Online Series: Good News from Woody Allen, Bad News from the BBC
Posted on January 13, 2015 at 10:14 am
Amazon, which got its first Golden Globe wins (can we still call this category “television?”) Sunday night for “Transparent,” has announced that Woody Allen will write and direct a new series to be made available through their Prime streaming platform in 2016.
British TV specialist Acorn has the first complete collection of Agatha Christie’s Partners in Crime: The Tommy & Tuppence Mysteries starring James Warwick and Francesca Annis as the lively detective duo; Agatha Christie’s Poirot & Marple Fan Favorites Collection featuring 11 of the detectives’ most popular mysteries with guest stars Jessica Chastain (Golden Globe-winner for Zero Dark Thirty) as well as Hugh Bonneville (Downton Abbey) in a Marple and Poirot mystery; and Wodehouse Playhouse Complete, featuring all three series of the uproarious BBC comedy starring Pauline Collins (“Shirley Valentine” and “Quartet”).
I loved the old PBS series “Upstairs, Downstairs,” which ran from 1971-75 on the BBC. It was revolutionary because it gave almost-equal time to the stories of the servants (downstairs) and the wealthy Edwardian-era family they worked for (upstairs). Jean Marsh, who played a housemaid, was the series co-creator with her friend Eileen Atkins. A new 40th anniversary DVD set has been released by Acorn Media with more than 25 hours of new bonus material.
When the master of 165 Eaton Place, Sir Hallam Holland, carries his wife across the threshold of their new home, Lady Agnes exclaims with pleasure, “What a ghastly old mausoleum!” Neglect has strewn cobwebs everywhere and furred the surfaces with dust. But with a sumptuous renovation and the help of the indomitable housekeeper Rose Buck (Jean Marsh), the iconic address so beloved in the original series Upstairs Downstairs is soon restored to its former glory.
It’s 1936, a tumultuous time in Britain, and within the walls of 165 Eaton Place, characters from an orphanage, a damp Welsh castle, the heart of the British Raj and elsewhere together will face a changing world, not just upstairs and downstairs, but side by side.
While You Wait for ‘Glee’s’ Second Season: Try ‘The Choir’
Posted on July 2, 2010 at 3:59 pm
Gareth Malone is a choir director who brings music to people who never thought they could be a part of something so purely glorious. This award-winning series comes to American television on July 7. Guaranteed to produce laughter, goosebumps, and a couple of tears, and very likely to inspire you to try some singing, too.
