An A to Z of UK Television Drama

Archive television podcast in which Andy Priestner and Martin Holmes explore a new UK drama every episode, offering informal critique, insights and trivia. Join them every fortnight for televisual-based larks.

An A to Z of UK Television Drama is a tv podcast hosted by Unknown Host, with 61 episodes on record and a Required Pod Score of 80. PitchCentric scores this show on Booking Probability, Listen Score, and live audience signals refreshed every 24 hours.

Unknown Host hosts An A to Z of UK Television Drama, a tv show with 61 episodes published.

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  An A to Z of UK Television Drama

  2.23 Who Pays The Ferryman?

  Dec 24, 20242h 2mS0

  [Spoiler alert! This series is almost 50 years old but we will be revealing - around 90 minutes - in who spectacularly dies in the literal cliffhanger to episode 7. You have been warned!] Hey sis, it's Christmas, but this month Andy and Martin are visiting sunny Elounda on Crete for Michael J. Bird's classic revenge drama Who Pays the Ferryman? Featuring Jack Hedley, Betty Arvaniti, Neil McCarty and Patience Collier the series gripped the British public in 1977 and after its BBC2 transmission was immediately repeated on BBC1. The following year it became an even huger hit in the Netherlands. The series also...

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  An A to Z of UK Television Drama

  2.22 Vote, Vote, Vote, for Nigel Barton (and Stand Up, Nigel Barton)

  Nov 23, 20241h 32mS0

  After a brief hiatus, Andy and Martin resume the second season of A to Z with the letter V. Admittedly cheating a little, their choice was 'Vote, Vote, Vote for Nigel Barton', the second of two autobiographical Dennis Potter plays from 1965 in The Wednesday Play strand. They also cover the first play, 'Stand Up, Nigel Barton'. Both feature Keith Barron as the title character who we follow from childhood, to university, to a reluctant attempt to stand as a Labour candidate in the General Election. Both plays stand up incredibly well and the subject matter is no less relevant today...

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  An A to Z of UK Television Drama

  2.21 Undermind

  Sep 14, 20242h 2mS0

  Andy and Martin travel back in time to the summer of 1965 and the adventures of HR consultant Drew Heriot and his sister-in-law Anne as they face up to the machinations of 'Undermind’: aliens who have brainwashed British citizens in order to cause national unrest ahead of their imminent invasion. Their various schemes include: spreading pirate radio misinformation; inciting youth violence in a seaside resort; influencing the works of a popular children’s author; the distribution of suicide-inducing birthday records; interference with the printing of exam papers, and most abominably of all, the assassination of Eamonn Andrews! Yes, really. Starring Jeremy Wilk...

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  An A to Z of UK Television Drama

  2.20 Tutti Frutti

  Aug 10, 20241h 42mS0

  This month Andy and Martin review the highly regarded 1987 BAFTA-winning Scottish drama Tutti Frutti, written by John Byrne and starring Robbie Coltrane and Emma Thompson. Unfortunately Andy disputes that high regard and is staggered that Fortunes of War (also with Thompson), another best drama nominee that year, lost out to it. He finds Tutti Frutti to be deeply unfunny and its joyful depiction of toxic masculinity difficult to stomach. Martin on the other hand believes it has merits with several characters and situations that are well drawn and memorable. Not since GBH has an old show disappointed Andy so much...

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  An A to Z of UK Television Drama

  2.19b Interview with Carolyn Seymour

  Jul 13, 202435 minS0

  Twenty-one years after their first recorded interview on the first Survivors DVDs back in 2003, Andy catches up with Carolyn Seymour who played Abby Grant in Survivors. Carolyn reflects on her relationships with the key figures who made the show: Terry Nation, Terry Dudley and original director Pennant Roberts; how she and other women actors suffered at the hands of chauvinism in the 70s; and reveals how she got through the tough winter location filming. She also responds to the criticism that Survivors was too white and middle-class (she heartily agrees), explains where the series sits in her wider career, and...

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