Port Isaac. We stayed there a couple of weeks in Carnweather, which is part of Doyden House right on the coast. You know the little castle tower folly that Mrs. Tichell took the baby to in Doc Martin? It's on the property too, called Doyden Castle.
I guess prosperity has hit the little town, they were incredibly nice people. It was like a....movie set, and so it is today. I hope they are reaping TONS of money. We have such wonderful memories of it now but I haven't been back. The BEST homemade nougat I ever had and the best fish (despite Burt Large now) hahaha and the most AWFUL "1 mile walk" which had to be 8 miles at least on the Coastal Trail was it? haahaha Nearly lost two of us. People would sign a journal and leave notes of good walks, etc., for the next people. It was charming it really was.
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Rosemary, I was just discussing the cost of property in CA vs OH with a cousin. She is conparing the two and maybe will move to OH next year. CA is an expensive state to live in when it comes to owning your own place. And in Ohio, you get more bang for your buck.
Ginny, I love and DVR all of Father Brown! But I never noticed that the Bishop was also Clive on Doc Martin! Did you say that they are now filming Season 9? I thought they were doing 7! Do you mean that what I am watching (all repeats that I have already seen) is not the season I thought
it was?? That means I can go watch 1 or 2 seasons that I've never seen? Whoa!
Am I in the right discussion to talk about The Invisable Bronte Sisters?
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Yes, you're in the right discussion. I just got it off course. :). They are now filming season eight, the newest season of Doc Martin, and they will have one more year in their current arrangement, to go, so there will be nine altogether, 7 of which are now on DVD.
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Hi Anne,
See my posts 60 and 61 for some interesting links regarding the Bronte sisters and their brother.
I tried Father Brown. It was just okay; I haven't been watching it for a year or so now. I also didn't care much for the one Grandchester I saw. Between the two, I liked Father Brown better.
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Oh, Frybabe, what a treasure Gutenberg offers us about the three sisters and how they thought and why they wrote! Thank you so much for those links🤓💕. I did peek in to read a small bit of Patrick's work and will return later to enjoy his poems.
As for the Sunday night program, I didn't know what to think. After Patrick dies, Charlotte thought back to how they treated Patrick's poetry the night he was sure he could join their little group of writers. How they handed back his work and told him to go. How sorry she was and just sat there
crying.
Was she wondering if they had treated Patrick more kindly during that time in their childhood, if he wouldn't have lived a better life and been a better person.
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I thought so too, Annie. Rejection by the principal females in his life seems to have played a part in his downfall.
For those of you who like Martin Freeman, I discovered that he is starring in a Crackle original TV series, called Start-Up, which takes place in Miami. As the name implies, it is about a guy trying to start a business. I plan on watching the first episode later on today. It is under their TV heading, British category.
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For those of you who may have missed Wolf Hall, PBS is rerunning it starting this Sunday at 10:00 pm, at least on the NC channels.
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Ginny, I have Wolf Hall on my Watchlist on Amazon Prime. I haven't started watching it yet. I'm trying to get some of the other programs I've had marked earlier out of the way.
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I think the reason that's big news (and I don't know where you watch Amazon Prime) is that on the big screen the quality of the program, the acting, the scenery, the experience, is pretty amazing. I have it on DVD but I found that the comparison to a 10.5 screen on a portable DVD player and a 29" monitor, and a large screen TV really makes a difference. At least for me, but my eyesight is admittedly quite poor.
I've just bought the new Amazon Fire Stick which will allow me to watch any Amazon Prime stuff on the big screen, which I like for a movie (and the CBS new series with Christine Baransky, too) but it will not allow you to also tape it on DVR, nor will Prime, so with PBS if you want to go back and look at the spectacular acting, you can, over and over. Of course you can do that on DVD, also. She must be nearing the end of her third book in the trilogy, which has been long awaited. I figure they know something I don't.
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I checked and found that they will be showing it on my PBS station also.
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Wolf Hall is a brilliant adaptation, but the sets are dark - I think they said that this was because interiors were dark in those days.
Mark Rylance and Claire Foy were the stars of the show for me, but there were so many other good performances - Damian Lewis, Mark Gatiss, Anton Lesser, all outstanding.
Enjoy!
Rosemary
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OH it is and it began last night with a new introduction I've never seen, magic. Yes on the dark, didn't they say that they filmed it in natural light, just as it would have seemed to the people at the time?
They are so BIG on the screen. I'm so used to tiny little figures. hahaha The guy who played Norfolk also is outstanding. And of course Jonathan Pryce. They are ALL just wonderful.
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I didn't want to stay up so late to watch or wait a week for the next episode, so I started watching it on Amazon. Interesting the way they portrayed some of the people. I don't know what to make, exactly, of Cromwell. He sees all, says not much (no excess verbiage there), and always has such a sad, unhappy face. Thomas More comes off as being a bit sarcastic maybe? Nasty. I think I liked the portrayal of More a lot better in A Man for All Seasons. I wonder if the real man was somewhere in between.
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Oh good, you're watching it, too!
I am so disappointed that on this rerun they are cutting it off sharp at the hour, and some of the episodes are longer, so I'm missing stuff. It's a good thing I can look at the DVD's, or see it, as you say, on Amazon. I must hook up that FIRE stick thing so I can see it full size (or bigger than a pea anyway).
Yes, the whole thing was supposedly about the difference in Cromwell, how Rylance's portrayal (which is nothing short of wonderful) makes him seem so...what would you say? Not the horrid monster one may previously have thought, tho there ARE hints. Mantel has taken the liberty of making them fit, the viewer can excuse this or that, and Rylance I think could do anything. I THINK Mantel said that she herself was somewhat altered by the actor's portrayals, when she watched the film, which she liked.
Revisionist history people shouted, but look at Bishop Gardiner and especially, as you say, Thomas More. I THINK, and it's been a while since this came out, but I think this More portrayal came from Mantel's research at Oxford (I thought, but it could be Cambridge) as I've seen the name of the eminent scholar who had been consulted and who was writing at the time the supposed definitive biography of More. At the time I wrote down his name, but I can't find it now or his book, I've been checking on the recent biographies. Maybe I need to check on those written right after her book came out, the first one...was it 2012? Not sure.. and not the movie.
There is going to be another movie, but her 3rd book is not yet out. What on earth will it say? And how?
I can't get over the production values, I really can't, they are spectacular.
He was saintly in a Man for All Seasons, wasn't he? Just wonderful, one cried. He's not the same man here, wait till you see the rest. Which one was he, or was he, as you say, a little of both?
Norfolk in this fascinates me. The whole thing is fascinating.
It does make you wonder whether or not revisionist history is a good thing or a bad one. Should we keep the people we have set up on pedestals and/ or in this case as villains, firmly on them, or not?
Do we need them, more than we need the truth?
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Were the originals more than an hour? The first season shows on Amazon are too. Well, the first one was an hour and one minute, the rest so far are 59 minutes. There are six episodes with the seventh being a talk about the show with the actors.
I rather suspect that More was actually in between a saint and a nasty dude. What surprised me is that they seemed to indicate that More and his wife were not very close. I got that mostly from a comment she made and when, given a last chance to sign the paper, More just shrugged at the suggestion he could go home to his wife and children should he sign. I can't believe that he would not have taken measures to make sure his family would be secure from vengeful factions should he be executed. That wasn't mentioned in the video.
So far, I get the impression that both Cromwell and More, in the show, are more or less swept along with the events and just trying in their own ways to make the best of circumstances. I really know so very little about either man, not to mention the greater court of Henry VIII other than a general knowledge of him and his eight wives (and I am sure I've forgotten half of what I knew when I was into English history).
BTW, I do love Rylance's "hangdog" look for Cromwell. Wosley, as I recall, was not kindly looked on by history either. Bishop Gardiner is someone whom I know nothing about. He is pretty much relegated in the show to making snide remarks and giving nasty looks toward Cromwell.
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I don't know. I thought the first was one and a half hours but I am glad to hear yours are within the hour. I'll hope this next one does not get cut off like the first one did, Henry was in mid sentence.
:) Yes, I just read an interview with Mark Gatiss, who plays Gardiner, who said all he really did was show up when Cromwell was going somewhere and b***at him. hahahaa. I really like him, he's the creator and writer of the new Sherlock series (and plays Mycroft).
The Court thing is fascinating, especially considering Caesar was considered the first to have a "court" as we know it. You can see, just by observing, how the feudal system developed and then how it declined and finally ended, supposedly with Henry VIII.
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Holbein the Younger's portrait of Cromwell:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Cromwell#/media/File:Cromwell,Thomas(1EEssex)01.jpg
The slide show continues with several other portraits including Ann Boleyn. She was pretty.
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(http://seniorlearn.org/bookclubs/masterpiece/masterpiececlassic.jpg)
See the 2017 MASTERPIECE schedule (http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/masterpiece/schedule/index.html).
Let's talk about PBS programs that we enjoy.
