LUDWIG: A new detective series

I'm really enjoying the new BBC detective dramedy series Ludwig, playing on Britbox in the U.S. The series stars David Mitchell and Anna Maxwell Martin. You'll recognize several of the minor characters, too, including Welsh actor Gerran Howell who stars as a medical student from Nebraska in the U.S. show The Pitt. What a surprise. I'm so used to seeing British actors in many shows, but not usually in U.S. ones.

In Ludwig, John Taylor (David Mitchell) is a reclusive puzzle maker who publishes puzzle books under the pen name "Ludwig". His identical twin brother, James Taylor, is a successful detective chief inspector in the Cambridge police force. James has gone missing, and his wife Lucy (Anna Maxwell Martin) enlists John's help to solve the mystery. Pretending to be his brother, John infiltrates the local police station to investigate, and becomes inadvertently embroiled in solving other cases.

While seeking to unravel the mystery of his twin brother's disappearance, reclusive puzzle-designer John 'Ludwig' Taylor takes on his twin brother James's identity as DCI on Cambridge's major crimes squad. 

Read the NYT review here

And the good news is that the BBC has commissioned a second season of Ludwig with Mitchell and Martin remaining in the starring roles. 

SHAKESPEARE & HATHAWAY NEWS

I mentioned this when I first saw it in September, but the fun British mystery show Shakespeare & Hathaway has begun (maybe finished?) filming a new season. It's been three years since Season 4. Now it's back--and I'm pretty sure by popular demand! 

Jo Joyner and Mark Benton reprise their roles for series 5 of Shakespeare & Hathaway, alongside Patrick Walshe McBride (my favorite!), who plays aspiring actor and understudy Sebastian Brudenell. Filming is underway in the streets of Stratford-Upon-Avon. 

Shakespeare & Hathaway started 7 years ago, and there have been 4 seasons and 40 episodes. The show features ex-Detective Inspector Frank Hathaway turned private investigator who meets ex-hairdresser Luella Shakespeare when she employs him to investigate the fiancé she met online. Together they form a private detective agency. 

Series 5 of Shakespeare & Hathaway will premiere on UKTV’s specialist crime drama channel, Alibi, shortly with a later launch on the BBC and iPlayer. U.S. airing? No news, but the first four seasons are available on BritBox, so possibly Shakespeare & Hathaway, Season 5,  will air on Britbox later this year. Stay tuned!!

Death in Paradise: Christmas Special and Series 14 News!

Don Gilet will play the new lead Detective Inspector Mervin Wilson on Death in Paradise that will debut on the BBC on Christmas. 

This is one of my favorite detective shows, and I've liked all the past DIs. The BBC has a tradition of releasing a Christmas special to mark the end of the current season and the start of a new one. 2024's special will introduce a new detective in Saint Marie after the departure of Ralf Little's DI Neville Parker. DI Mervin Wilson makes his debut in a feature-length Death in Paradise Christmas special this December, before series 14 broadcasts in 2025. Mervin arrives on the island of Saint Marie from his home in London. 

Don Gilet says: “I am delighted to have returned to the wonderful island of Guadeloupe and this time to be stepping into the well-worn shoes of the Detective Inspector. It’s been a real pleasure filming such a beloved series alongside the hardworking cast and crew. I can’t wait for the fans to see how DI Mervin Wilson fares on the island, how he fits within the Saint Marie police team and what secrets may unfold..."

Gilet will be joined by series regulars Don Warrington, Shantol Jackson, Ginny Holder, Élizabeth Bourgine and Danny John-Jules who will continue playing Commissioner Selwyn Patterson, DS Naomi Thomas, Officer Darlene Curtis, Catherine Bordey, and Officer Dwayne Myers, respectively.

Death in Paradise returns with the 2024 Christmas Special on BBC One, and Season 14 will be released in early 2025. Previously, Death in Paradise aired in the U.S. on BritBox. No news yet, but I'm assuming the Christmas Special and series 14 will be available here in early 2025, based on former releases. I'll keep you posted.

Agatha Christie's MURDER IS EASY: March 1 on Britbox

At last we have a date for the latest Agatha Christie production of Murder is Easy in the U.S.  --  March 1 on Britbox. This show premiered in the UK last Fall. I love a great period Christie production. I'm looking forward to watching.

Based on the classic Agatha Christie Mystery, Murder is Easy tells the story of Luke Fitzwilliam who finds himself on the trail of a serial killer after meeting Miss Pinkerton on a train to London. 

