Broadchurch

BAFTA host a preview screening tonight of episode 1 of Broadchurch, the new eight-part drama series from ITV starring David Tennant and Olivia Colman. Tickets were swiftly snapped up for the free event which takes place at the Princess Anne Theatre, BAFTA in Piccadilly at 6.45pm. The screening will be followed by a Q&A with series writer, creator and executive producer Chris Chibnall, director James Strong and cast members Olivia Colman and Jodie Whittaker. David Tennant is not expected to attend.

About Broadchurch:
A new eight part ensemble drama series, Broadchurch will explore what happens to a small community when it suddenly becomes the focus of a major event and is subjected to the full glare of the media spotlight.
Bloodied and dirty, Danny Price has been found dead on an idyllic beach, surrounded by rocks and a jutting cliff-face from where he may have fallen. David Tennant takes the role of DI Alec Hardy; an out-of-town, newly promoted police detective who takes the job local girl DS Ellie Miller (Olivia Colman) believes should have been hers. Ellie has to find reserves of patience and toughness to negotiate a professional relationship with the difficult and unyielding Hardy. Yet as the drama progresses, Hardy’s own secrets are laid bare.
Cast members also include Vicky McClure, Arthur Darvil, Pauline Quirke, Andrew Buchan, Jodie Whittaker and Will Mellor.

Find out more about Broadchurch here

Broadchurch begins on ITV in March

ITV's new crime thriller Broadchurch begins on ITV on Monday 4th March at 9pm.

TV listings magazines have already published today that the series would begin in the week of 2nd - 8th March, and the actual start date and time has just been confirmed by some listings sites.


Everything matters, now. Who did what, who was where. Everything connects.

A new eight part ITV ensemble drama series, Broadchurch, led by David Tennant, Olivia Colman and Vicky McClure will explore what happens to a small community when it suddenly becomes the focus of a major event and is subjected to the full glare of the media spotlight.
Bloodied and dirty, Danny Price has been found dead on an idyllic beach, surrounded by rocks and a jutting cliff-face from where he may have fallen. Whilst his death remains unresolved, the picturesque coastal town of Broadchurch is at the heart of a major police investigation and a national media frenzy.The sadness of losing a child consumes Danny’s family, Beth and Mark Price (Jodie Whittaker and Andrew Buchan), their daughter 15 year old Lara and Beth’s mum, Liz as they attempt to cope with their grief. Understandably they struggle to cope with the unwarranted attention heaped upon them. Devastated by their loss, they struggle to relate to their friends, neighbours, the church, the press, and the police.

David Tennant takes the role of DI Alec Hardy; an out-of-town, newly promoted police detective who takes the job local girl DS Ellie Miller (Olivia Colman) believes should have been hers. Ellie has to find reserves of patience and toughness to negotiate a professional relationship with the difficult and unyielding Hardy. Yet as the drama progresses, Hardy’s own secrets are laid bare. Ellie is also emotionally involved with this case. Ellie’s son Tom was the dead boy’s best friend and she’s known Danny all his young life. How could she not be drawn in? But Hardy’s clinical methods force Ellie to see the community she grew up in through a different prism. One by one the community of Broadchurch are drawn into the police enquiry. Local hoteliers and business people are implicated as the effects of a death in the community begins to impact on their hard-earned livelihoods. But can the town survive such a seismic shock during its economically crucial summer months? As the case drags on, the whole town will come under pressure: personal, economic, professional and emotional.





For more information visit our Broadchurch pages

David Tennant has been interviewed by The Independent about his latest project, the eight part crime drama series Broadchurch which begins on ITV in March. David was interviewed on location in West Bay, Bridport back in September of last year where the coastal scenes were shot against the backdrop of the magnificent cliffs and beautiful seascapes. The drama follows the impact on a small seaside community of the suspicious death of a child and the aftermath as neighbours come under suspicion and the town falls under the scrutiniy of the police and media.

David explains:
"Clearly it is a murder mystery… a whodunit… but that is a key into a much more complex, richer story. It's also a story about the family that it's happened to, and the community that's reeling from the death of this child.
"I know the Chris is a big fan of The Killing," he adds, of writer Chris Chibnall, though the latter cites Murder One and Twin Peaks as major influences.