UPCOMING
(http://seniorlearn.org/bookclubs/masterpiece/classic_2017/mymother.jpg)
My Mother and Other Strangers (http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/masterpiece/shows/my-mother-and-other-strangers/)
June 18, 2017
Set in Northern Ireland during World War Two, My Mother and Other Strangers follows the fortunes of the Coyne family and their neighbors as they struggle to maintain a normal life after a huge United States Army Air Force (USAAF) airfield, with 4,000 service men and women, lands in the middle of their rural parish.
(http://seniorlearn.org/bookclubs/masterpiece/classic_2017/grantchester3.jpg)
Grantchester, Season 3 (http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/masterpiece/shows/grantchester/)
June 18, 2017
James Norton (Happy Valley) stars as the handsome, jazz-loving vicar Sidney Chambers, with Robson Green as his law-enforcement ally, Inspector Geordie Keating, in Grantchester, a mystery series based on the acclaimed novels by James Runcie. When we last left the sleepy village, Sidney faced a moral dilemma: be with the woman he loves, or take the moral high road.
(http://seniorlearn.org/bookclubs/masterpiece/classic_2017/primesuspect.jpg)
Prime Suspect: Tennison (http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/masterpiece/shows/grantchester/)
June 25, 2017
MASTERPIECE dials back the clock to spotlight the influences that turned 22-year-old rookie policewoman Jane Tennison into the savvy, single-minded crime fighter beloved by Prime Suspect viewers. Starring Stefanie Martini (Doctor Thorne) in the iconic role immortalized by Helen Mirren, Prime Suspect: Tennison airs in three riveting 90-minute episodes.
ALREADY DISCUSSED
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King Charles III (http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/masterpiece/shows/king-charles-iii/)
May 14, 2017
The hit Broadway show King Charles III, starring Tim Pigott-Smith, adapted for television, imagines Prince Charles’ ascension to the throne following Queen Elizabeth’s death.
(http://seniorlearn.org/bookclubs/masterpiece/classic_2017/darkangel.jpg)
Dark Angel (http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/masterpiece/episodes/dark-angel/)
May 21, 2017
Starring Downton Abbey‘s Joanne Froggatt, Dark Angel tells the story of Mary Ann Cotton: loving wife, mother, and serial murderer. Faced with abject poverty and an ailing husband, Mary Ann is ruthlessly determined to pursue a better life.
(http://seniorlearn.org/bookclubs/masterpiece/classic_2017/homefires2.jpg)
Home Fires, Season 2 - Final Season (http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/masterpiece/shows/home-fires/)
April 2 - May 7, 2017
The Final Season of Home Fires follows the women of an English rural village as they are separated from their husbands, fathers, sons and brothers during World War 1 and must forge alliances among their diverse community.
(http://seniorlearn.org/bookclubs/masterpiece/classic_2017/wolfhall.jpg)
Wolf Hall - Encore Presentation (http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/masterpiece/shows/wolf-hall/)
April 2 - May 7, 2017
An encore presentation of Season 1 from 2015 of Wolf Hall. Adapted from Hilary Mantel’s best-selling Booker Prize-winning novels Wolf Hall and its sequel, Bring Up the Bodies, Wolf Hall follows the complex machinations and back room dealings of accomplished power broker Thomas Cromwell, who must serve king and country while dealing with deadly political intrigue, Henry VIII’s tempestuous relationship with Anne Boleyn, and the religious upheavals of the Protestant reformation.
(http://seniorlearn.org/bookclubs/masterpiece/classic_2017/brontesisters.jpg)
To Walk Invisible The Bronte Sisters (http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/masterpiece/episodes/to-walk-invisible-the-bronte-sisters/)
March 26, 2017 (2 hours)
Written and directed by Sally Wainwright (Happy Valley, Last Tango in Halifax), To Walk Invisible depicts the evolution of secluded, dutiful clergyman’s daughters into authors of the most controversial fiction of the 1840s.
(http://seniorlearn.org/bookclubs/masterpiece/victoria/victoria1.jpg)
Victoria (http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/masterpiece/programs/series/victoria-s1/), Season 1
January 15 - March 5, 2017
A diminutive, neglected teenager is crowned Queen Victoria, who navigates the scandal, corruption, and political intrigues of the Court, and soon rises to become the most powerful woman in the world.
(http://seniorlearn.org/bookclubs/masterpiece/sherlockholmes4/sherlock4.jpg)
Sherlock (http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/masterpiece/programs/series/sherlock-s4/), Season 4
January 1 - 15, 2017
Sherlock (with Benedict Cumberbatch and Martin Freeman) returns with three brand-new episodes that promise laughter, tears, shocks, surprises and extraordinary adventures.
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Not as pretty as Claire Foy. :) Nor the German Anne of Cleves, whom he thought was ugly. Look at those eyes of Cromwell, tho!
I have to say tho that this morning thanks to Netflix, I was able to begin to watch the new 2017 season, the 5th year, of Father Brown's series. We can't get it here in the US on DVD, it only came out in the UK a couple of months ago and hasn't been converted yet, but it's streaming on Netflix, and there are 15!!! new episodes! Since the Latin classes are out this week, I'm binge watching. The first is a Christmas one, and THAT one I am going to add to my yearly viewing of Christmas Fare. Hokey? Maybe. Predictable? Maybe. Super fun? Definitely!
I did notice, however, in the last scene when they raised a glass to "absent friends," that it was Sid and not "Monty" who was mentioned. I like Sid, a lot. I don't think we've ever met "Monty," have we? Poor Felicia, he seems absent a LOT but no glass was raised to him.
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Just watched an interesting video I ran across in my Amazon video, Holbein: Eye of the Tudors. It was obvious that the maker of the video was unhappy about the new version of history which is turning More into the bad guy and Cromwell into the good guy. Apparently Mantel is not the only one to express this revisionist version of history.
Okay, so I have a question. If Holbein was the one who painted the picture of Anne of Cleves which the King claimed deceived him as to Anne's beauty, then how is it that Cromwell got executed and not Holbein as well?
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Maybe that's why it has taken Mantel so long to write the 3rd book. :)
Wasn't Holbein famous for his likenesses? Henry liked the portraits Holbein did well enough of him and his children.
That's a good question. I don't know enough about British history to answer it.
I have a feeling there's more to it than that, and that Norfolk and Gardiner had a hand in it, rivalry and jealousy, and jockeying for position in the court...And then there was that odd little thing in the first program where, was it Henry who asked him about his feelings toward the clergy? And you can see Cromwell's stance. He must have made a lot of enemies, especially in the dissolution of the monasteries. I am interested, myself, in how he fell, but it was a serpent's nest he was dancing in, politically, anyway.
My thought on it is that Mantel is not as revisionist as she was trying to make the case that he wasn't the absolute monster he's been formerly portrayed as; she's thrown in lots of unsympathetic things he did. There are always two sides. And so in the movie they cast Rylance with those sympathetic eyes, and he made the case pretty much.... for the movie, anyway. Holbein painted a different Cromwell, just LOOK at those piggy, mean little eyes, and if Holbein's as accurate as his fame insists, she MAY in fact BE doing revisionist history, it's a novel, after all.
Fascinating, isn't it?
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I have to ask, is that Wolsey's ring on Cromwell's finger in the portrait?? Is that why the movie made such a point of it?
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I hadn't noticed the ring in the portrait, Ginny.
I did notice that Rylance did a good job of getting his facial expression right. And I noticed that Holbein used a similar expression for several of his paintings, including his wife. They all seem to be there, but not there with that gaze. Kind of circumspect maybe, or like you might look if you were day dreaming or just not thinking about anything? I'd say sad, but that doesn't quite describe it. It struck me that Rylance's Cromwell, like the painting, didn't show any real (or intense) emotional expression, just that distant gaze no matter what was going on. Holbein's portrait of More is a bit different. There you can see an intensity in the forward leaning posture, in the eyes and to an extent, the facial expression, showing a keen interest in something not shown in the portrait.
Holbein didn't live more then a few years after Cromwell's execution. He died of the "sweating sickness" that took Cromwell's wife and girl's. I was wondering what it referred to and here is an answer. No one really knows, but many now think, thanks to the Four Corners outbreak in 1993, it was a form of hantavirus. http://theconversation.com/what-was-sweating-sickness-the-mysterious-tudor-plague-of-wolf-hall-37194
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Oh interesting, thank you! I wondered myself on the "sweating sickness," what a horror. That's why Henry VIII kept moving his court, to get away from whatever it was. It's a miracle any of them ever lived between the plagues and this strange sickness: imagine a broom causing such!!! You can't win, can you? Try to keep a clean house and look what it gets you. :)
There's another portrait of Cromwell Holbein did and the eyes are different. He seems to have pretty much really hit at Cromwell in the one we know. It interests me that the man playing More in this production looks more like the Erasmus painting of Holbein than he does the More one. That intense look you cite can be taken more than one way in the Holbein, too.
The Frick Collection which has supposedly the most accurate Holbein has another one of him by Jacobus Houbraken(1698−1780) and he looks a little different in the eyes area. He's almost normal looking here:
http://collections.frick.org/media/view/Objects/1020/511?t:state:flow=8143ea50-a31c-4bba-b574-bd04c55d9a41
Obviously not done from life. And this roundel from Wikipedia is interesting, so all together there are more portraits of him without those awful eyes than with them, but that, perhaps, is what Holbein saw.
