Director Julian Farino on making the series

I always described Michael Apted’s original 7 Up series as the best thing that has ever been on British television. Begun in 1964, it provided an amazing insight, not just into Britain through the decades, but also into the journey of the lives of those who took part (and take part still: Michael’s films having now reached 56 Up).

When the BBC decided that they would like to start off a whole new series for the Millenium with a new set of characters whose lives would be followed every seven years and I was offered the chance to direct it, I was nervous but mostly beyond happy.

I recently met with Michael in Los Angeles, and I reminded him what he had told me before I began - that the project would become a far greater emotional journey and responsibility than I could imagine.

Now that we have completed our third instalment, 21 Up New Generation, I told him I understood what he had meant. I have known the characters in our films since they were six years old and have been trusted with portraying them on film in an honest and intimate way aged seven, 14 and now 21 – it’s a strangely intense bond. They have become friends as well as subjects of the films, and I feel we have shared their highs and lows – the separation of parents, the deaths of relatives, the triumphs of achievements.

Michael and I also spoke about the value of starting a whole new cycle of the series. Michael had just watched our newest films and said it was remarkable to him how different Britain was today to that of his generation – "so far ahead, emotionally, so sophisticated".

This, of course, is the beauty of the project. Through the personal, we are each time making a portrait of Britain today. I look back at our 7 Up film in 2000 and see the Spice Girls poster in Sanchez's bedroom, watch Sophie and Stacey dance to the band Steps, see young Jamie from Northern Ireland reflect on the differences between Catholics and Protestants…

In starting a new cycle, we had the advantage, unlike Michael, of knowing that we intended to carry on filming every seven years.

Melanie Archer, the series producer, and myself travelled for months all over the UK meeting thousands of six and seven year olds; we were able to choose a range of children diverse in social, geographic and ethnic background. It seems an age ago that we travelled numerous times across the Severn bridge, knowing that we wanted to include someone from Wales; now we just know Owen, our Cardiff lad who played cricket, rugby, golf at the age of seven and was a potential Olympic swimmer at the age of 14.

It’s been a joy and a privilege to chart the lives of the characters we chose, to watch them grow up in front of us.

Michael Apted put it most eloquently in that same conversation – "We are showing how life moves on in the most beautiful way - through the people who live it."

Julian Farino has directed extensively for the BBC and for HBO in America. He won a BAFTA for the Charles Dickens adaptation Our Mutual Friend and received several Emmy nominations for his work on Entourage, How To Make It In America and Newsroom. He recently completed the feature film The Oranges with Hugh Laurie, and Marvellous, a single drama for BBC Two with Toby Jones.