British Costume Period Dramas (any recommendations)
LM
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Hello, i really like costume period drama television shows
I've seen The Village, Call the Midwife, The Mill, Downton Abbey, Lark Rise, The Paradise and the remake of Upstairs Downstairs. Currently watching The Crimson Field on Sunday as well.
I was wondering if anyone had any recommendations for other shows along the lines of these.
Much appreciated. Thanks.
I've seen The Village, Call the Midwife, The Mill, Downton Abbey, Lark Rise, The Paradise and the remake of Upstairs Downstairs. Currently watching The Crimson Field on Sunday as well.
I was wondering if anyone had any recommendations for other shows along the lines of these.
Much appreciated. Thanks.
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http://www.amazon.co.uk/Tenko-Complete-BBC-Series-Box/dp/B0009M9FEQ
There's also Twenty Thousand Streets Under The Sky:
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Twenty-Thousand-Streets-Under-Sky/dp/B000B6F8FA
Really well done. :cool:
Oh yes, that was a good one.
Also based on Mrs Gaskell is Cranford with a stellar cast led by Judi Dench. I remember really loving Middlemarch, by George Eliot, which was made in the mid-90s with Juliet Aubrey and Rufus Sewell.
The very best literary adaptations IMO were Price and Prejudice with Colin Firth and Jennifer Ehle, made in the 90s, and Bleak House with Gillian Anderson heading the cast. These are not TV dramas though, they are all literary adaptations. But they were all really popular.
I absolutely loved an ITV drama series called Lost in Austen which was about an ordinary modern day young woman in London who finds Elizabeth Bennett from Pride and Prejudice in her bath and goes back into the novel with her. If you have seen the Colin Firth version, this drama is absolutely delightful, very funny and many of the characters are secretly the opposite of how they come across in the novel and TV version. It's inspired.
The Crimson Petal and the White is a more 'adult', edgy period drama, it also included Gillian Anderson in the cast and was quite compelling.
ITV did a series of one-off Jane Austen adaptations a few years ago starring popular actors like Billie Piper. Not everyone liked them.
I'll think of some more later ...
I am watching Cranford and very much enjoying it. Two episodes in to it. Incredible cast.
A favourite Dickens adaptation of mine was Our Mutual Friend, also from the late 90s, with Anna Friel and Stephen Mackintosh, David Morrissey, Paul McGann, etc.
If you like more of a romp, the Alex Kingston version of Moll Flanders is good fun - no prim and proper Victorians in this!
Middlemarch was gooD, I don't think it'd ever been repeated?
There was a drama on when I was a teenager called We'll Meet Again, about the Americans stationed here during WWII, which not exactly a costume drama, was good all the same.
Also brilliant we're Pride and Prejudice (1995), Sense and Sensibility (Emma Thompson), Little Dorrit, Bleak House, Our Mutual Friend, Martin Chuzzlewit ... and Poldark.
I also used to love The House of Elliot. ITV3 recently repeated it, but I think it's finished now though.
I am almost totally alone I think, in loving the recent BBC adaption of Jamaica Inn, but I would recommend giving it a try if you haven't seen it.
Cadfael was on ITV not BBC
There are plenty of historical detective books that could be made into tv show
The Falco series by Lindsey Davis
Roger the Chapman by Kate Sedley
Sister Fidelma by Peter Tremayne
Brother Althelstan by Paul Doherty
Crowner John by Bernard Knight
Those are just the ones that spring to mind
Others I would recommend are:
The Caesars (Granada, 1968, B&W)
I, Claudius (BBC, 1976, colour)
Poldark (BBC, 1975-77, colour)
Brideshead Revisited (Granada, 1981, colour)
The Jewel in the Crown (Granada, 1984, colour)
Sherlock Holmes adaptations, including the 1968 BBC colour series starring Peter Cushing
The Rivals of Sherlock Holmes (Thames, 1971-72, colour)
Upstairs, Downstairs (LWT, 1971-76, B&W & colour)
The House of Eliott (BBC, 1991-94, colour, stereo)
Secret Army (BBC, 1977-1979, colour)
Colditz (BBC, 1972-74, colour)
Manhunt (LWT, 1970, colour)
Jamaica Inn was atmospheric and brilliantly acted. Shame about the sound issues. Hopefully they'll rectify it and repeat it once improved.
But, the person who suggested Tenko upthread. I second that. No other drama series has been as liberal and as hard hitting since. I make that statement comparitively considering it was 30 years ago. If Tenko doesn't get you "there" then nothing will.
Some of my personal favourites which haven't already been mentioned:
Silas Marner (BBC, Ben Kingsley)
Our Mutual Friend (1976 version from the BBC, Leo McKern)
The Barchester Chronicles (BBC, Nigel Hawthorne, Geraldine McEwan and a truly splendiferous performance from Alan Rickman as Obadiah Slope)
To Serve Them All My Days (BBC, John Duttine)
And if by any chance you can get hold of it, the 1974 version of David Copperfield simply has to be seen for the tour de force that is Mr Nice Guy Martin Jarvis as an utterly loathsome Uriah Heep.
Thanks for that info...I would have missed it completely. I have now put it on to record and look forward to seeing it again...
The Onedin Line
Fantastically dark tale set in the 18th Century, of sexual obsession and avarice, very different from most costume dramas, and a world away from Jane Austen adaptations.
Couldn't agree more. It was brilliant.