Season 2017 2017

TV-G

With a mass-casualty terror attack in the UK seen as almost inevitable, this drama documentary dramatises what terrorism experts fear is the most likely scenario for Britain's next major terror attack. Counterterrorism police believe that the greatest threat to our security comes from Marauding Terrorist Firearms Attacks (MTFA), which can result in dozens of fatalities even if armed police respond within minutes. There are more than a thousand high-priority terrorism suspects in the UK, but there are only enough surveillance officers to monitor a fraction of these at any time.

Written by Tony Jordan, this is the heartwarming story of Dame Barbara Windsor, the Cockney kid with a dazzling smile and talent to match. Preparing to perform in the theatre one cold evening in 1993, the cheeky, chirpy blonde Babs recounts the people and events that have shaped her life and career over fifty years from 1943 to 1993.

She contemplates her lonely childhood and WWII evacuation, her decision to go from Barbara Ann Deeks to Barbara Windsor - inspired by the Coronation of Queen Elizabeth II, her complicated relationship with her father, her doomed marriage to Ronnie Knight, capturing the attention of Joan Littlewood and becoming the blonde bombshell in the Carry On films. Babs, ever the consummate professional, never lets her fans down whatever her personal anguish and steps on the stage to rapturous applause.

King Charles III, adapted by Mike Bartlett from his Tony-nominated stage play, is part political thriller, part family drama, and a timely examination of contemporary Britain.

Prince Charles has waited his entire life to ascend to the British throne. But after the Queen's death, he immediately finds himself wrestling his conscience over a bill to sign into law. His hesitation detonates a constitutional and political crisis, and his family start to worry, with William and Kate becoming aware his actions may threaten their future. Meanwhile, an unhappy and frustrated Prince Harry starts a relationship with a 'commoner', just at the moment that the press is looking for a way to attack. With the future of the monarchy under threat, protests on the streets and his family in disarray, Charles must grapple with his own identity and purpose to decide whether, in the 21st century, the British crown still has any real power.

This adaptation retains the daring verse of the original text while fully realising on screen the ambitious scale and spectacle suggested by the play - from Westminster Abbey and Buckingham Palace to the restless streets of London. Tim Pigott-Smith (Downton Abbey, The Hour) reprises the role of Charles from the acclaimed West End and Broadway production, while Charlotte Riley (Close to the Enemy, Peaky Blinders) stars as Kate Middleton. Olivier award-winner Rupert Goold (The Hollow Crown, True Story) directs. It is produced by Drama Republic, the company behind Golden Globe, Bafta and RTS Award-winning dramas The Honourable Woman, Doctor Foster and An Inspector Calls.

Story of notorious Victorian poisoner Mary Ann Cotton, convicted in 1873 as Britain's 1st serial killer.

Real-life drama about the murder of 20-year-old Sophie Lancaster who in 2007 was kicked to death in a park by a gang. Her boyfriend, Robert Maltby, was also severely beaten and ended up in a coma. The two of them were attacked because they were dressed as goths.

This drama documentary tells the story of the Conservative Party's 2016 leadership campaign - how Boris Johnson, having won the referendum and in pole position to be the next PM, handed victory to Theresa May.

Based on extensive research and first-person testimonies, this dramatized narrative goes beyond the headlines to lay bare the politicking and positioning, betrayals and blunders of this extraordinary political time. The programme also features key interviews with people who were intimately involved in the campaigns of the main contenders.

2017 sees the 50th anniversary of the 1967 Sexual Offences Act which decriminalised homosexual acts in England and Wales between adult males, in private. While it would take several decades before homosexuals would reach anything like full equality in this country, this legislation marks the beginning of this journey.

