THE DAY OF THE DOCTOR (Trailer for 50th Anniversary TV show)

 

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Dear Anglophiles: The amazing writer Mr. Douglas Watkinson provides today's guest post.  Mr. Watkinson has written for television (including the Midsomer Murders series, beloved by Anglophiles everwhere!) and for stage.  He is also a novelist, having created the detective Nathan Hawk series. 

I’ve written for television all my life. When I started out, it was the brave new artistic medium of the seventies and eighties and we had an absolute ball!

I was lucky. Most writers didn’t earn enough money to keep body and soul together, let alone feed, clothe, and educate four children as I did. Not that it was plain sailing all the way, and one year, 1997 to be precise, it required some very nifty improvisation. My wife decided that we would ‘do bed and breakfast’, assuring me that it would get us out of our financial difficulty of the moment. She was right. Within months, two small barns had been converted into guest units and were up and running and an incredible mix of people were coming from all over the world, for all manner of reasons.

Then, of course, I was offered more television work, this time in the shape of helping to set up Midsomer Murders and then writing for it. I was all for slimming down the B & B, perhaps even shelving it, but my wife, being a canny Northerner, wasn’t so keen. The guest units stayed, the business prospered, and these days we could fill the place every night of the year if we chose to.

As far as Midsomer Murders goes, I’ll cut to the chase. Fifteen years, 230 countries, and 208 bodies later, none of us who worked on those early stories can quite believe that they've been seen by one billion people worldwide. I have to repeat it to make sure I’m not dreaming. A billion people have watched it, and they all have one thing in common. They believe that the fictional county of Midsomer represents the true England, with the murder and mayhem being nothing more than a touch of colour. How do I know this? Because 15 years after we opened our B & B, 15 years after those first Midsomer stories, dramatised from Caroline Graham’s novels, people come to see the locations, and it just so happens that most of the series was made within a stone’s throw from where I live. Which means that many of them stay with us.

In general, people can’t believe that me writing for the series and helping to run a B & B in the thick of the locations is a happy coincidence. If anything, they imagine that British television works by a producer picking a location and then knocking on local doors to see if anyone would care to try their hand at a script. If only it were that simple!

And when I said earlier that we get visitors from all over the world, I wasn’t kidding. We get Midsomer fans from as far away as Estonia, Latvia, Australia, Canada, America, and Japan, to say nothing of our regulars from Europe. One couple from Sweden has been three times! We consider them to be friends. A couple of weeks ago, I gave a talk to members of The Midsomer Murders Society, which meets yearly for a four day event, and they too represent all nations. Attending the evening feast, in a gathering of some 80 people, there were Germans, Belgians, Australians, Americans, Canadians ... as well as the English hardcore.

I have, as you might guess, come to know my audience over the past 15 years of the two businesses, writing and hospitality, running side by side, and I’ve discovered something which never ceases to surprise and delight me. There is a thirst out there in the world for all things essentially English - from the landscape and the people who live in it, to the history and architecture certainly, to the murderers, their victims, and the people who solve the crimes. One billion people testify to this fact. Their belief that what they see in a drama like Midsomer is quintessentially English and their desire for it to remain so, both baffles and enthrals me and, I must confess, chimes with my own wishes.

That’s one of the reasons why I created the detective Nathan Hawk book series, because as I looked round our one-billion audience, I saw that they didn’t have a huge variety of fundamentally English detectives to move on to. Plenty of Americans, yes, plenty of female sleuths, far too many professional policemen who seem to become very samish in their work! What I grandly thought the world was lacking was a rogue, English detective, with attitude and wit, who would open up for those of the one billion who want to read him, a place which already delights them - England.

It’s been a tough learning curve for me, however, because whereas when I wrote a script for The Onedin Line, say, or Poirot, or Howards Way, I needed to persuade only one person to like it, and then millions would watch the result whether they wanted to or not, now I have to persuade one reader at a time. And it’s taken me to the far out world of Facebook, Twitter, and running my own website. All highly enjoyable stuff, but I little thought, as I submitted my first script to the BBC that one day, I’d be able to reach everyone in the world in theory and the things I’d written would be seen by a billion people. All I ask now is that one percent of them buy a copy of Haggard Hawk, Easy Prey, or Scattered Remains. If nothing else, they are just about as English as it’s possible to be.

If you want to know anything more about me, Douglas Watkinson, or the Nathan Hawk series of detective books, or other things I’ve written, let me point you to this link:
www.douglaswatkinson.com

If you’re looking for a B & B within easy reach of London, Oxford, and the murderous, fictional county of Midsomer, let me point you to this link:
www.dintoncottage.co.uk

Zella's comment:  Dear Anglophiles, if you would like to sample Mr. Watkinson's books, here are links  to Amazon, where you can check them out.  (Perfect gifts for the Anglophile with an insatiable appetite for British detective stories, right?!)

• UK readers, go HERE

• USA readers, go HERE

• To pre-order the new book in the series, Scattered Remains, go HERE  (USA readers only)

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Dear stateside Anglophiles: Lucky us!  Tonight, two stellar British television programs air on PBS.  Be sure to catch CALL THE MIDWIFE and MR. SELFRIDGE, both of which presented their season premiers last Sunday.  If you're like me and had to miss the opening episodes last week, no fear!  You can watch them below.  Enjoy!