His character, DI Alec Hardy, is not the easiest person to get along with and his arrival and methods upsets his local colleage DS Ellie Miller, played by Olivia Colman. However, Hardy has his own secrets and has come to the small town of Broadchurch under something of a professional cloud
"I'm shoved out in the sticks to be forgotten about," says David. "And then what should happen but there's a high-profile murder case on my patch."

Chris Chibnall speaks very highly of David, with whom he has previously worked on United and before that Doctor Who. "David's a great leader of an ensemble cast," he says, "He's very, very versatile and he's fearless as well… he's not afraid to try stuff out. When you see the rushes every day you think, 'How has he done that?' Also, on a commercial level, people love him, and that's rare. There are actors you admire and there are actors you love and it's a big difference."

David however, is more modest, “You don't think particularly tactically as an actor," he says, "you just sort of bumble along. You'll be very lucky if there are two things you get to choose between – mostly as actor you're just going, 'What's my next job? Do I get to eat next month? I still feel I'm about to be found out." He believes that it is the quality of writing that is the makings of a successful performance, “So when a great script comes along you sort of bite the hand off really. It always starts with a script – you can spoil a good script but you can't make a bad script good. That initial reaction is very important because once you start investing in it you can't see it objectively again until it's finished."

Read the full interview here - David Tennant: From time traveller to crime unraveller


Broadchurch begins on ITV on Monday 4th March at 9pm

Find out more about Broadchurch here

Broadchurch writer Chris Chibnall, director James Strong, David Tennant, Olivia Colman and Jodie Whittaker all took part in a Q&A session at BAFTA's Princess Anne Theatre in Piccadilly earlier tonight. The session followed the preview screening of episode one the eight part series which premieres on ITV on the 4th March.

David Tennant, who is currently shooting The Escape Artist for the BBC in London and the south-east was a late addition to the chat, not confirmed by BAFTA until just before the event. The Q&A session was introduced by Vicky Frost of the Guardian.

Here are some of highlights of the session:

Speaking of the amazing landscape in the location that the drama is set in Chris Chibnall said "We wanted to make something where something terrible happens in a beautiful place".

Chris Chibnall said that David isn't always the only actor that he and James Strong ever consider, but he is the best!

David Tennant said that he'd been drawn to the project by the strength of the script and the chance to work with the two directors again. He also joked that he would have been "really angry" if John Simm had got his role!

The actors discussed the many emotional scenes that the drama threw up, with Jodie Whittaker saying that they tried to achieve the scene in as few as takes as possible and with only a little rehearsal. Some of the scenes were extremely difficult to film and they cried a lot.

Some of the cast and crew discussed their experiences of living in small communities

David Tennant and Chris Chibnall both denied any knowledge of plans surrounding the Doctor Who 50th Anniversary special

Olivia Colman joked with David Tennant that he wasn't in the first scenes of the drama as he was advertising Virgin Media. He replied, "And Greek yoghurt sells itself!"


Broadchurch is a skilfully written drama which engenders powerful and emotive performances from its cast. The seaside town of Broadchurch is small and close-knit, the sort of place where everyone knows each other. David Tennant plays DI Alex Hardy, a difficult and unlikeable big city police detective who is brought into the small community from Scotland following an unspecified event in his past in order to keep him out of sight. This tactic backfires when the community is thrust into the media spotlight following the death of a local boy. Olivia Colman plays his colleague DS Ellie Miller, a local woman who knows the family involved very well and has to deal with her own emotional response to the tragedy as well as cope with the abrupt and focused Hardy. Jodie Whittaker and Andrew Buchan also excel as the anxious and dread-filled and then grieving parents. Also worthy of mention are the young actors who deal admirably with difficult scenes and subjects. The drama is beautifully shot with the coast of Dorset playing a major part and the beautiful, sensitive scenes are enhanced by the haunting score by Olafur Arnalds.

There are eight parts to Broadchurch. If the remaining episodes are as accomplished as the opener then there is no doubt that it is going to hold its audience gripped and guessing over the entire two month run. And it is likely to be an emotional rollercoaster from start to finish.

