Cassian Harrison announces wealth of new BBC Four commissions
BBC Four Channel Editor Cassian Harrison today announced a raft of new commissions including a major new season exploring our enduring fascination with all things Gothic across BBC Two and BBC Four; gripping new international drama from Belgium, as well as new series of Spiral and the Bridge; a season of Storyville films looking at love in the 21st century; and Len Goodman and Lucy Worsley taking to the floor to tell the story of British dance.
Published: 21 August 2014
BBC Four has a unique place in the BBC portfolio offering intelligent, innovative and surprising content with a distinctive depth, wit and verve.
Cassian Harrison says: “BBC Four is in rude health: share and reach were both up on the previous year and audience appreciation continues to be the highest of all BBC channels.
"Since joining the channel in October last year, we’ve enjoyed a magnificent celebration of the 18th Century across BBC Two and Four with Lucy Worsley’s series, The First Georgians reaching over 1m viewers an episode; broadened our drama palette with our first ever Belgian conspiracy thriller, Salamander, and bilingual dramas, Hinterland and Amber; itched and scratched with Michael Mosley to a greater understanding of parasites (in Infested! Living With Parasites); learnt to love concrete in our Architecture season; welcomed new Sky At Night presenter, Maggie Aderin-Pocock; and had a front row seat at incredible performances, from the Duchess Of Malfi and the Proms to Blondie at Glastonbury.
"BBC Four has a unique place in the BBC portfolio offering intelligent, innovative and surprising content with a distinctive depth, wit and verve.
"Today I’m excited to be announcing a wide range of new commissions which showcase BBC Four at its very best, from a major new season in collaboration with BBC Two that explores the enduring influence of Gothic in its many forms, to contemporary documentaries from some of our leading film-makers; and from the hard-to-resist combination of Len Goodman and Lucy Worsley dancing cheek-to-cheek to the first series from new talent Sona Datta; not forgetting, of course, some cracking new international drama series to look forward to on Saturday nights.
"This is on top of the great comedy we’ve already announced coming up this autumn, including Puppy Love from Jo Scanlan and Vicki Pepperdine and The Detectorists with Mackenzie Crook."
Factual
Gothic season
This autumn, BBC Two, BBC Four and the British Library are celebrating all things Gothic with a new season of programmes exploring the literature, architecture, music and artworks that have taken such a prominent place in British culture. A host of famous literary faces will look back on Frankenstein’s creation in A Dark And Stormy Night: When Horror Was Born on BBC Two, while on BBC Four Andrew Graham-Dixon looks back at how Victorian Britain turned to the past for inspiration to create some of Britain’s most famous artworks and buildings, in The Art Of Gothic: The Shock Of The Old.
In The Genius Of The Gothic, Dr Janina Ramirez looks at Perpendicular Gothic, Britain’s first cultural style and Dan Cruickshank looks back at Gothic architecture’s most influential family in Great Scotts! The Family That Built Britain. BBC Four delves into the archives uncovering classic performances from Siouxsie and the Banshees, Bauhaus, The Cure, Sisters of Mercy, The Mission and more in Goths at the BBC.
Dancing Cheek To Cheek: An Intimate History Of Dance
Lucy Worsley and Len Goodman take to the floor to reveal the untold story of British dance. Over three episodes, they’ll show how Britain’s favourite popular dances from over the centuries offer a fascinating window into British society and our relationships with one another.
Each week, Lucy and Len will research and investigate a number of historic dances as well as train alongside a group of amateur dancers to recreate an iconic dance finale in full costume in a historic location. Tracking the story of popular dance from the 17th century to just before the Second World War, Len and Lucy will demonstrate how dance has always been about far more than just mastering the moves and feeling the rhythm. It’s about sex and seduction, power and politics, etiquette, economics, and of course, romance.
The series was commissioned by Mark Bell, Head of Commissioning for Arts and executive produced by Emma Hindley for Silver River and Greg Sanderson for the BBC.
Spider House
Amazingly, spiders have never been studied in a domestic environment. Now BBC Four and Windfall Films reveal the highs and lows of this secret spidery world by taking over a gothic family house and with the help of foremost arachnologist and breeding expert, Graham Smith, populating it with the top UK domestic spider species, each displaying amazing abilities and astonishing behaviours.
In Spider House, presenters Dr Alice Roberts and Dr Tim Cockerill take the viewer on a journey of domestic discovery as each different room of the house features extraordinary insight into spider life and behaviour inside our homes. Using glorious macro technology Tim and Alice capture every moment of spider life in the home – in unprecedented detail – showing your spidery housemates as you have never seen them before.
Alice Roberts enters the Spider House as a self-proclaimed arachnophobe, but by the end of the 90-minute programme, will she be converted into an admirer or become entangled in a web of loathing? And will Alice be able to overcome her fear and spend a night in the Spider House?
This innovative and astonishing film will shine a light on a secret world taking place all around you, and change the way you feel about spiders in your home forever.
Spider House was commissioned by Tom McDonald, Head of BBC Science and Natural History Commissioning. The executive producer for Windfall Films is David Dugan and for the BBC is Aidan Laverty.
Treasures Of The Indus
Art historian Sona Datta presents a three-part, landmark series exploring the treasures of the Indian subcontinent. From the plains of Pakistan to the foothills of the Himalaya, from northern India and Rajasthan to the deep south and Tamil Nadu, Sona will explore the people, places and dynasties that have shaped the modern Indian world.
Treasures Of The Indus (3x60') was commissioned by Mark Bell, Head of Arts Commissioning. It is directed by Hugh Thomson and Spike Geilinger and executive produced by Harry Bell for Tern TV and Greg Sanderson, Commissioning Editor for the BBC.
Storyville: Love In The 21st Century season
Three new films explore the funny, intimate and moving story of love in the 21st century:
Love Is All: 100 Years Of Love And Courtship (Director - Kim Longinotto)
From the very first kisses ever caught on film, through the birth of youth culture, gay liberation and free love, this is the celluloid story of love and courtship since the birth of the movie camera. Told with spellbinding footage from the British Film Institute archive, directed by the renowned Kim Longinotto and with a stunning Richard Hawley soundtrack.
The Love Hotel (Director - Phil Cox)
This film takes viewers inside a Japanese Love Hotel. While the Love Hotel culture is being threatened with closure from conservative politicians and corporate interests, the clients still visit to play out their fantasies. An intimate film about the Japanese psyche.
112 Weddings (Director - Doug Block)
112 Weddings is a funny, intimate and candid exploration of love and marital commitment over the long haul. As a part-time wedding videographer hired for his intimate documentary style, filmmaker Doug Block videotaped 112 weddings in total, and long wondered what became of these couples with whom he shared such an emotional experience. Is married life what they thought it would be?
Storyville is edited by Nick Fraser and the commissioning editor is Kate Townsend.
International drama
Cordon
A new 10x60' series from Belgium. Everyday life in the centre of Antwerp comes to a sudden standstill when the area is hermetically sealed off from the outside world. The cause is a contagious and deadly virus which spreads like wildfire.
The people trapped inside the cordon are suddenly left to their own devices. It brings out the very best in them, but also the worst…
Spiral 5
The fifth season of French thriller Spiral will take Laure Berthaud and her team into the world of organised crime where none will remain unscathed by the brutality of the investigation.
The Bridge 3
Award-winning Scandinavian drama series The Bridge, created and written by Hans Rosenfeldt, returns with another compelling case.
EDA