CALL THE MIDWIFE
This brilliant, period drama took the UK by storm last year before jumping the pond and entrancing US audiences.  Set in 1950's London, the show portrays nurse midwives working in London's poor East End.  The television show is based on the memoirs of Jennifer Worth.  Last year, Season 1 premiered; now, Season 2 is airing.  Below you can watch episode 1 of Season 2 before watching episode 2 on PBS tonight.  

MR. SELFRIDGE
This British-produced period drama should fill the void for Downton Abbey fans as we wait for Downton's next season to begin late this year.  Mr. Selfridge has been called "Downton Abbey with tills [cash registers]."  Set in 1908 London, the series features the life of Harry Gordon Selfridge, the American who opened the famous Selfridges department store in London and changed the face of shopping forever.  Majors characteristic of Selfridge's personality include egotism and philandering, so I wondered if I would cotton to the show--well, suffice it to say, the brilliant acting and writing won me over immediately!  Below you can see episode 1 before watching episode 2 on PBS tonight.

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Few television programs are spoofed as much as Downton Abbey.  Unless a person, place, or thing is important in our culture, we don't bother spoofing it, do we?  Many Youtube spoofs of Downton are floating around the Internet, but and I think this one is particularly well written, with innuendo and references to pop culture.  And little wonder the video is topnotch--it was created for Britain's Red Nose Day! 

Red Nose Day is a  UK-wide, fundraising event to aid people in the UK and Africa who are facing dire injustice or poverty .  The event culminates in a live television extravaganza held in March (this year on Friday the 15th).  On odd-numbered years, Comic Relief organizes Red Nose Day, and the telethon features celebrities performing funny skits; on even-numbered years, Sport Relief does the organizing, and the telethon showcases sports.  Since Red Nose Day's inception 25 years ago, it has raised over 750-million pounds for charity.

British actors starring in the Downton Abbey video, below, include Jennifer Saunders, Joanna Lumley, Harry Enfield, and Victoria Wood.  The character of Cora Crawley--the outlier American--is played by Kim Cattrall, who is very difficult to recognize!

NEWS ALERTS!  Dear Anglophiles: I've received bits of news today that I must share. 

• The very first images of Downton Abbey's Season 4 have emerged!  Click the link below to get the lowdown and to feast your eyes.  (Note: If you've not seen Season 3, this link is a spoiler; do not tread here.)
  

Dame Margaret "Maggie" Smith is one of Britain's most beloved actresses.  The 79 year-old, now starring in the famed Downton Abbey TV series, has won seven BAFTA Awards, two Academy Awards, three Golden Globes, three Emmys, and one Tony.  Thankfully, she has no plans to retire.  I just watched her interviewed on 60 Minutes (see video below) and was saddened to learn that she is, in fact, quite lonely . . . a complaint voiced by many elderly folks, whether movie stars or not.  Since Maggie's second husband (the "love of her life") died, she has had no desire to remarry and lets work fill the void.  Currently, Maggie is busy filming Season 4 of Downton, and my fingers are crossed that fine scripts continue to come her way. 

In case you're unfamiliar with Britain's Michael McIntyre, here's your chance to see his legendary talent.  According to The Telegraph, Michael is currently the highest-grossing, stand-up comic in the world, having made £21 million in ticket sales last year.  

The 37 year-old, award-winning, English comedian hosts his own BBC1 program, the Michael McIntyre's Comedy Roadshow, and has a slew of impressive credits under his belt (see bio link, below).  He attended Edinburgh University for one year before dropping out to write and pursue his career.  (When asked in an interview what he studied, he quipped, "...er, biology or chemistry … I remember there was a white coat involved." 

NEWS ALERT: Downton Abbey's writer, Julian Fellowes, may step down--heading to U.S. to write NBC's The Gilded Age.

I laughed until I cried!  Check out this scene from Mrs. Brown's Boys.   


Mrs. Brown's Orgasmic Phone Call....

(This award-winning series airs on BBC, but sadly, not on PBS.)

Dear Anglophiles: Both good news and bad news looms for those of us who watch British programming on PBS (i.e., all of us). . . .  

The bad news: Only one episode remains in Season 3 of Downton Abbey, and then a long hiatus (until autumn) will be forced upon us.  Woe!  

The good news: According to Entertainment Weekly,  Season 4 of Downton may air in the US much sooner than expected!  Typically, Downton appears stateside four months after debuting in the UK.  However, this fall, after Season 4 commences across the pond, it may quickly hit American airwaves.  One reason cited for the expediency is spoilers.  In our age of instant communications via the Internet, trying to keep the massive US audience from discovering what happens in upcoming, cliffhanger episodes of Downton has been problematic, to say the least.  So keep fingers crossed that this speedup occurs.

We fans of British TV programming have more good news: The series Mr. Selfridge debuts on PBS next month! (Sunday, March 31.)  Mr. Selfridge is a lively, British period drama about American-born Harry Gordon  Selfridge who founded the famous London department store that bears his name.  The series looks positively brilliant and should be an excellent tonic for our Downton withdrawal.  (The show has been described as "Downton Abbey with tills.")  

After taking the quiz, if you need a refresher on who your character is, click HERE to see the cast.