(https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/c/cb/Thomas_Cromwell%2C_portrait_miniature_with_fur_collar%2C_after_Hans_Holbein_the_Younger.jpg/300px-Thomas_Cromwell%2C_portrait_miniature_with_fur_collar%2C_after_Hans_Holbein_the_Younger.jpg)
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The broom, yes. Hantavirus is a nasty thing that can be airborne spread. That is why, if you check on how to clean up mouse infested areas, you see recommendations to first wet down the area with bleach or the like, allow it to set a little bit and than wipe the stuff up, oh, and wear a dust mask. The premise is that wetting the area down will keep a lot from becoming airborne and the bleach may kill the virus.
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Well I've watched all of Wolf Hall again and the performances on the big screen never seem to amaze.
Next up is King Charles III, I can't wait to see it, I think it starts this Sunday night, am not sure how many episodes if any, but Tim Piggot Smith who just died stars in it, he of the Jewel in the Crown, and I am really looking forward to it, tho it appears it's causing some controversy in the UK. Diana is a ghost, for starters.
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I know nothing about King CharlesIII but the ads for it look enticing. So are you DVRing it while traveling? We are so spoiled by all our gadgets. I think you can find it on Netflix to see it's a series.
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It's on now. It's different.
Yes I'm taping it on the DVR.
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Is there anyone watching besides Ginny and me? Is this what the English hope will happen? After Elizabeth dies?
And there's Merrick from The Jewel In The Crown!!! Playing King Charles III! Different, that's for sure. But the acting was good! Did you think you were watching a Shakespeare play?
I wonder if Barbara is watching? Our poet!!🤓🤓
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Annie and Ginnie, I watched Charles III and also the program "documentary" that followed.
I hadn't read the info about it in my PBS Newsletter so didn't realize it was a play before it was a film. I did think the dialogue sounded "Shakespearian" (is that a word?) and was glad to hear that the writer had planned it that way.
Apparently the cast of the film was also the cast of the play so it was interesting to hear their comments on being in both - as well as their comments on the characters they played.
I can see why it might cause controversy in the UK - "young upstarts" taking a hit at the aging future king in favor of someone from "their" generation.
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I haven't seen it and I don't think it's made much of an impact here, but I suppose no-one I know is that interested in the royal family.
The sad thing about it is that Tim Piggott Smith, whom I have admired ever since he played Merrick in The Jewel in the Crown, died suddenly and before the screening. Another fine actor gone. I still think of him in his creepy, repressed role as a cruel army officer in the dying days of the Raj. He was the lower middle class upstart, the one who wanted - but would never have - the easy confidence of the public school boys. The Jewel is one of those series that gives more every time you watch it - as a teenager I took it at face value, now I see more and more in its themes of power, oppression, bigotry and madness.
We're still working our way through the box set of Mad Men - another masterpiece that rewards on so many levels.
Rosemary
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Callie, wasn't that documentary fascinating? I wish I had DVRed the whole program. Hope they reshow it so I can. Does anyone know if anyone, other than Netflix,who aren't, is showing The Jewel in Crown? I would love to watch that again.
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It's rarely (if ever) shown on TV here Annie - it was a TV series rather than a film and they don't seem to repeat those old ones. I have the DVD. I have just had a look at US Amazon and it is available but much more expensive than it is here. May be worth it though!
Rosemary
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Rosemary, one of the credits at the end of "King Charles III' was an announcement "In Memory of Tim Piggot Smith ??? (didn't catch birth year) - 2017.
Was the stage production presented in the UK? If so, what kind of a "run" did it have?
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Ann, the BBC Shop online, (shopbbc.com) has the Jewel in the Crown, the 14 episodes remastered version, on DVD, $35.00, and the introductions by Alistair Cooke. 12 1/2 hours. Amazon has the 25th year edition for the same price, I didn't read further about the extras or the remastered stuff. :)
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Thanks everybody who looked it up!
I think I will order it later this summer after I check with the sites who have it as to how long it will take it to get here. You know PBS shows every once in a awhile. I remember the when it was shown in GB for the first time it was said that the crime rate went down and no one was out on the streets when it was on. They were all so entranced with story.
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Annie, I was just speaking about that with a friend the other day - how we all used to be so transfixed by some of the excellent series made at that time. There was of course no catch-up TV, and you could not buy the DVD, so you all watched it at the same time and discussed it the next day. Other series in the same vein were The Forsythe Saga, The Onedin Line, A Dance to the Music of Time, Poldark (original version with Angharad Rees) and Brideshead Revisited.
I was idly watching the slightly ridiculous Rosemary and Thyme last night (it's repeated endlessly on our digital channels) and who should pop up as a rather camp teacher in a boys' boarding school but Anthony Andrews - the very same Anthony Andrews who so brilliantly played Sebastian in Brideshead. He looked almost the same after all these years, and seemed to be acting more or less the same part! I was of course madly in love with him at the time, despite Sebastian being a less than salubrious character, and I have to say he is still quite attractive.
Rosemary
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You know I have a copy of Brideshead on vcr tape. I might watch it again to see if Sebastian was really so good looking! And he is on Rosemary and Thyme!! I think I will just google this mess! Hahaha!
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Masterpiece has three series beginning this month! See the heading above for more information about MY MOTHER AND OTHER STRANGERS, GRANTCHESTER, SEASON 3 and PRIME SUSPECT: TENNISON.
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Fans of the Great British Bake Off Alert!
The newest one (and the last one featuring Mary, Mel, Sue, and Paul) will premiere this Friday June 16 on your local PBS station!
Don't miss it!
"Season 4 premieres Friday, June 16th
Follow the trials and tribulations of passionate amateur bakers whose goal is to be named the U.K.’s best. Each week, the bakers tackle a different skill, the difficulty of which increases as the competition unfolds. Mary Berry, a leading cookbook writer, and Paul Hollywood, a top artisan baker, serve as judges. Together with hosts and comic foils Sue Perkins and Mel Giedroyc, Berry and Hollywood search for the country’s best amateur baker by testing the competitors’ skills on cakes, breads, pastries and desserts, crowning a winner after 10 weeks of competition."
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we also had a series with just Mary and Paul baking themselves with no contestants - quite nice - the friendship between the two was observable - wasn't there a third judge in the originals? if so who was it?
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Would be interesting to see them baking themselves Barb :D What would Mary be? A Victoria Sandwich, I think...
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Those Master Classes, Barb? I taped them all, those were really nice, but the Hopper 3, a new device that recorded them, lost them all, just deleted them, nobody seems to know why at DISH, while I was in Europe. Shame. Perhaps I could buy them and have them to keep that way. It seems to be happening to a lot of people but they are not talking about it, my brother in law had the same thing happen in another state.
It was just Paul and Mary as judges but Sue and Mel were the sort of entertainers and MC's. And they'd sit at the judging table and ask questions of the judges. It was a good show.
:) Rosemary. I didn't know what a "sponge" was until I went to England the first time. I just saw a photo of Mary and the Queen at the Chelsea Flower Show when I was there.
Terrible terrible fire in that high rise in London. I can't understand how it got on ALL the floors like that so quickly. What a horror.
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:D :D and Paul could be a humpty dumpty made of sponge cake encasing a boiled egg -
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Hi (belatedly) Ginny - yes, the Grenfell Tower fire was a terrible, terrible thing. As we now know it spread so fast owing to the insulation and cladding on the building, neither of which were fit for purpose, both of which had been used to save money (this is social housing). The people who lived in the tower were very poor, many were immigrants, but the block is in the middle of the London Borough of Kensington, one of the richest parts of London and indeed of the entire UK. Billionaires live (or rather own huge investment properties, often left empty) just a few roads away. This should never have happened. It is a clear indictment of the way British society seems to be going - the poor becoming ever poorer, the rich becoming obscenly wealthy.
By contrast, last weekend I went to see a wonderful film Summer in the Forest, about Jean Vanier and the L'Arche Communities. Vanier (a French Canadian former navy officer) started the first one in northern France in the 1960s, when he realised how badly special needs people were being treated - usually locked up in asylums. There are now about 150 communities worldwide - wonderful places, though he is keen to emphasise that they are not utopias but just places where people can lead a 'normal' life. Some of the residents are profoundly disabled, others not so much. Some have suffered brain damage, for others it is not a physical thing, but the result of terrible experiences. No one is financially rich, no one is financially poor. What a contrast to what so-called normal society seems to have become.
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Rosemarykaye, I did not know this: The people who lived in the tower were very poor, many were immigrants, but the block is in the middle of the London Borough of Kensington, one of the richest parts of London and indeed of the entire UK.
I did wonder how they managed to evacuate quite a few buildings of the same cladding in the surrounding neighborhoods as a precautionary measure, and it never occurred to me it was low rent housing!! I kept thinking boy I am glad I don't live in a high rise in the area, how can they force people out, and rethinking my stay in the next hotel on a high floor. Just a horror.
Somebody told me oh you're OK if there is a sprinkler system, just ask first, and I'm thinking no amount of sprinklers would have stopped that but I may be wrong.
