BritBox

When it emerged that BritBox was rebooting Spitting Image, the ITV show that ran for 18 series from 1984 to 1996 and which mercilessly lampooned the Thatcher-Reagan era, there was scepticism that the revival would work.  

Could a collection of latex puppets that had helped redefine TV satire in the pre-digital age be successfully reinvented to send up today’s politicians and celebs?  

When it arrived on our screens in 2002, Spooks was truly revolutionary. British telly had mastered the cerebral spy thriller – most notably with the BBC’s revered adaptation of John le Carré’s Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, starring Alec Guinness as master spy George Smiley – but Spooks was different. 

Bringing a cherished project to television can take several years’ hard graft; for it to take decades is much more unusual. But, thanks to BritBox, an adaptation of The Beast Must Die – written by Poet Laureate Cecil Day-Lewis under his crime-writer pen name, Nicholas Blake – has finally reached the TV screen.

Sitcoms as perfectly realised and executed as Channel 4’s Drop the Dead Donkey are exceedingly rare. That this newsroom caper, set mostly in the offices of Globelink News, was a topical satire, filmed partly the day before transmission to keep the material as up to date as possible, speaks volumes of the skills of creators Andy Hamilton and Guy Jenkin, the brilliant ensemble cast and its director, the energetic Liddy Oldroyd. Unusually, Oldroyd directed all six series, some 65 episodes. Tragically, she died in 2002, aged 47, four years after Drop the Dead Donkey ended.

Entitled A Sword in my Bones, it is based on an original story by Gaby Chiappe, creator of the first series.

Billy Howle is set to reprise his role as the talented but troubled Detective Nigel Strangeways, who investigated the hit and run of a six-year-old boy in the first series.

Howle said: “A lot of hard work by all the cast and crew went into making the first original drama for BritBox, during a pandemic, and it seems to have paid off.

Written by Toni Grisoni (Southcliffe) and Simon Maxwell (Deep State), the eight-part series will follow two families, the Marlows and the Wyatts, who have been feuding in the ‘Edgelands’ of the Thames estuary for centuries.

In the land of mudlarks, smugglers, entrepreneurs and opportunists, the two families are natural enemies with a mutual fascination.

“In conversation” with RTS Yorkshire Chair Fiona Thompson in February, ITV Content Delivery’s James Macmillan recalled: “We were totally blown away… It’s been a very tough year for everyone, but I can’t think of a better way of ending 2020 than by winning the award.”

The Leeds-based business development manager explained how the Carry On movie was restored to its original condition.