SO much to report about the final series of Life On Mars.
Interviews and background material, all held for several months until the Manchester drama returns to the screen.
Now there’s just 14 days to go before Sam (John Simm), Gene (Philip Glenister) and the rest of the A-Division team are back on BBC1.
The first feature on the second series is in today’s MEN – click here for the online version.
There’s more from that interview with John to come, along with others, including Phil, Liz White (Annie) and Marshall Lancaster (Chris).
Month: January 2007
SO there we were, watching a preview of a new TV drama at ITV Network Centre in London.
Written by At Home With The Braithwaites creator Sally Wainwright, the first episode of Bonkers lives up to its title.
Even so, prepared as I am for most things, I have to admit I didn’t see a certain twist coming.
It involves a film star called Felix Nash and something rather strange.
HE was the leader who inspired a television generation in Granada’s glory days at Hollywood-on-Irwell.
David Plowright liked a good party – and he would have loved the one thrown in his honour last night.
The former Granada chairman, who died last August at the age of 75, was remembered at the London Television Studios on the South Bank.
It was a moving and uplifting event, full of tributes.
And with new ITV executive chairman Michael Grade the last to speak, it also stirred the very soul of British television.
LIFE on Mars star Philip Glenister wanted to take it home to speed up the weekly shop.
John Simm was frustrated he never got to play with it.
A bottle of Old Spice in the glove box, David Bowie playing on the radio and a screeching sound coming from the tyres?
Yes, we’re talking about the real star of the award-winning Manchester drama, which is to be auctioned for charity.
IT’S the best-selling show heading for a heart-stopping climax.
The return of Life On Mars is now just a matter of weeks away, with eight hotly-anticipated episodes ready to roll.
A viral marketing campaign has already begun and TV trails start on BBC1 this Saturday.
Fans will know how Sam Tyler (John Simm) and Gene Hunt (Philip Glenister) were transformed into puppets for a surreal sequence in episode five.
A final word – for now – on the BBC move to Salford.
Some media commentators and critics are still saying it doesn’t make sense.
They might change their minds if they looked at the full background – and the vision of the future planned at Salford’s Media City.
As highlighted in last Friday’s MEN, in the longer term the BBC is thinking along the lines of moving even more parts of its organisation to Salford.
TIME to inject some calm into the hysteria surrounding a certain reality TV show.
There will be no public crowd at tonight’s Celebrity Big Brother eviction due to the current heightened feelings over the series.
Channel 4’s email in my in-box reads: “Over the past few days, Celebrity Big Brother has generated an intense and, at times, heated public debate which the evicted housemate will be unaware of.
”As a result, Channel 4 and Endemol have taken the decision to conduct tonight’s eviction in front of a studio audience and without a crowd.”
CHAMPAGNE corks were popping in Salford tonight after final confirmation of the BBC’s big move north.
The news was broken first in later editions of today’s MEN and on our website. It’s been a very hectic last 12 hours.
Just over two years ago I sat in BBC director general Mark Thompson’s office as he revealed for the first time plans to move five departments to Greater Manchester.
I spoke to him again last November when he visited the site of the proposed Media City at Salford Quays.
It was clear then that the move was poised to go ahead, even though many still thought it would never happen.
Today the sceptics were proved wrong.
JERMAINE Jackson is in no doubt: “I’m tired of biting my tongue, call it what it is.”
He appears convinced that Bollywood star Shilpa Shetty is the victim of racism in the Celebrity Big Brother House.
Over 10,000 complaints – and counting – have now been received by both regulators Ofcom and Channel 4.
Tonight’s show raised yet more concern for Shilpa at the hands of the trio who are already regarded by some as the “three bitches”.
Housemates Jade Goody, Danielle Lloyd and Jo O’Meara may be guilty, at the very least, of playground bullying, jealousy and cultural ignorance.
And let’s not even go anywhere near Jade’s gormless boyfriend Jack Tweed.
THERE was a running gag in Coronation Street last night about the vast amount of tea and coffee brewed in Weatherfield.
Corner shop kid Amber and missing in action Adam also re-appeared from the Red Rec black hole.
Oh, and Tracy Barlow was charged with murder after builder Charlie Stubbs graduated to an altogether different kind of spirit level.
Thanks to Tracy’s tearful mum Deirdre, hosepipe and sprinkler bans are to be lifted across the nation.
Life of Wylie 