(I thought of you, believe it or not, when I returned to London for the second time this summer and had to go thru Victoria. I remembered what you said, and I did avoid the STEPS, because of some kind of tendon or ligament issue I've had in one leg)... (that's my excuse for taking a cab there) hahaha It was worth it, too.
Have you been able to see the new Father Brown? I understand it started in January in the UK? How do you like it? How does it compare to the others? Are either of the two missing characters back at all?
We're getting the "new" season here now, they are calling it "7," the first full one which does not have Lady Felicia or Sid in any of them tho Sid has returned once from prison, and left again, I understand he's to be on Broadway this fall. You can't help but wish them well, but they really are missed. (I did try some of Father Brown's lemon drops and humbugs and all I can say is they must be an acquired taste. But my grandson had his first millionaire's bar or shortbread whatever they are called and is a fan for life.) :)
Summer in the Forest sounds wonderful, I will look for it.
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Ginny, the sprinkler systems in Grenfell Tower were either not installed or not working, ditto the alarms. Social housing in this country - and especially in the tower blocks - is allowed to rot these days, with very little maintenance, no wardens, no caretakers. Lifts rarely work, people are afraid of being mugged in the stairwells (which are usually in a revolting state). Having said that, it seems from what residents have said that there was a real community in Grenfell, and that people looked out for one another. It was the council - starved of cash by central government - that failed to look after these people, but really I feel that this translates as a failure of society. None of us knew how bad it was, but we should have known. This should not be allowed to happen in a 21st century so-called civilised country (or indeed anywhere).
But I am so glad you had a good time in London :) Millionaire's shortbread! I remember making that as a child - my mother being horrified at the cost of the ingredients. Now I am more horrified at the amount of fat and sugar in it, but I agree it is delicious.
I have not seen the new Father Brown. The new series are usually only shown on the Sky channels (that you have to pay extra for, and which my husband refuses to have on the basis that he's not giving a single penny to Rupert Murdoch...) so we just wait till they turn up on Freeview. But I've seen some of the episodes without Sid and Lady Felicia and I agree, it's not the same without them. I think the actor who plays Sid has become very much in demand for other things - did you see him in Dr Thorne?
What we are getting at the moment is the new series of Top of the Lake: China Girl. I was away for the first episode and the daughter forgot to record it, but luckily it is on i-player so we can catch up. It has already had a great review in The Guardian. We're also enjoying the new series of The Windsors (spoof) and Poldark. And about 7 episodes left on our Mad Men marathon - got to get to the end before Madeleine departs for university in September!
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Glad to see your post rosemary - and thanks for the info on Grenfell Tower - the financial support of society has been cut back so much and with fewer jobs there are aspects of life that remind me of reading a novel by Dickens.
As to the new Father Brown - saw it last Sunday and then there was the usual replay Saturday night - awful - just awful - could not even watch the replay - awful writing - awful directing - awful acting - the only actors in the lot that pulled off a performance was Mark Williams as Father Brown and Sorcha Cusack as Mrs Bridgette McCarthy - Inspector Mallory was more disjointed than usual, Bunty, who can act was not up to her usual performance and the others were as if a bunch of stills could be extracted that represented their best. I was really disappointed.
Looks like the end of Grantchester tonight - will he or won't he - Mrs Maguire's story is wrapped up with a satisfying ending and Al Weaver, as Leonard Finch has really shown himself to be a fine actor.
Some of the scenes in this second season for The Tunnel were difficult to watch last night but I do enjoy the series far more than I did Hinterland that had another sort of darkness with troubled people.
As to A Place To Call Home - oh my... the issues of class and now we even have Jack, the Doc awakening to his homosexuality - the characters Sarah and the matriarch Elizabeth and the crucified homosexual son James really hold that show aloft as a benchmark of acting that everyone ponies up and gives it their best. The filming is so spot on it too elevates the story.
Cannot make the switch yet from Kris Marshall playing DI Humphrey to Ardal O'Hanlon taking over the lead in Death in Paradise - Kris brought a lightness with his easy absent-minded way where as, all I can think of is at any moment Ardal will fly off in his cape as George Sunday - He plays the part too heavy trying to be frivolous with all these cutesy bits of playing with props and so he comes across disjointed rather than bumbling.
All I can say is thank God for the Brit Coms - the usual TV is beyond anything I can even watch - if I want to watch a movie I can go to Amazon and make a choice, the rest is all garbage with the news taking over all the air time - tired of the whole mess - so for three consecutive nights it is Brit Coms plus the Baking show - and that is it - for the remaining days of the week the TV is off.
Even Charlie Rose is no longer a regular on his own show. The one younger guy does a good job but just does not have the depth that Charlie Rose exhibited 20 years ago during the early days of his show. It appears the wheel is turning yet again - the glories of aging - every other decade is a huge change from the past.
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Ginny - check with your library for the master class series you lost - or for any tv series.
Jean
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Oh good idea, Jean, I will!
Barbara, which episode was that? My DVR got two this week, The Tanganika Green, and the Sins of the Father.
I know there's a LOT of comment about hating the new series, specifically the first one in the series (they can't be talking about the Christmas Program). We can't purchase Season 5 here in DVD yet in the correct "Region," so we can see it on our own players, but we are getting it on PBS.
Tanganika Green is "Episode 70" and Sins of the Father is "Season 4 Episode 9."
I hate that Lady Felicia and Sid are gone, temporarily I hope, tho they both as Rosemarykaye says have booming careers, so it's a real burden for the writers, because the vibe was lost. And I can see not replacing those characters, either, because the originals may come back someday. In a way it's like a real parish, people come, and go.
Jeepers, the story just gets worse and worse, thank you Rosemary, I had no idea about the residential towers and their conditions. We don't get any of those programs like Top of the Lake: China Girl here, and I appreciate hearing about them so I can keep a watchful eye.
And of course I know you've all seen that Mary Berry is going to judge another cooking show, not about baking but the full meal. . Can't wait for any of her series promised, including the ones in the great houses, they will all be good.
This is so funny, Rosemary: (that you have to pay extra for, and which my husband refuses to have on the basis that he's not giving a single penny to Rupert Murdoch...) My husband feels the same way about ONE of the PBS stations here which refused to air a tell all documentary about the plight of the mill workers which the others showed.
How is the "new" Paul Hollywood Great British Bake Off, Rosemary? On Channel 4? And do you understand the big uproar about Channel 4 about to play the "Diana tapes?" Apparently they were not seen in the UK but were broadcast elsewhere? I don't recall seeing them. I'm not sure why Paul Burrell had them (to protect her? Then why not burn them?) or how bad they can be.
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Hi Ginny and Barb!
Ginny I have no idea about these 'Diana tapes' or why Paul Burrell should have them. I am not that interested in the royals, thoough I have to say that William and Harry seem to be turning out better than their forefathers! I imagine that Burrell has kept them (whatever they are) as some kind of insurance for his retirement. I know very little about him, but he does seem a bit smooth.
I haven't seen the new Paul Hollywood Bake Off either - I didn't even know it was on yet. We watched the first episode of Top of the Lake: China Girl last night and it was brilliant. They have in fact put all 6 episodes onto i-player straight away, even though they are only up to the second one (tomorrow night) on 'real' TV, but we decided not to watch them, as we'd rather follow the series as it progresses. Elisabeth Moss is such a good actor! And new to this series is Gwendoline Christie, wonderful as Moss's new sidekick. I'd never seen her before but my daughter knows her from Game of Thrones. I read that this series will be shown in the US on a channel called 'Sundance TV'? Just to warn you, its subject matter is not for the faint-hearted!
We finally finished the whole of Mad Men. I feel bereft! But what a fantastic series - I don't think the writers or the actors put a foot wrong. And such an ambiguous ending - I'm still thinking about it.
Rosemary
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It was The Fire In The Sky that was so awful - this week not as bad with Flambeau, The Penitent Man but now they have Mrs. McCarthy acting as a sleuth with Bunty - I can see Bunty but Mrs. McCarthy!!??!!
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Oh well you're either way ahead of us, because neither of those have appeared on our schedules, or else you're way behind (because DISH lost all my programmed DVR tapes while I was on vacation, so it may have been among them), I hope not, because that's two more I have not seen! Love Flambeau, isn't he a hoot?
I guess they have to expand Mrs. McCarthy's role to try to fill the missing two characters. I really like Sorcha Cusak, or however it's spelled. She's younger than I am! That was a shock!
The one I just saw had Mrs. McCarthy and Bunty sleuthing about in a great house. The Bunty character is beginning to wear thin a bit, I think, hopefully they will change direction with it, and possibly put her in clothes that are not glued to her skin. I don't know how she walks, or sits, and I've been reading a lot of negative comments on the somewhat overdone Inspector character in the new episodes. Apparently the actor is a fine one and people resent the buffoonish presentation.
In the older episodes I loved Father Brown's sense of humor. I love seeing him enjoying himself at the absolute worst shows and jokes and presentations, he comes across as humble and sweet. I don't know how the actor does it, I really don't, but it shows a lovely side of the character's personality.