But the dramatic events that led to this Act took place over ten years before and are at the heart of Against the Law, a powerful factual drama starring Daniel Mays and Mark Gatiss. Mays plays Peter Wildeblood, a thoughtful and private gay journalist whose lover, under pressure from the authorities, turned Queen's evidence against him in one of the most explosive court cases of the 1950s - the infamous Montagu Trial. Wildeblood, and his friends Lord Montagu and Michael Pitt-Rivers, were found guilty of homosexual offences and jailed. But the public thought the trial unfair and forced a reluctant government to set up a committee to investigate whether homosexuality should be legalised. The committee was led by Sir John Wolfenden. With his career in tatters and his private life painfully exposed, Peter Wildeblood began his sentence a broken man, but he emerged from Wormwood Scrubs a year later determined to do all he could to change the way these draconian laws against homosexuality impacted on the lives of men like him. He was the only openly gay man to testify before the Wolfenden committee about the brutal reality of being gay in this country at that time. In 1957 the committee recommended that the laws be changed. It would take a further 10 years before these recommendations would become law.

Woven through this powerful drama is testimony from a chorus of men who lived through those dark days, when homosexuals were routinely imprisoned or forced to undergo chemical aversion therapy in an attempt to cure them of their 'condition'. There is also testimony from a retired police officer whose job it was to enforce these laws and a former psychiatri

Flood is the story of what happens when the world is destroyed and how those who survive try to make it new again. One day, it starts to rain and no one knows why. And it doesn't stop. Far out on the North Sea, a fisherman raises a girl in his net, miraculously alive, from the deep sea. Is she one of the migrants now washing up on English shores? Or someone sent for some higher purpose?

Set in the aftermath of an apocalyptic event, which has seen England engulfed by water, this play asks a simple question: what if the fleeing masses from our TV screens and Twitter feeds, in their boats and their orange lifejackets, had English accents? A reimagining of the flood myth, it is the story of how the nation is destroyed by a global flood and tsunami wave. Presented on a floating stage in Hull's Victoria Dock, those left fight for survival.

Adapted by Stephen Butchard from Ian McEwan's Whitbread Prize-winning novel, The Child in Time is a lyrical and heartbreaking exploration of love, loss and the power of things unseen.

Stephen Lewis, a successful writer of children's books, is confronted with the unthinkable: he loses his only child, four-year-old Kate, in a supermarket. In one horrifying moment that replays itself over the years that follow, Stephen realises his daughter is gone. With tenderness and insight, the film explores a marriage devastated by the loss of a child. Kate's absence sets Stephen and his wife, Julie, on diverging paths as both struggle with an all-consuming grief. With the passage of time, a balance of sorts returns, until hope surfaces and triumphs unexpectedly.

In the week that follows Princess Diana's tragic death on 31 August 1997, four separate stories unfold as four ordinary lives are all affected in different ways.

Jack is a shy 19-year-old, the only child of an adored mother who dies the same night as Princess Diana. He struggles to come to terms with her death while computing the loss of an icon who meant so much to both of them. Estranged from his father, he seeks help from a young neighbour, Russell.

Yasmin is unhappily married to Hassan, an unsuccessful businessman who can't admit his failure. Affected deeply by news of Diana's death, Yasmin's patience snaps when their television is re-possessed while she is watching the coverage. Making a pilgrimage to London with their only daughter Aalia, she arrives unannounced on the doorstep of her Uncle Zaheer. Inspired by the public outpouring of emotion at Diana's death, Yasmin goes on a journey of self-discovery.

Michael is a junior reporter on his honeymoon in Paris with his new wife Sophie when news of Diana's death breaks. A fluent French speaker, Michael teams up with the charismatic Laura, a star reporter flown in to cover the story. Spending more and more time on the story at the expense of his honeymoon, Michael struggles to balance his career with his fledgling marriage.

Mary is a Glaswegian florist. Living alone with her mother who is battling Alzheimer's, she struggles for money. Mary hatches a plan to drive to London and sell flowers before Saturday's funeral. With the help of her adoring friend Gordon, she travels to the capital in an old coach filled with flowers. Unexpectedly caught up in the public expression of love for Diana, Mary discovers emotions she thought were long lost.

'They catch Mancunia's infectious yawn, and this great city holds them in its palm.'

This drama by poet Michael Symmons Roberts follows three men in Manchester during one night in September. Written in verse, the film tells the poignant stories of Marley, Antonio and McCulloch. It is also a love song to a city - to Manchester, the backdrop to the film, whose familiar streets are difficult to leave for the departing Sarah.