The cast of Broadchurch also includes Arthur Darvill as the town priest, struggling to keep the community working together, Pauline Quirke as scruffy local woman Susan, Vicky McClure as a national newspaper reporter and Will Mellor as telephone engineer Steve, with David Bradley, Peter de Jersey and Joe Sims also appearing.

Watch episode 1 of Broadchurch on ITV on Monday 4th March from 9.00pm

Broadchurch actress Olivia Colman will be a guest on Graham Norton's BBC Radio 2 show on Saturday 23rd February form 10am to chat about the drama.
You can listen online worldwide at www.bbc.co.uk/radio2

Broadchurch starts on ITV1 on 4th March at 9pm.
Visit our Broadchurch section here.

The ITV Press Centre have released more details about the first episode of Broadchurch. David Tennant and Olivia Colman star as two detectives attempting to solve a murder in a small seaside community in this gripping and moving eight part series. Arthur Darvill, Jodie Whittaker, Andrew Buchan and Vicky McClure also appear in the series which begins on the 4th March.

Broadchurch
Monday 4th March, 9pm, ITV, ITV HD

David Tennant and Olivia Colman star as detectives in this eight-part crime thriller written by Chris Chibnall and directed by James Strong.

On a morning in July, the Dorset town of Broadchurch is bracing itself for the annual influx of holidaymakers. But 11-year-old local boy Danny Latimer has gone missing. As his mother Beth (Jodie Whittaker) starts to search frantically for him, local CID officer DS Ellie Miller (Colman) returns to work after a family holiday. But she is shocked to discover that the promotion she thought was hers has gone to DI Alec Hardy (Tennant), whom she has never met before, an outsider to the town with a reputation for failure. Then the call comes through – Danny’s body has been found on the beach. Preliminary findings suggest that Danny’s death is suspicious, so Miller and Hardy must break the terrible news to Beth, her husband Mark (Andrew Buchan), and Danny’s sister Chloe (Charlotte Beaumont). Hardy believes that Danny must have been abducted and swears to the family he will find whoever is responsible for Danny’s death. As the investigation gets under way, can the friendly and engaging Miller and the rude and abrupt Hardy put aside their differences to work as a team to find out the truth about Danny’s fate?

Read more about Broadchurch here

Source: ITV Press Centre programme information

David Tennant talks to the Times about his new series Broadchurch and outlines his perfect weekend in an interview with the Times today


David Tennant talks about Broadchurch

The tenth Dr Who also has something to say about nappies, boxed sets and why he’s really still a geek at heart

“Look at this!” says David Tennant ecstatically, waving a slice of chocolate cake at me and insisting I have some too. “You don’t get this at the BBC!”

It’s quite a shock to find him so transformed. I have just been watching him playing granite-featured Detective Inspector Alec Hardy — a man who can gaze at the corpse of a child without a flicker of emotion.
Tennant, in person a much cheerier soul, takes the lead inBroadchurch, ITV’s answer to The Killing. The drama series follows the disintegration of a close-knit seaside community after the mysterious death of a little boy.

Much of the tension stems from the friction between Tennant’s enigmatic character and DS Ellie Miller, played brilliantly by Olivia Colman, a dissolving marshmallow of pity as she attempts to cope with the murder of her young son’s best friend. Needless to say, the ill-matched colleagues don’t hit it off. But in real life, Colman says, Tennant is “the nicest man in the world”.

“I’m very glad she says that,” says Tennant, blushing, when I relay this to him. “Of course I’m not.” Well, perhaps there are a couple of even nicer chaps out there, but it is remarkable that, even though he inhabits the frequently bitchy world of showbiz, there seems to be no one who has a bad word to say about him.
Despite his fame, he remains polite, chatty and self-deprecating. “I was well brought-up,” he explains with a laugh. He’s also universally hailed as a great actor, having carried off roles as diverse as Casanova, Hamlet, Benedick, Barty Crouch Jr in Harry Potter, and, er, harassed teacher Mr Peterson in Nativity 2 (yes, I’ve got small children).