Rosemary, I must be the only person in the universe who has not seen Mad Men, is it worth it? Sometimes I wonder what I missed. I had not seen The Good Wife, either, but I saw the first episode of The Good Fight (the spin off on CBS which you have to pay to see with Christine Baransky) and was blown away by her performance. That first episode was electric. I keep hoping that CBS will relent on the having to pay part because it seems silly to pay for that one program and it streaming on top of it, (and I don't like any of the other programs offered) but they haven't. It's not much money, it's the principle of the thing.
It may actually BE that the Hollywood version of the Bake Off has not even appeared. I wonder if we'll see it here.
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I wondered what had happened to episodes of The Good Fight. Is this a CBS station for which you have to pay?
My Netflix only has seasons 1-5 of Father Brown. I'm working my way through #5 now. Last one I watched was "The Chedwick (?) Cyclone" and I was surprised to see Father B. so interested in boxing. Somehow, that didn't fit with his temperament.
Bunty and Mrs. McCarthy are still there. When does that change?
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Barbara, we've caught up to you, I see both of those now on the DVR. I personally disliked the Lucia one very much, so far.
Callie:
I wondered what had happened to episodes of The Good Fight. Is this a CBS station for which you have to pay?
Apparently yes. The first episode was "free" on CBS but the rest require a subscription to CBS's...new money making venture in streaming called CBS All Access: this is from their site: 8,500 shows to watch on any device: http://www.cbs.com For CBS All Access annual plans, the pricing is as follows:
Limited Commercials Annual Plan: $59.99/annually with a 1 Week Free Trial*
Commercial Free Annual Plan: $99.99/year with a 2-Day Free Trial*
I would love to see the rest of the Good Fight, but I am not interested in the other programming. one of which is Candy Crush, a new show which was showing in previews the other week, absolutely unbelievable...you have to see it to believe it. Pairs of people endure being strung up on swinging apparatus trying to play physically the game Candy Crush on a giant upright electronic board. Unbelievably awful.
My Netflix only has seasons 1-5 of Father Brown. I'm working my way through #5 now. Last one I watched was "The Chedwick (?) Cyclone" and I was surprised to see Father B. so interested in boxing. Somehow, that didn't fit with his temperament.
Bunty and Mrs. McCarthy are still there. When does that change?
I always get the British show numbering wrong. Season 5 is the latest and aired in 2017.
The actor who played Sid has been in the British West End production of The Cursed Child which is coming to Broadway, so as long as that runs, which could be forever, I guess he'll be doing that. Maybe he can do some occasional returns.
The actress who played Lady Felicia apparently is also very busy. This is a listing of what she's dong in 2017:
Appearing in: Film:
THE GATHERING STORM
AN IDEAL HUSBAND
TV:
Will (TV Series)
Ellen Burbage
- Brave New World (2017) ... Ellen Burbage
- The Two Gentlemen (2017) ... Ellen Burbage
- Cowards Die Many Times (2017) ... Ellen Burbage
- The Play's the Thing (2017) ... Ellen Burbage
2017 Prime Suspect 1973 (TV Mini-Series)
Mary Collins
- Episode #1.4 (2017) ... Mary Collins
- Episode #1.3 (2017) ... Mary Collins
- Episode #1.2 (2017) ... Mary Collins
- Episode #1.1 (2017) ... Mary Collins
Both appear blessed with a lot of work. Lovely for them, sad for us.
The Father Brown writers have a big task ahead of them. The early series is hard to beat.
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Thanks, Ginny. I'll pass on paying CBS for the "privilege" of watching their selected shows.
Thanks also for the info on the number of Father Brown series. The Season 5 episodes seem to be getting away from the gentler stories.
I enjoy seeing actors from the various long-time BBC series pop up on other things, particularly when they play a totally different type of role. Signs of a good actor, IMO.
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Me, too, Callie. The Father Brown series has taken on a more...modern edge. I have not read the original Chesterton books tho I have them on the ipad, perhaps I'll try one and see which film creation is more accurate. But it really isn't about accuracy as the film versions have a life of their own, and that life appears to be changing as you've said. Maybe the idea is to show Father Brown tackling not the world of the '50's but of 2017, what we're more "used to."
In the meantime we can always go back to the beginning and watch the old ones again, they're worth it. I just found out there are more episodes in those which were shown in the UK, so I'm going to hope PBS shows more of them than on the DVD's.
Rosemary, this is an explosive question and you really need not answer, but you have said several times that you don't follow the Royal Family particularly and I guess my question is I'm wondering why? The Queen seems to be exemplary, but is it the antics of the rest of them you are not interested in?
I ask for two reasons: first, that The Crown is coming back for a 2nd year in November!! Minus John Lithgow as Churchill, unfortunately, but this will be the last season with our present cast, and I can't wait to see it, the acting is out of this world. So that has piqued my interest in the Royal Family, or some of them.
And also because I'm reading the new Smith biography of Prince Charles. It's gigantic and I'm half way through and...I'm not sure what to say? How can we know any of our public figures? Why do we insist on putting them pedestals? I don't think any of our own public figures are who we think/ hope/ project they are. I never was interested in "Camelot," or the Kennedys, who were not as they were portrayed, or any of the other presidents and their families, as far as following them personally. I'm beginning to wonder what is wrong with me.
We live in such a Revisionist Age. Many of our former Founding Fathers and heroes are often shown now to have been half legend and half nothing like what we thought. I'm also reading a mammoth, 1000 page biography of MacArthur, my gosh his real life defies description. It's like some sort of ancient epic, and yet, all I knew of him was the "old soldiers never die," the Truman firing, and the takes and retakes of his landing over and over on the beach.
The Smith biography of Charles presents a different side of him, positive things he's actually accomplished, which are considerable. I had no idea. And the little negative things are sort of presented after an avalanche of astonishing works, as tiny little after thoughts, as if they don't matter. . But they linger in the mind. I gues they are more salacious and easy to remember for the normal reader than some of the projects and things he's tried to do.
So now he's more of an enigma, than ever, to me. He's... He's plunged himself into really worthy causes, unlike a lot of his predecessors, he's done a great deal which I knew absolutely nothing about, in areas which seem particularly worthy, quite a few of which ideas which I agree with, actually...but... then there's the other side. Sad. Things I really didn't need or want to know. I can't seem to put a finger on it. He seems contemplative and concerned, BUT... for some reason like that Peanuts character, he always seems to have a little cloud over his head. Despite everything he's done, started, and accomplished, his press remains awful. What is it he lacks in dealing with people?
I think perhaps one issue has been that all these years he's been trying to manage his own press by honestly pouring out his feelings, doubts, insecurities, etc., in public and on paper, whinging, really, and maybe he has needed a better PR manager. Because it doesn't seem to be working. Maybe the last half of the gigantic Smith book will do that for him. He's at an age when people look back to their own legacy and want control of their lives. I wonder how history will see him.
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(http://seniorlearn.org/bookclubs/masterpiece/masterpiececlassic.jpg)
See the 2018 MASTERPIECE schedule (http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/masterpiece/schedule).
Let's talk about PBS programs that we enjoy.
UPCOMING
(http://seniorlearn.org/bookclubs/masterpiece/classic_2018/unforgotten.jpg)
Unforgotten, Seasons 1 and 2 (http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/masterpiece/shows/unforgotten/)
April 8, 2018 to May 13, 2018
Two stone-cold cases of murder test the wits of crime-solving duo DCI Cassie Stuart and DS Sunny Khan, played by Nicola Walker (Last Tango in Halifax) and Sanjeev Bhaskar (Indian Summers), in back-to-back seasons of the critically acclaimed UK crime series Unforgotten.
(http://seniorlearn.org/bookclubs/masterpiece/classic_2018/littlewomen.jpg)
Little Women (http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/masterpiece/shows/little-women/)
May 13, 2017
Set against the backdrop of the Civil War, the story follows sisters Jo, Meg, Beth and Amy March on their journey from childhood to adulthood. With the help of their mother, Marmee, and while their father is away at war, the girls navigate what it means to be a young woman: from sibling rivalry and first love, to loss and marriage. Based on the classic novel by Louisa May Alcott, this three-part adaptation was written by the award-winning creator of Call the Midwife, Heidi Thomas.
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The Father Brown series is on Netflix also.
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Oh good, Jean (Mabel) and Jean (FlaJean) haha Thank you!
Jean (Mabel) maybe if your PBS station is starting over, ours will, too, right now they are at the end of Season 5, but I lost all my previous recordings when we were overseas, thank you DISH.
And Jean, (FlaJean) thank you also, I have DVD's of 1-4 already (5 will not be out till later for us in the US) and I can check them against what Netflix has.
I was shocked to see, in looking at a site which had the titles of each episode, how many we in the US (at least so far) are lacking, even if we've bought the DVD's, and I'd like to see them, too.
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I'm watching "Father Brown" on Netflix. All 5 seasons are available.
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Hi Ginny, and sorry for the late reply - I wasn't avoiding answering your questions, I'm just so tied up with the festivals at the moment; I fight my way through the Old Town, see shows or visit exhibitions that range fro the 5* to the total rubbish, then fight my way back onto a crowded, damp and humid bus (if I'm lucky! ended up walking home yesterday) and as soon as I get in it's reviewing time. I really don't know how people like Broadway Baby do it (though I've met the woman behind that and she is truly terrifying).