From The Guardian:

This vintage crime tale replaces an English police officer with a Nigerian attaché. It tackles race, feminism and class, while still being quintessentially English. 

The cast includes Penelope Wilton, Mark Bonnar, Mathew Baynton and Jon Pointing. The busiest of the lot, though, is Industry’s David Jonsson, who stars as Luke Fitzwilliam, refashioned from the retired English police officer of the original novel into a Nigerian attache, who has travelled to the UK to take up a position at Whitehall. The action, of which there is plenty, has been moved forward a couple of decades, to 1953, and there are reworkings of certain characters and plot points. Screenwriter Siân Ejiwunmi-Le Berre’s tweaking of the story suggests an inventive and imaginative new take on the 1939 original. The first half takes the most liberties with its source material and is by far the strongest, hinting at Fitzwilliam’s divided loyalties as a member of the ruling elite and a colonised subject of a nation close to independence. His conversations with his Nigerian friends in London, about pride, duty and obligation, make the prospect of him being dropped into a mostly white country village in the mid-20th century even more tantalising a dramatic prospect.

Yet this early promise soon fades into the background as Murder Is Easy settles in as a quintessentially BBC Christie adaptation.

SHETLAND SEASON 8 NEWS

Alas, Jimmy Perez has left the building! 

Shetland, Season 8, stars Ashley Jensen as the lead following the departure of Douglas Henshall. 

Shetland season 8 will start on Wednesday, November 1 at 9 pm on BBC One. No release date yet for the U.S. Let me know if you find a date. We're all anxious to watch the new series. 

From WhatToWatch

Ashley Jensen taking over as the island's top cop following the departure of Douglas Hensall as DI Jimmy Perez.

Shetland will have a new feel as Ashely's DI Ruth Calder will be teaming up with long-standing series regular DS Alison "Tosh" McIntosh (Alison O’Donnell). 

The plot will see Calder heading back to her native Shetland to protect a vulnerable witness to a gangland murder. But can Calder and Tosh find the witness in time? And how will the pair work together, especially given Calder's hostility towards Shetland?

Talking about joining the team, Ashley said when she was cast: "I am absolutely thrilled to be joining Shetland as DI Ruth Calder. It's such a hugely successful show and I am aware I have very big boots to fill since the departure of DI Perez, who was very much loved by fans of the show.

"There will be a different dynamic with Ruth amongst the regular characters and a few more new interesting characters to enjoy. However, the integrity of the show and the world that has been created will remain very much in the same tone as the last seven seasons. It's a real privilege to be asked to lead this show into a new chapter. I can’t wait to be working in Scotland again. I have missed it!”

Also joining the cast are Phyllis Logan (Guilt, Downtown Abbey), Jamie Sives (Guilt, Annika), Dawn Steele (Holby City, Granite Harbour), Don Gilet (EastEnders, Sherwood), Ann Louise Ross (River City, Katie Morag) and Lorraine McIntosh (Outlander, My Name is Joe). The guest cast will star alongside series regulars including Steven Robertson (playing DC Sandy Wilson), Lewis Howden (Sgt Billy McCabe), Anne Kidd (Cora McLean), Angus Miller (Donnie), Conor McCarry (PC Alex Grant) and Eubha Akilade (PC Lorna Burns).

BBC announces new lead for Shetland Series

The BBC's award-winning murder mystery drama Shetland announced a new lead actor when it returns next year. 

From BBC.com

Ashley Jensen will star as DI Ruth Calder, a native Shetlander who returns to the isles after 20 years working for the Met in London. The Scottish actor takes on the lead detective role left vacant by DI Jimmy Perez, played for seven series by Douglas Henshall.

Jensen said she was "absolutely thrilled" to be joining the show.

The 53-year-old, who was born in Annan in Dumfriesshire, got her big break when she starred alongside Ricky Gervais in Extras in 2005. She went on to appear regularly in US TV series Ugly Betty before returning to the UK with roles in shows such as Agatha Raisin and Catastrophe. In 2019 she reunited with Gervais in the Netflix comedy series After Life.

The new series of Shetland will film in locations on Shetland and across Scotland this spring.

Jensen will join series regulars such as Alison O'Donnell (DS Alison 'Tosh' McIntosh), Steven Robertson (Sandy), Lewis Howden (Billy) and Anne Kidd (Cora). Jensen said: "There will be a different dynamic with Ruth amongst the regular characters and a few more new interesting characters to enjoy.  "However the integrity of the show and the world that has been created will remain very much in the same tone as the last seven seasons. 