So it seems a bit of a shame that there is now only one role with which he will forever be associated — although he clearly doesn’t mind that enough to stop looking and dressing like the tenth Dr Who. Today, for instance, in a meeting room at ITV, he is wearing a stripy T-shirt, clingy tweed trousers, highly-polished tan brogues and spotty Paul Smith socks on his bony ankles. His brown hair is sticking out in all directions, his eyes boggle and he twitches with nervous energy. Frankly, he could have stepped straight out of his Tardis. It’s just that he speaks in a Scottish accent rather than an Estuary one.

It was as a little boy, watching Peter Davison playing the Time Lord, that Tennant famously realised he wanted to do the same. After he landed the part in 2005, he was quoted as saying he’d be the Doctor forever. Five years later, he left. “Suddenly to be in a world where it feels like everyone is staring at you takes a bit of getting used to. You have to keep questioning whether it’s worth it. It’s not a bad thing — it’s a huge privilege — but it also feels like a bit of a responsibility.”

Besides, he owed it to his childhood ambitions, he says, not to lose his enthusiasm for the role. “I thought I should go out while I’d still miss it, rather than stay on until the thought of squeezing myself into a tight suit and running around and shouting and saving the world felt like a bit of a drag. I wanted it to be a special thing I had this wonderful treat of being asked to do.”

He’s kept some of Dr Who’s suits and, of course, his Sonic Screwdriver. “It doesn’t do nearly as much as the toy ones you can buy. They make their own noise. Mine just lights up and slides up and down.”

Tennant still watches the show and raves about Matt Smith’s “mercurial madness”. But he is clearly glad to have moved on. The day after we meet, he is due to start filming The Escape Artist, a legal thriller for the BBC. Then, in August, he takes on Richard II in the RSC’s new production, a role he has always longed to play. “He’s an incredible character who’s a total t*** in some ways, but you end up feeling very sympathetic towards him,” he explains.

Theatre, he says, is his “proper job” and filming is a sabbatical — but he finds theatre terrifying, “to the point where, every time I do a play, I say to myself, at the five minute call when there’s no going back: ‘Never do this again. This is stupid! Stupid, stupid, stupid! It would be better to work in a shop. This is horrible!’

“I think every actor that goes on stage is a lot closer to never being able to do it again than you might imagine,” he concludes. His stage fright tends to wear off after the first few performances, “but you still have some nights when your brain is telling you you’re about to forget the next bit”.

He relaxes before going on stage by playing music and, somewhat less appealingly, by farting. “It’s a breathing thing,” he explains. “If you do lots of breathing exercises, you’re pushing down with your diaphragm. It does feel like a release, I find, a good old fart before you do anything.”

Otherwise, he eschews the good-luck rituals beloved of many of his thespian comrades. “I’m rampantly anti-superstitious,” he says. “If I find myself developing them, I’ll run from them.” I suspect this is down to his upbringing: his father, Sandy McDonald, was a Church of Scotland minister, and David grew up with his brother and sister in a manse in Paisley.

He was a swotty child. “I still am a geek,” he says defiantly. “I don’t think there’s anything wrong with it. I see no shame in having an unhealthy obsession with something. As a kid, it was Dr Who and superheroes, then I became a record nerd.” He scoured the Paisley charity shops looking for bolero jackets and paisley shirts so he could emulate his idol, Jim Kerr of Simple Minds.

“I did get punched in the face once for being a weirdo,” he admits.

At 17, he joined the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama. As there was already a David McDonald in Equity, he chose a stage name in homage to Neil Tennant of the Pet Shop Boys. Didn’t the girls spot his heart-throb potential? “God no. Never. Not at all. I had my first kiss around the age of ten, but then there was a long drought. As soon as adolescence arrived, I was frozen. I’ve never felt that was a side of life I was particularly accomplished at,” he says.

This is rather odd, given that he has the reputation of cutting a swath through his leading ladies. He dated Sophia Myles for several years after they appeared together on Dr Who. Now Tennant is married to Georgia Moffett — who is the daughter of the ex-Time Lord Peter Davison, and who, to compound the weirdness, he met when she played his cloned daughter in a Dr Who storyline in 2008.