Yesterday I went to a very interesting panel discussion organised by the Network of Independent Critics - one of the speakers was none other than Lyn Gardner, longtime theatre critic of The Guardian. She was nothing like I had expected - very down to earth and self-deprecating, but also full of ideas and knowledge. She said - 'why do we do it?' Because we are filled with enthusiasm for something and we want to share it' - I found this so true. I hate giving anyone a bad review, so if (as happened this afternoon) I see a terrible production I tend not to review it at all. I know that's a cop-out, but I always feel - and especially with the Fringe - that these poor people have worked so hard, and often spent so much money to get here and stay here, that it would be mean to lay into them.
The awful thing about the panel session was that only about ten of us turned up. What a colossal waste - as well as Lyn Gardner, there was the former theatre critic, now turned director, of The Times, a lady who works in circus and holds several academic posts in performance arts, an actress who has become a critic, and a critic who has written a book about how to review theatre. I don't review much theatre, I prefer books and art, but it was all still so interesting. This was a FREE session put on by the Fringe itself, but they are such a shambles that they never advertise things properly. If the same session had been run at the Book Festival (which opens tomorrow) they would have charged £12 per ticket and it would have been sold out. There is a second session next week - I hope they market that a bit better.
Anyway - you asked about Mad Men. Both Madeleine and I thought it was absolutely fantastic - great story, with lots of little subplots, but more importantly so much about social and political history of the US, about sexism, homophobia, racism, the Kennedy years, religion, women's gradual rise in the workplace. It is so nuanced and clever, and the acting is just outstanding. Elisabeth Moss and Christina Hendricks are fabulous, but so is just about everyone, there are no duds in the entire series. I do recommend it.
As for the Royals, I will probably be shot down in flames for this, as I know Americans are said to love them, but to me (and to my family, including my 90 year old mother) they are a bunch of over-priviliged, overpaid freeloaders. They cost the country a fortune, they contribuute very little, they don't even pay tax. There! Now I will go and hide in the basement (or would if I had one...)
There has just been a controversial programme on TV here about Diana, with a lot of video footage taken by a voice coach she employed to improve her public speaking after she was divorced. She seems to have been exceedingly frank with this man and told him all sorts of very intimate things about her marriage. She attracts a great deal of sympathy in the UK, but by then she was an expert in playing the media, she knew exactly how to work the victim image. It is of course very sad indeed that she died as she did, but that marriage was a disaster on both sides. I believe that Charles is so weird because of his upbringing - my mother says he was a sensitive child who was deprived of love, and who was sent away to an extremely harsh boarding school at a young age. And imagine having anything less than the hide of a rhinocerus and having Philip as a father! He was told he had to find a virgin to marry so that he could produce an heir. Mrs Parker Bowles was completely off limits. If he had just married her in the first place none of this would have happened. I think the court establishment has a lot to answer for; it is an unstoppabe juggernaut of tradition - though it does seem to have loosened up a bit in the younger generation. It will be interesting to see if Harry is allowed to marry Meghan whatever her name is.
Anyway - those are my thoughts!
Madeleine has a bar job for the festival which involves her being out very late at night, so I have been watching TV on my own. I didn't want to continue with the series we are both watcing so I dug out the DVD of Murder One, which I found in a charity shop. We had watched this when it first came out many years ago but we missed the last episode and never found out what happened! I must say that so far it is every bot as good as I remembered it - though it's hard to accept that Stanley Tucci is one of the baddies when we are all still madly in love with him from The Devil Wears Prada and Julie & Julia!
And now I'd better actually do a review...
Rosemary
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Absolutely NOTHING on PBS tonight or this entire weekend - everything is music and I like country music as much as anyone but these shows I have already seen over and over again - nothing and next week there is a nod to the usual. However, interesting there is a new Endeavor season 4, that will be featured and then thank goodness, our local station has already announced they are cutting the fund drive off early so it is really just this weekend because the regulars will not be back next weekend but the shows chosen will be at least from the genre we are more used to on a Saturday and Sunday night. Well small blessings, there will be no competition keeping me from seeing the stars tonight...
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Barb, sometimes it is nice to 'see the stars' isn't it? In the middle of all the rushing about for our festivals, I went this afternoon to the tiny St Vincent Chapel for a choral evensong. So peaceful.
I hope you have a good evening,
Rosemary
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Rosemary, thank you for that answer. Yes that is the "Diana Tapes" to which I referred earlier.
I did not know that the Royal Family does not pay taxes. And there are so many of them! I guess they are one of the few remaining monarchies we in the US know the most about. Now the new " The Crown" episodes are now being advertised in teasers, the time skipped ahead to the Kennedy era. That should be something. The Philip character is especially interesting and they say he will get more and more prominence as the series progresses.
Lucky you with all those festivals to go to and exciting things to hear and see! Exciting, to say the least. Loved your account of the panel. I like panels, you get such a wide range of good opinion. At least when one person doesn't dominate. Hope the next one is better publicized. I loved your having to walk home, tho I doubt you did, so how I think of the UK, so Bill Bryson-ish. There is nothing within walking distance of me, but you in the UK are famous for walking a lot farther than I would ever consider. He seems to think nothing (or did, perhaps when younger) of walking incredible distances and then back home again. We do NOT walk enough in this country, or I don't, for sure. Too far out and then how would one get back unless one called somebody to pick one up.
We don't have "Broadway Baby" here in the US, although strangely enough, Broadway is here. I did look her up but was not familiar with the subjects currently being reviewed. So I learned something.
Based on your recommendation I'm going to watch the first few episodes of Mad Men and see for myself. Everybody talks about it but I've never seen it.
Thank you for all the above. (Stanley Tucci is always good, always glad to see him in anything.)
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Oh PBS here has just aired the wonderful Christmas Father Brown episode called The Star of Jacob, it's priceless. I hope those of you who like Father Brown can get to see it.
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So how did you see it now? Seems like it would be shown later in the season! Is that the one with all the different animals?
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On my Netflix, "The Star of Jacob" is the first episode in Season 5 of Father Brown.
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He's coming back!! Father Brown has an entire new season, Season 6, starting in January 2018~!!
Annie, yes, that Christmas special was the one with the animals, and Callie is right, it's the first show of Season 5, which is last years, which, despite the absolutely priceless beginning Christmas special and the fantastic end with Flambeau I thought was the weakest series of the lot.
I think my favorite episode of all of 5 series was The Crackpot of the Empire but I don't know why?
Mark Williams on Season 6 on the Father Brown Facebook Page:
"Great news for the most-watched BBC1 daytime drama series – Father Brown Series 6 will be released in January 2018 (pending the exact premiere date announcement) and it will be preceded by a Christmas Special that was just announced to air on, well obviously – around Christmas, but we will notify you as soon as the exact date and time are set. Stay tuned for the latest news!"
YAY! I absolutely love this series, some of the episodes are super, some not, but Mark Williams absolutely shines along with Sorcha Cusack and how I miss "Lady Felicia" and "Sid," tho, hopefully they can make some guest appearances. Nothing against the young woman who plays "Bunty," just miss the others.
"Flambeau" is perfect, isn't he? My favorite treat of the past year has been watching these, all 5 seasons. And our local PBS station, in fact two of them, are rerunning all of them, but not in order which is confusing, but better than nothing at all.
What an antidote to the news.
Did you know their budget on this show is such that despite being such a hit they have to film in whatever weather presents itself? That's not fake rain, that's the real thing. Just endears the show to me that much more.
So now we have an entire brand new Christmas special to look forward to this Christmas and a new season which I hope our PBS will pick up and show.
(http://seniorlearn.org/latin/graphics/hollysmall.gif)HO HO HO!!
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Hi all
Not sure if I already mentioned that we are enjoying a new adaptation of EM Forster's Howard's End? Matthew Macfadyen plays Mr Wilcox and Hayley Attwell Margaret Schlegel, but my two favourites are Philippa Coulthard as Helen Schlegel and Joseph Quinn as Leonard Bast. I hope you get it on PBS, it's well worth watching.
Rosemary
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I just saw an ad on my PBS channel for a program that will be on tomorrow night at 8pm. Penelope Keith will be shown around the Queen’s castles. “In Her Majesty’s Service” is name of the program. When we were in Chicago in 1998, we attended a play starring Penelope Keith. Some of you may remember her as the next door neighbor on the PBS show called ????? The Good Neighbors? Anyway Ginny suggested we go see her in Chicago. She always seem to play an uppity neighbor. She was always a good comedian. Thought some of you might like to watch it. Enjoy! 🤓👌
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Our PBS station showed a whole evening of "Mapp and Lucia" this weekend, plus the first part of a Christmas "Last Tango in Halifax." I must admit, 5 minutes of the first was enough, and I turned it off, but I did watch Last Tango.
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Which adaptation of Mapp & Lucia was it, nlhome? I recently watched the one with Miranda Richardson and Anna Chancellor and loved it, but I know there are some others.
