Life and Birth will be told through the eyes of the parents and staff at three of Birmingham’s busiest and most diverse maternity units, Heartlands Hospital, Good Hope Hospital and Birmingham Women’s Hospital.
Unprecedented access unveils the cutting-edge medicine used across the antenatal clinics, Fetal Medicine Centres, delivery suites, emergency operating theatres and Birmingham Children’s hospital every day.
ITV’s dramedy series Cold Feet, starring James Nesbitt, Fay Ripely, John Thomson, Robert Bathurst and Hermione Norris, promises dramatic developments for its eighth series, with a wedding possibly on the cards.
Set in Manchester, the series follows a group of middle aged friends as they struggle with parenthood, major life changes and a shifting society. Adam (Nesbitt) finds himself reassessing his habit of flirting with much younger women, while Karen (Norris) and David (Bathurst) try to support their unhappy son Josh.
There was a press furore last month, when the BBC admitted that a scene showing tribal people living in tree houses was faked by the makers of Human Planet.
A few weeks later, the BBC withdrew the series from distribution after finding a second editorial breach. A scene showing a hunter apparently harpooning a whale was revealed to be inaccurate.
“We thought it was the right time to do something big about the NHS – it was encountering lots of problems and it was being treated as a political football.
“We wanted to get over what was happening right now in the NHS and aimed for broadcast in January when the NHS often faces a winter crisis,” explained BBC Two commissioning editor Danny Horan at the event, which was held at ITV London Studios.
Describing it as having, “nail-biting twists and powerful emotional pull”, the Daily Telegraph said BBC Two’s recent timely medical documentary series Hospital “could pass as a top-drawer medical drama”.
The fledgling production company Label1 that made the stylish, six-part series has its own twist. Unusually, the firm was set up in 2015 as a “quasi-indie” within ITV Studios. The two people behind the venture were experienced programme-makers Simon Dickson and Lorraine Charker-Phillips.