The couple celebrated their marriage on New Year’s Eve, 2011, at the Globe Theatre in a glamorous knees-up attended by Stephen Fry, Derren Brown, Sir Patrick Stewart and Gordon Brown. Tennant has adopted his wife’s 11-year-old son, Ty, who is from a previous relationship, and they have a daughter, Olive, who is nearly two. Now Moffett is pregnant with another baby. Tennant is reluctant to discuss this, but says he’s looking forward to its arrival. Does he change nappies? “Oh stop it,” he says. “Of course I change nappies.”

The family live in West London and, when he’s not working, Tennant enjoys hanging out at home. “I’ve got three boxed sets on the go at the moment, which is bad practice because they drift,” he confesses. “I’m two thirds of the way through Damages, season three, and I’m also watching the American Office, season four. And I’ve got Game of Thrones. I watched the first series of The Killing, which I enjoyed, though it probably didn’t need to be 20 episodes long. I wish I had the time to read more books.”

He also enjoys cooking. “Jamie’s quite hard to beat because it’s all very clear. I like to keep trying new recipes. At Christmas I got very interested in an oxtail recipe and spent a long time refining it, using a finer cut of beef but cooking it with oxtail for the sauce.” Otherwise, he doesn’t really have any hobbies, he says. “I’d like to garden, but I don’t. My dad is great at it, so if he’s down he does a lot of strolling up and down telling me what to plant and tying up the tomatoes. I rely on his visits.

“I get less sociable as I get older,” he says, “and more inclined to go into my bunker. It’s lovely to have people round but not leave the womb. It’s too much hassle.”

Sounds like a Tardis might come in handy after all.

David Tennant’s perfect weekend

Theatre trip or crash in front of the TV? Theatre trip

Slippers or loafers? Slippers

City or country? City

Bowie or Beethoven? Both

Michelin-starred food or local pub? Michelin-starred food

Personal trainer or Pilates? Personal trainer

Ski or sun? Sun

Novel or autobiography? Autobiography

Soya skinny latté or builders? Black coffee

E-mail or snail mail? E-mail

I can’t get through the weekend without... Sleep


Times subscribers can read the interview here

Acorn Media have given details of the DVD extras that will be included in the release on disc of the new crime drama series Broadchurch. The DVD will be released on Monday 27th May.



DVD Extras:

Broadchurch: Behind the Scenes
Cast Filmographies
Picture Gallery
Subtitles


Broadchurch is an eight part crime drama series written by Chris Chibnall and directed by James Strong and Euros Lyn. David Tennant and Olivia Colman star as a pair of police detectives trying to unravel the mystery behind the death of a boy in a tiny and picturesque seaside town.

Series description

A hot morning in July and the Dorset town of Broadchurch, is bracing itself for the tourist season, when Danny Latimer, an 11 year old schoolboy, goes missing.

His mother, Beth, frantically starts to search for him while her best friend, Ellie Miller, a local police officer, arrives at work to discover that the promotion she thought was hers has gone to D.I Alec Hardy an outsider with a reputation for failure.

When Danny’s body is found beneath the picturesque cliffs that dominate the town opposites collide. Both Miller and Hardy are determined to solve the mystery of Danny's murder, Ellie perhaps too sensitive to the people in her community; Alec as efficient as he is blunt. When news of the crime spreads through the town, a chain reaction begins which will put Broadchurch under a national spotlight, pulling the town, its residents and its secrets, apart.

Read more here


Broadchurch begins on ITV on Monday 4th March at 9pm.

You can pre-order your copy of the DVD here

Olivia Colman appeared on the Graham Norton Show on BBC Radio 2 this morning to chat about the new ITV drama Broadchurch.

Olivia repeated writer Chris Chibnall's description of the drama and said that it was going to be the sort of story that you hear every now and again that breaks everyone's hearts. Broadchurch is set in a small community where everyone knows everybody else and her character is in the difficult position of knowing the victim very well. “She wanted to be in the police force to serve her community and then this awful thing happens – then you suddenly wish you didn't have this job,” she said.

She found the experience of filming traumatic scenes very cathartic and offset the cast were able to have a giggle as they had cried all their tears during filming.