Last Tango is very popular here, though I started to get a bit bored with it towards the end of the last series. Derek Jacobi is wonderful though!
Nothing much on our TV this week - except for Film 4 showing Carol, which Madeleine and I saw at the cinema when it first came out. I found it quite overwhelmingly powerful, and Cate Blanchett is fabulous in anything - especially this - so i will watch it again.
Rosemary
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PBS changed the Penelope Keith program to 10pm, EST! It’s 9pm right now so I hope those who might want to watch it will get to!🤓🙏❤️
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Rosemary, that was the version that our PBS station was showing, with Miranda Richardson. I was not in the mood, I guess.
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nlhome - I do think it is quite odd until you get into it, and I wasn't sure at first, but in the end I found Anna Chancellor in particular absolutely perfect. I agree though, you have to be in the mood.
Rosemary
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mb5mKUXUi2E
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Oh isn't that interesting? I like her (as EF Benson would say) immensely in the role. I need to get that series, thank you for mentioning it, Rosemary, and for putting in the link, Barbara.
But I feel sorry for the new Georgie, as who could ever do that better than Nigel Hawthorne? This actor is good but Nigel Hawthorne (I wonder what he thought of the role, he did not mention it in his book) was Nigel Hawthorne, such camp.
I like Geraldine McEwan (the original Lucia) now, but at first I couldn't stand her voice, and mannerisms, I couldn't understand what I was looking at, and it turned me off, too, but something about it kept drawing me back...but then when I figured it out and read the books, I understood. I think that original cast is so camp and so perfect, I can hear them now as I'm sitting here. I mean Prunella Scales! But I like camp and a lot of people don't. I wonder what EF Benson would have thought of it, there used to be two societies, very serious indeed about his works. At one time I belonged to the more serious but earnest one: I wonder if they still exist.
I came IN to say thank you, Ann, for that head's up, we didn't have it here but it's on Youtube, and here you all are talking about Mapp and Lucia and as it happens I have been escaping the headlines with the 1000th reread of the series. This time I started with Miss Mapp, a book I used to like the least and now am astounded anew at how well it's written and with EF Benson's skillful touch. This time around I am somewhat stunned by all the Biblical allusions thrown into the work, I am not sure I have ever noticed them before. It's such rich prose. He was the son of the Archbishop of Canterbury I am sure you all know, and it shows, but the allusions are not of the garden variety.
I love reading his books, another world, a harmless one, a satire, more than a comedy of manners..what would you call it? It makes this world seem far away sometimes. And like Arthur Conan Doyle, he dismissed these books in favor of his scholarly ones and these are the ones he's best known for. Nice to see somebody talking about him, I must look for this new series on DVD.
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Yes, I am happy to see there are two EF Benson Societies flourishing in that little town of Rye (Tilling), what a hoot.
But I came back in to say that today at Publix Supermarket they had two slices of what I immediately recognized as a Victoria Sponge (from watching the Best British Bake Off) and so I bought the small package of two slices, but they were rectangular or loaf like in shape, so I looked it up on Google and lo and behold when searching for Victoria Sponge Cake they were talking about something called The Mary Berry Story and it's on youtube https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLM6Vm8M_vnSfw5Ec80FB3EegMyquV1xPx (https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLM6Vm8M_vnSfw5Ec80FB3EegMyquV1xPx) and I enjoyed so much learning about her life and career, it was a lovely program, a step back in time. I did not know she had had polio as a child and was hospitalized for it. If you like Mary Berry, the former host of the Great British Bake Off, (and who does not?) I thought I'd bring it here. (The video initially says you can't see it in your country and then it begins to play). THESE "Victoria sponge cakes" which I bought had cream cheese icing, but those "Victoria sandwiches" she calls them in the film do not have icing, just a dusting of sugar. You wouldn't think looking at it how good it is.
AND Publix had mincemeat, so I can fix it Christmas (and eat it myself, since nobody else will ) in small tarts this year. Better than black eyed peas for good luck in the New Year if eaten on the 12 Days of Christmas. :)
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Mincemeat tarts are great. I like mincemeat but always feel a little goes a long way because of the strong, rich taste. I used to like to make a combo pie with a layer of mincemeat and a layer of pumpkin in a whole wheat crust. I was fond of whole wheat crust. I used it almost always when I made individual spinach pies in deep tart tins and often with apple pie, sometimes adding some shredded cheddar cheese to the crust mix.
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I am amazed and impressed by how much cooking all you American ladies do at Christmas!
Mince pies are everywhere here. I am not a fan, but my husband loves them, and he actually prefers the shop bought ones, the cheaper the better it seems - I think it must be the pastry. We have just been to buy a cabbage for the sacred bubble and squeak, and he came back with a half price box of pies, even though we still have 2 boxes unopened. I managed to steer him past all the other reduced stuff, as although the prices had been cut hugely, we really do NOT need all this stuff, especially now none of our children are at home.
For me the best food of the past few days was actually in little Highland village coffee shops, where we stopped off after various walks. There is a new one in Nethy Bridge, the village where my son & d-in-law live. It is called Nethy House and it is absolutely charming, with fabulous scones and cakes, and some pretty, locally-made, crafts. The ladies who run it are all so friendly. As is so often the case in the Highlands, most of them have two or three jobs, so many also work at the outdoor activity centre where Freddie & Naomi are instructors. Everyone knows everyone else, which maybe drives you mad after a few years, but which I, as a city dweller, find quite lovely.
There is a lot of tradition surrounding food for New Year (Hogmanay) in Scotland. The whisky features big time, also shortbread, cranachan, haggis, cock-a-leekie soup and something called black bun. I will be hiding under the duvet with my book - currently Death on the Cherwell by Mavis Doriel Hay.
Rosemary
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Never a fan of mincemeat. Pumpkin pie for Thanksgiving, cookies (anise cookies are a family recipe, they are cutouts made with ground hickory nuts as part of the shortening, that we thought were German but further research suggests perhaps Polish, just know the recipe I have is from my great-grandmother) and fudge for Christmas. And pickled herring for New Year's Eve - not a baked item, but traditional. I forgot to buy it this year.
It's -6 degrees Fahrenheit here this evening, so hot chocolate is what we want.
Did watch the Christmas "Call the Midwife" the other night.
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Also watched the Christmas "Call the Midwife" the other night - OK but they have had better on the series - something was missing and not sure what - the explanation of the storm after the show was more riveting to me than the show itself. The Halifax series for me has also lost its punch - so tired of Gillian and all her issues... And Celia is so about Celia so that I do not like watching her.
Looking forward to the next group of shows in "A Place to Call Home" and I love that they brought back the "Detectorists" - quirky and fun.
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Couldn’t agree with you more about The Last Tango, Barbara. I don’t DVR it anymore! Never heard of “The Detectorists”. Is it on Netflix?
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I also agree about "Last Tango In Halifax". I really hope it is....... :D
My PBS station is mostly showing reruns throughout January. Looks as if the new season of "Victoria" will be the only one I keep up with. :(
[/HAPPY NEW YEAR AND HAPPY READING, EVERYONE
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Annie do not have netflex so I really do not know --- I wonder if Acorn would have it - have not signed up but considering it.
Yep Callie it appears Victoria is next - does not grab me either - I am sure getting picky in my old age :D the guy who plays Albert bothers me -
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I thought a new season of Father Brown was supposed to start soon but it isn't listed in my monthly guide.
I do have Netflix but haven't seen any new shows listed there that sound interesting.
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That's a good question and the answer apparently is that it doesn't begin on BBC 1 until February 12, but it LOOKS like there's a possibility we can then see the episodes on their website immediately after that. That's what it says, but available to what country, I don't know. I am sure there's a catch and we can't but maybe Netflix will be on the ball. Father Brown is one of the few series that come here without a year's wait, so maybe we can get it, or Netflix will, here before too much longer. I'd like to see the new Channel 4 Great British Bake Off, too, it's had a lot of viewers in the UK. I can't imagine it without Mary and Sue and Mel, tho.
10 episodes, 10!! NEW Father Brown Episodes! I can't wait. I wonder what happened to the new Christmas episode, maybe they meant next Christmas? Or maybe it aired in the UK. I sure do love that show.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b09m0xvw
PS: and no, we will NOT see it, February 12 on the BBC One website. I tried to watch one they said was available and when I hit the arrow to view it, here's what they said:
BBC iPlayer only works in the UK. Sorry, it’s due to rights issues.
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I searched for "Father Brown Season 7 America" and found no links even hinting at a start date.
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No, (I think it's season 6) but no, I don't see it either.
I came in to say, Ann, that it appears that Penelope Keith's At Her Majesty's Service comes to our local PBS on January 14 at 8 pm. I like her, remember when we went to see her in Chicago? (Was it?) At any rate it looks good. I am going to tape it.
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Ginny - do give the new Bake Off a try when it arrives, it is really excellent - and I speak as one who thought it couldn't possibly be any good. The new presenters may take you a little while to get used to, but they are all brilliant. I love Noel Fielding, he's very off the wall (and I think he's reining it in from his usual TV persona!), Sandy Toksvig is very well known on radio and TV here and she's hilarious, and Pru Leith is every bit as good as Mary Berry, but very much her own person, with a very dry wit - and amazing clothes.