"It's a real privilege to be asked to lead this show into a new chapter."

DEATH IN PARADISE SPIN-OFF: Beyond Paradise

Beyond Paradise: Death in Paradise Spin-Off 

From Deadline:

The BBC and BritBox have commissioned a spin-off of BBC drama favorite Death in Paradise, with Kris Marshall’s DI Humphrey Goodman character making a return in the UK.

Marshall played the lead role in the show’s third-to-sixth season before being replaced by Ardal O’Hanlon and Beyond Paradise will spotlight his return to being a DI in his home nation. Beyond Paradise will be distributed internationally by BBC Studios and be available in all Britbox international markets outside of Australia.

Beyond Paradise will be on BBC1 in the UK and BritBox in the US in 2023. 

From WhattoWatch: 

Humphrey was last seen finding love with Martha. Martha left Saint Marie, leaving Humphrey devastated. But Humphrey then returned to London and declared he'd move to be with her. And that appeared to be the end of the story. However, in Beyond Paradise we find the pair living together in rural Britain. Martha is now his fiancee and Humphrey is hoping for a quieter life. He has a new DI job, but surprise surprise his new hometown has a very high murder rate! 

Speaking to Digital Spy, Kris said that the show will be exactly what the fans will be hoping for, but that it will have its own "unique" feel. He explained that the show will: "follow on [from] Humphrey and Martha's storyline, from when he left Death in Paradise and Saint-Marie, and their rural life back in rural England, adding "Of course, being Humphrey, he's brilliant but you know... he's a slightly odd gentleman." 

He continued: "I can't really say much about what happens, but what it is about the scripts that I really love, Tony Jordan's done a beautiful job on the two or three scripts I've seen. It's exactly what you hope for in terms of if you're a fan of Death in Paradise. Obviously, it's not in the Caribbean, but it's in its own paradise. It's got its own new twist on it. "What's really lovely is everything about the new scripts are brand new, and yet they sort of remain... it's a juxtaposition really of having what you're used to and what we really love about Death in Paradise, but having a new spin on it. 

I think it's really unique and like a comfy blanket as well. I think it's going to be, I hope Death in Paradise fans are going to take to it straight away", he said. 

***

Various news sources report that many of the characters from Death in Paradise will make cameo appearances. I can't wait.

SHETLAND TO RETURN FOR TWO MORE SEASONS!

Well this really is good news. The BBC reports that Shetland starring Douglas Henshall will return for two more seasons.

Based on the novels of Ann Cleeves, series six and seven will be filmed in 2020 and 2021, for six hour-long episodes in each.

Shetland - starring Douglas Henshall as Jimmy Perez - debuted on BBC One back in 2013.
Gaynor Holmes, commissioning editor for BBC Drama in Scotland, said: "We are really proud of Shetland."

She explained: "The crime series led by DI Perez and his team has proved hugely popular with audiences both in Scotland and across the rest of the UK."

Since the series first aired, thousands of tourists - many from cruise ships - have headed to Shetland, inspired by the drama.

VisitScotland in Shetland last year said the Shetland TV series and books had been an "amazing success" for the islands.

Congrats to Ann Cleeves and the BBC! Looking forward to the new shows!

BBC adapting Nicholas Blake's The Beast Must Die

Adapted from Deadline:

The BBC is adapting the Nigel Strangeways novel The Beast Must Die written by Nicholas Blake, the nom de plume of poet Cecil Day-Lewis, that was first published in 1938.

The BBC adaptation is being written by Gaby Chiappe, who wrote the  Gemma Arterton feature film Their Finest and has written on a number of British crime dramas including ITV’s The Level and Vera as well as BBC’s Shetland. It is being set up as a series, likely to be five or six episodes, and is set to be exec produced by Nathaniel Parker, the actor known the lead role in The Inspector Lynley Mysteries.

The series could turn into a long-running franchise for the BBC as Blake/Day Lewis wrote 16 books featuring the detective.

The Beast Must Die has been adapted for the big screen a number of times over the years including in 1969 as an Italian thriller directed by Claude Chabrol and in 1952 as an Argentine thriller directed by Roman Vinoly Barreto.