Olivia talked about the starry cast (“It’s a bit much…You could do a drinking game, everytime you see a famous face”), and described David Tennant as the nicest man in the world, and she and host Graham mused on David’s ability to be likeable even when he is playing unlikeable. “He’s playing a recalcitrant, slightly socially awkward guy, with a past, but you sort of love him”. They also all wanted to get straight back into doing something lighter straight afterwards “While we were filming, Jodie and I and Andrew and David and I were all crying and saying ‘I want to do a musical!’” she joked, “But it is lovely to always try and do something different, that’s the ideal”.

She also revealed her on set injury when Jodie Whittaker managed to dislocate her knee during a struggle on the beach in early scenes. She said it was painful, but “luckily popped out and popped straight back in again”.

Broadchurch stars Olivia Colman and David Tennant as two police officers attemting to find the killer of a yound boy in a small seaside community. Andrew Buchan, Jodie Whittaker, Pauline Quirke and Arthur Darvill also star. The eight part series begins on ITV at 9pm on Monday 4th March.

Listen to Olivia chatting to Graham via BBC iPlayer. The interview, which should play worldwide, begins at 1hour 34 minutes and is available to hear again until Saturday 2nd March.

With the premiere of the new eight part series Broadchurch on ITV just over a week away, here's a chance for you to get to know some of the principal characters we'll be meeting over the next couple of months.



DI Alec Hardy
DI Alec Hardy is a newly promoted police detective who has moved from a large force in Glasgow to the small town of Broadchurch. His move has been under an unspecified professional cloud and he has been transferred to the tiny community to keep him out of the public eye. However, when he is called upon to investigate the death of eleven year old Danny Latimer he is cast back into the media spotlight and it is only a matter of time before his own secrets are laid bare.

Hardy is a difficult individual to work alongside, with clinical methods and extremely high standards that he expects others to meet. He is very much a big city cop, with plenty of experience in murder cases. However, he is unsociable, abrasive and unyielding, lacking the people skills that allow him to understand the needs and feelings of others. He finds it hard to work in the small community and has a low opinion of small, local forces.

Hardy is very different to his local colleague Ellie Miller, both professionally and personally: he is all for his work, with no life outside it, while she is sociable and well-liked. This adds to the initial animosity between them early on in their working partnership. Hardy has also been promoted into the position that Miller assumed was hers.

Played by David Tennant




DS Ellie Miller
Ellie is a local girl, brought up in Broadchurch, and has a deep loyalty to the town. She has a family of her own and feels very much in the heart of a close-knit community where everybody knows everybody else. She has a close connection to the family of the dead boy: her own son Tom was Danny Latimer’s best friend, so she is personally and emotionally involved.

Ellie joined the police to serve her community and has worked her way up. She believed that it would be natural for her to step into the Detective Inspector role, so finds it extremely galling to have to accept the arrival of Alec Hardy who takes the job that she thought was to have been hers and having to take the lead from Hardy only adds to the bitterness that she feels towards him. She finds his methods difficult and ill-suited to the way that she and her colleagues have been used to working so their relationship is strained to say the least.

Ellie is a trusting person who is asked to examine the town that is her home and the people who live there with deep scrutiny by the intense and focused DI Hardy, forcing her to gain a fresh perspective on the community which she loves and to see her friends and neighbours as potential suspects.

Played by Olivia Colman
Also seen in:
TV Peep Show, Twenty Twelve, Rev, Green Wing, The Accused, Doctor Who
Film I Give It A Year, The Iron Lady, Hot Fuzz, Tyrannosaur



Reverend Paul Coates
Paul Coates is a young priest in his first parish and it is one that should, by rights, be peaceful and trouble free. He has made great efforts to be embraced by the Broadchurch community, even teaching IT at the local school and playing 5-a-side football in addition to his church duties. Even the older residents of the town have accepted him and he is seen as something as a figurehead. He tries his best to offer support in the wake of the tragedy.

Paul is completely dedicated to the church and his role; however he too has secrets from his past and he is among those who becomes affected by the fallout from the murder.