I came here to say that we have a new series of Vera, just started on Sunday and as good as ever. If you haven't seen it before, it's about a female detective (played by the always wonderful Brenda Blethyn) in Northumberland. It's based on the books by Anne Cleves.
Last night I watched the first episode of a new Kay Mellor series Girl Friends. It looks promising. It's about three women around the age of 60, played by Miranda Richardson, Zoe Wanamaker and Phyllis Logan (ex Downton Abbey), all very good actresses. Miranda Richardson is the features editor of a glossy magazine run by her partner, who has now decided to replace her with a younger model, both professionally and personally. Wanamaker is the run-down, hard-up single mother to a newly-released ex-prisoner son, with full-time care of his child. Logan is the wife of a chancer - or at least she is for the first few minutes of the first episode. There are lots more complications - typical Mellor - and it's all slightly predictable I suppose, but these three actresses are just fantastic and I'm looking forward to seeing what happens.
Just seen the time and had better get my skates (or snow boots...) on,
Rosemary
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Oh I do like the sound of Girl Friends, Rosemary, thank you for telling us about it, and the Vera.
I would love to see the new Bake Off, and I am so glad that the new team is a good fit, because in the past Paul's forays alone seem to have not worked out well. There are now available many of the original series from the BBC 1 featuring Paul, Mary, Sue and Mel, on DVD which we can see here, so perhaps it won't be long before we can see the new Channel 4 ones, too. I love some of those people on the old series, it was so well cast as to contestants.
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Just popping in to say our new series of Call the Midwife is fantastic - though my daughter wishes the redhead and the little Welsh nurse were still in it (I think they may return, as references have been made to them). This time we have the introduction of the first black midwife in Poplar - as you can imagine, this brings out all the racist worst in some East Enders. The actress is Charlotte Ritchie. Judy Parfitt, Helen George, Jenny Agutter and Linda Bassett are all still there and all wonderful. Sunday evenings are very good at the moment!
As the series has now just about caught up with my childhood (though I lived in South London, not East) it is interesting to be reminded of life back then - the physical things (like no telephone in the house, no showers - baths only -, and just about all adults smoking) and also the attitudes. I would never call my parents overtly racist, but they would have been quite taken aback if a 'coloured' family had moved into their area (which was very far from smart). 'Unmarried mothers' were hugely disapproved of, only loose women went into the public bar of a pub, and if a woman (other than Mary Quant) wore trousers to work there would have been uproar. I am not a fan of nostalgia - I enjoy this show for its stories and its wonderful characters, but I'm really glad it doesn't show life in the 60s as idyllic; for many it was awful.
Rosemary
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I too enjoy Call the Midwife for its stories and characters, and I have been enjoying the times as they advance, including the music. I haven't heard when the latest episodes will hit the states, but I'm ready whenever.
Our local PBS station is showing The Coroner now, plus one mystery set in New Zealand and another in Australia. I enjoy the settings of these stories.
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Rosemary, I'm watching the current season 7 of Call the Midwife now. The series writers, actors and production are wonderful as usual. I'm enjoying it although, as you say, it's tackling some difficult issues. There is some info on this season at http://www.pbs.org/call-the-midwife/home/
I'm looking forward starting this Sunday to a new crime series called Unforgotten that stars Nicola Walker from Last Tango in Halifax. And a new adaptation of Little Women will begin mid May. See info in the heading at the top of the page. http://seniorlearn.org/forum/index.php?topic=5035.msg314037#msg314037
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I get the feeling I missed the Benedict Cumberbatch program A Child in Time. It is available for online streaming until 4/15. I think I'll watch it tomorrow.
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I'm looking forward to the new Masterpiece programs. Our local PBS station has been showing the Brokenwood Mysteries, and I am really enjoying them. My granddaughter watched with me last night, and I apologized for boring her (my husband does not enjoy the show), but she said it was really fun to watch because she had to pay attention closely between the accents and the plot, which moved right along with lots of twists.
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I absolutely love the story Little Women. I went with my daughter to see the 1994 movie in the theaters when it first came out. I have the entire collection from Ashton Drake of Little Women porcelain dolls. Jo was my favorite character. Her relationship with Laurie was just so sweet. I need to see if I have PBS on my Direct TV.
I was never able to get into Call of the Midwife.
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YES!!! Netflix has Season 6, the new one, of Father Brown the 2017 one, which really just stopped being aired in January)!!! It starts with the famous new Christmas Episode called The Tree of Truth with a return of a character everybody loves.
YESSSSSSSSSSSSSS!! I was choosing an episode from the last 5 years when I saw all 6 seasons listed and Season 6 is the one we've been waiting for here in the US.
If you have Netflix, enjoy!
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Season 6 of what, Ginny?
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:) I was so excited I failed to say!!
Father Brown!!!!!!!!!!!!
I'll add that above.
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Thanks! ;D
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Rosemary, I just found Father Brown on Netflix and am watching S1 E1, The Hammer of God. I will probably binge watch to catch up to the current season. The first scenes reminded me of the book we recently read The Warden Barchester Towers by Trollpe. For those who are not familiar with the show this is what it says:
Father Brown is a fictional Roman Catholic priest and amateur detective who is featured in 53 short stories published between 1910 and 1936 written by English novelist G. K. Chesterton. Father Brown solves mysteries and crimes using his intuition and keen understanding of human nature. Chesterton loosely based him on the Rt Rev. Msgr. John O'Connor (1870–1952), a parish priest in Bradford, who was involved in Chesterton's conversion to Catholicism in 1922.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Father_Brown
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Oh I just watched the first one of the 2018 Father Browns, the Christmas Episode and it was just.....wonderful.
I defy anybody to watch that thing and not shed a tear or two, it's so dear. I hope that show goes on for 20 more years.
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https://www.facebook.com/events/193125018134993/
(https://scontent-ort2-2.xx.fbcdn.net/v/t1.0-9/30624307_403293420138564_6029548736132507399_n.jpg?_nc_cat=0&_nc_eui2=v1%3AAeHaRF6kjrfO6wM6N9ZT4rmAKZfewbaZRKC2EuAGBFniviFhOxNjChu1_Cj9VNRSAS8HgoukbTuMbSfJLnpCfM0EzXPuQS04pWGJ3pMm0zCA-A&oh=f2e3a9d14a774262e6a95f9601005ddf&oe=5B2C4F72)
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Here is the list of books for the Great American Read. http://www.pbs.org/the-great-american-read/books/#/
I've read 21 of them and have four in my TBR pile.
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A nice, thorough review of Little Women
https://preview.tinyurl.com/y6vrmx2b
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Fans of Father Brown, rejoice! There's to be a new series coming out January 2019!!! I hope it has 25 episodes. I love the way they film it, they are a small budget thing (for some reason, tho it's the most popular BBC production now in the world since it's been exported all over) they film in whatever weather conditions there are, rain, snow, you name it. Love it.
And now we know where Sid is, he's appearing in the new smash hit Harry Potter and the Cursed Child in London. He plays Malfoy grown up. Here's an interview with him: https://www.pottermore.com/news/cursed-child-alex-price-interview
I tried to get tickets to it when in London to no avail. There are two performances the same day if I understand it, in the morning and then at night. You do them together or separately, I could get tickets to neither.
I came in to say I saw a remark by David Sedaris that he had read neither Dickens or the Bible and he'd have to be in prison or something, if I remember correctly, to read either (but he's a humorist) but that reminded me that I had not finished Dickens's Bleak House nor the Masterpiece Theater rendition of it, and so I did. That is the most magnificent production.
I did not know who Gillian Anderson was but golly moses what she did with Lady Deadlock's part, and Charles Dance as the villain Mr. Tulkinghorn, (there will never be a better one), is unforgettable..not to mention Smallwood! I'll never see the name Smallwood again without thinking of that characterization.
Now am reading the real book, since those characters are indelibly in my mind. Bleak House was filmed in divisions (if I understood a Charles Dance interview correctly) to emulate the way Dickens brought it out originally. And the Masterpiece Theater production has a lovely ending scene...just a great production.
And I will have to say since we're talking theater (or I am hahaha) that I was thrilled to see Mark Rylance up for a Tony for best actor and his wife's play up for one for Best Play for Farinelli and the King on Broadway in this year's Tony's. Even tho he and it did not win, (and had more nominations, too) it was the most unforgettable night at the theater I've spent in a long time. Never saw anything like it, and was so happy to see him and it included in the nominations.
And PBS is showing an old? Best British Bake Off with Mary and Paul I've never seen starting this Friday at 9 pm, so if you like that show you'd want to watch it, if it's listed on your area programs.
Lots of great stuff on PBS. . Now they need Antiques Road Trip with James Braxton, and we'll be all set. :)
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Hi
noticing Article about PBS. I just wanted to say that I stumbled on the ~channel here in the UK some months ago and have been absolutely impressed with all the fine programmes you have on this channel. I always used to watch the channel over 40 years ago when I lived off shore about 100 miles from Miami!