HT: BV Lawson's In Reference to Murder & J. Kingston Pierce's The RapSheet

China Miéville's The City and The City BBC production

China Mieville's speculative thriller The City & The City was one of my favorite books when it came out in 2009. Now BBC 2 brings it to TV. I can't even imagine how they filmed this to show all the nuances of this amazing book, but I'd love to see the production. Hope we get this in the U.S. soon. Broadcast in the UK begins this week. Thanks to Ali Karim for the heads-up.

From the BBC:

David Morrissey is Inspector Tyador Borlú in BBC Two’s adaptation of China Miéville's mind-bending novel The City & The City on BBC Two.

Tony Grisoni (The Young Pope, Southcliffe, The Red Riding Trilogy) has adapted this four-part genre-busting thriller from one of Britain’s foremost fantasy writers in a production made by Mammoth Screen and directed by Tom Shankland (Les Misérables, House of Cards,The Missing).
The cast also includes Lara Pulver (Sherlock) as Borlú’s wife Katrynia, Mandeep Dhillon (Some Girls) as Constable Corwi of the Besźel Policzai, Maria Schrader (Deutschland 83) as Senior Detective Dhatt of the Ul Qoma Militsya, Ron Cook (Hot Fuzz) as Borlú’s superior Commissar Gadlem, Danny Webb (Humans) as hard-right nationalist politician Major Syedr, and Christian Camargo (Penny Dreadful) as Doctor Bowden, an American academic.
When the body of a foreign student is discovered in the streets of the down-at-heel city of Besźel, it’s just another day’s work for Inspector Tyador Borlú of the Extreme Crime Squad (David Morrissey). But he uncovers evidence that the murdered girl came from Ul Qoma, a city that shares a dangerous and volatile relationship with Besźel, and this case will challenge everything Borlú holds dear.
China Miéville, three-time winner of the prestigious Arthur C. Clarke Award, published The City &The City in 2009 to dazzling acclaim, drawing comparisons with Kafka, Orwell and Philip K Dick. He says of the television drama: "It’s been extraordinary and moving to see this huge process, whereby a book written alone is collectively transformed into something familiar yet quite new. And it is extraordinary and moving to see the final result."
The City & The City was filmed on location in Manchester and Liverpool. 

 

BBC to film SEVEN more Agatha Christie Adaptations

The BBC confirmed yesterday that there will be seven more Agatha Christie adapations over the next four years. And Then There Were None, starring Aidan Turner and Maeve Dermody, came out last year (now on AcornTV in the U.S.)

Filming is underway on the adaptation of Christie’s short story "The Witness For The Prosecution" that will be a two-part drama starring Kim Cattrall and Toby Jones.

There will still be another seven after The Witness For The Prosecution airs, with TV bosses confirming three of these will be Agatha’s works Ordeal By Innocence, The ABC Murders, and Death Comes As The End.

Read more: http://metro.co.uk/2016/08/24/get-excited-because-the-bbc-has-signed-a-deal-for-seven-more-agatha-christie-adaptations-6087487/#ixzz4ILxFAJN6

BBC Creating Netflix-Style Streaming Site

Here's some great news for BBC fans!

It’s always been a tricky task to watch some of Britain’s best television unless it got picked up by Masterpiece Theater. But the international borders of broadcasting are somewhat eroded by the news that the BBC plans to launch a Netflix-style streaming service offering programming past and present. Some of its most popular shows like Doctor Who and Sherlock, which already air in this country, won’t be included, but there’s plenty more to watch: Few networks around the world can boast the kind of back catalogue the BBC has.

Read More Here.

Inspector George Gently Returns for Four New Episodes

BBC MEDIA CENTRE reports that Inspector George Gently starring Martin Shaw will return for four new feature length films created by Peter Flannery.  The character is based on one created by crime novelist Alan Hunter, who featured the Detective Inspector in a long-running series of mysteries published from 1955 through 1999.

"This classic series set in Northumberland is a vivid and colourful insight into a time of major social change as the swinging 60s hits the North-East. With the wit and sharp banter between our passionate growling detective hero (Shaw) and his mouthy sidekick Bacchus (Lee Ingleby) Inspector George Gently lovingly recreates the warmth of the period and the Geordie world that they inhabit.

Writer Peter Flannery says: "Gently and Bacchus return to my home turf of Durham and Northumberland with plenty more murders and cases to solve. It's 1968 and there are huge changes taking place in society, and hopefully our series continues to give a real portrait of the age."

Read the full article HERE

Hat Tip: Omnimystery News