Marley, Antonio and McCulloch are men whose lives have turned upside down for very different reasons. They sleep on the streets of Manchester in their vehicles, having lost all their economic and social power. They hide away in disused car parks or in industrial estates, trying to snatch sleep, listening to the radio for company. The commentary from England's first World Cup qualifying fixture, where some of the richest, most powerful men in the world of sport compete on the world stage is a stark contrast to their own situations.

As the film continues, it becomes clear how these three came to spend the night in their cars, and how their lives interconnect.

Two men battle against the establishment to tell the truth. This is the story of the struggle of James Ellis and Sam Thompson to stage the play 'Over the Bridge' in Belfast in 1959. A play that tackled the build-up of sectarianism and religious division in the Belfast shipyards.

Despite artistic director James Ellis agreeing to stage the play at the Group Theatre, the pair ran into censorship from the theatre's chairman, Ritchie McKee, who believed the play could cause civil unrest. Ellis resigned from the Group and the pair were denied access to venues, in no small part because of the influence of McKee, who was regional governor of BBC Northern Ireland, chairman of the arts council, brother of the Lord Mayor and owner of half of the theatres in Belfast.

This short film documents their battle to stage the play against the odds and their eventual success in doing so, with 42,000 people coming to see the play and Laurence Olivier asking them to bring it to London's West End.

Born to traditional Punjabi parents and growing up in Wolverhampton, Sathnam Sanghera moves to London after graduating from Cambridge University and builds a career as a journalist. He tries to gather the courage to introduce his English girlfriend Laura to his mother and father and reveal he will not be entering an arranged marriage - but instead learns a painful family secret.

A period drama adapted from the unfinished novel by Charles Dickens. This feature-length version combines the two episodes of the 2012 mini-series.

Opium addict and choirmaster John Jasper has vivid dreams of killing his beloved nephew Edwin Drood and stealing his fiancée Rosa. When two exotic strangers arrive in town, Jasper's dark desires take shape and his life will never be the same again.

An animated family film based on the much-loved children's book written by Julia Donaldson and illustrated by Axel Scheffler. The Highway Rat tells the tale of a ravenous rat who craves buns, biscuits and all sweet things. Tearing along the highway, he searches for sugary treats to steal, until his sweet tooth leads him to a sticky end.

Featuring the voices of David Tennant (Highway Rat), Rob Brydon (Narrator), Frances de la Tour (Rabbit), Tom Hollander (Squirrel), Nina Sosanya (Duck) and Husaam Kiani (Kittan).

For over a decade, the Liverpudlian ex-market stall trader Eddie Braben penned Morecambe and Wise's material, reshaping the double act into the Eric and Ernie that the nation took to its heart. But it wasn't all sunshine.
This comedy-drama follows the story of how The Golden Triangle was formed and celebrates the man behind Morecambe and Wise's greatest successes.

In 1969 Eddie Braben was persuaded by the BBC's then Head of Light Entertainment Bill Cotton to make the journey to London to meet Eric and Ernie and their producer John Ammonds. It wasn't a meeting of the minds. But there was a spark, something different and special that Braben saw in the music hall double act who had yet to crack their on-screen presence. He set out to uncover the essence of what would transform them into television's most beloved entertainers.

What followed was years of dedication, determination and hard graft - comedy comes at a price. With the help and support of his wife Deidree, Eddie dug deep, taking on a huge scripting workload that saw Eric and Ernie take over the living rooms and hearts of the UK population.

Year on year a new series, a new Christmas special, incredible celebrity guests and the never-ending commute from home in Liverpool to work in London saw Eddie work himself to the point of exhaustion. A man desperate for a break, but driven by perfection and the need to make people laugh.

The film culminates in a journey to the iconic 1977 Christmas Show, celebrates a decade of enormous success for both Braben and Morecambe & Wise whilst not shying away from the pressure and pain Eddie went through to help create the screen work of Britain's most beloved double act.