Played by Arthur Darvill
Also seen in:
TV Doctor Who, The Paradise, Little Dorritt
Film Sex & Drugs & Rock & Roll



Charlotte Beaumont, Jodie Whittaker, Andrew Buchan, Susan Brown & Oskar McNamara

Mark Latimer
Mark is husband to Beth and father to Chloe and to the deceased boy, Danny. He and Beth married young and their relationship is not what he was: they are distant and barely communicate. Mark himself is quite angry, but the grief of losing his son utterly consumes him. At the same time he has to be the rock for the rest of the family

Played by Andrew Buchan
Also seen in:
TV Garrow’s Law, The Nativity, Cranford, Party Animals

Beth Latimer
Beth is the mother to Danny Latimer and also to Chloe, and wife to Mark. Beth is broken by the discovery of her son’s body following her frantic search for him. She is devastated by her loss and finds it difficult to relate to people and events around her. Much of the backbone of the drama is the focus on the journey of Beth and Mark and their family following the tragedy.

Played by Jodie Whittaker
Also seen in:
TV Black Mirror, Marchlands, Cranford
Film Attack The Block, St. Trinian’s, St. Trinian’s 2: The Legend Of Fritton’s Gold



Carolyn Pickles, Jonathan Bailey & Vicky McClure

Karen White
Karen is another outsider, a national journalist for The Herald who arrives in Broadchurch in the wake of the tragedy in search of a story. She is dedicated to her job and has a ruthless side when necessary to get her story out, but she is sensitive when dealing with the families affected by Danny’s death.

It also seems that Karen has a particular interest in DI Hardy and may understand the reason behind his move to Broadchurch.

Played by Vicky McClure
Also seen in:
TV Line Of Duty, True Love, This Is England ’88, This Is England ‘86
Film This Is England, A Room For Romeo Brass

Olly Stevens
The junior reporter for the Broadchurch Echo. He is young and over-enthusiastic and desperate for his first scoop.

Played by Jonathan Bailey
Also seen in:
TV Leonardo, Me And Mrs. Jones, Campus

Maggie Radcliffe
The editor of the Broadchurch Echo who finds herself with a huge national story right on her doorstep

Played by Carolyn Pickles
Also seen in:
TV Doctors, Land Girls
Film Harry Potter And The Deathly Hallows: Part 1




Feb
24
Meet The Characters Of Broadchurch



With the premiere of the new eight part series Broadchurch on ITV just over a week away, here's a chance for you to get to know some of the principal characters we'll be meeting over the next couple of months.



DI Alec Hardy
DI Alec Hardy is a newly promoted police detective who has moved from a large force in Glasgow to the small town of Broadchurch. His move has been under an unspecified professional cloud and he has been transferred to the tiny community to keep him out of the public eye. However, when he is called upon to investigate the death of eleven year old Danny Latimer he is cast back into the media spotlight and it is only a matter of time before his own secrets are laid bare.

Hardy is a difficult individual to work alongside, with clinical methods and extremely high standards that he expects others to meet. He is very much a big city cop, with plenty of experience in murder cases. However, he is unsociable, abrasive and unyielding, lacking the people skills that allow him to understand the needs and feelings of others. He finds it hard to work in the small community and has a low opinion of small, local forces.

Hardy is very different to his local colleague Ellie Miller, both professionally and personally: he is all for his work, with no life outside it, while she is sociable and well-liked. This adds to the initial animosity between them early on in their working partnership. Hardy has also been promoted into the position that Miller assumed was hers.

Played by David Tennant





Adam Wilson, Matthew Gravelle and Olivia Colman

DS Ellie Miller
Ellie is a local girl, brought up in Broadchurch, and has a deep loyalty to the town. She has a family of her own and feels very much in the heart of a close-knit community where everybody knows everybody else. She has a close connection to the family of the dead boy: her own son Tom was Danny Latimer’s best friend, so she is personally and emotionally involved.

Ellie joined the police to serve her community and has worked her way up. She believed that it would be natural for her to step into the Detective Inspector role, so finds it extremely galling to have to accept the arrival of Alec Hardy who takes the job that she thought was to have been hers and having to take the lead from Hardy only adds to the bitterness that she feels towards him. She finds his methods difficult and ill-suited to the way that she and her colleagues have been used to working so their relationship is strained to say the least.

Ellie is a trusting person who is asked to examine the town that is her home and the people who live there with deep scrutiny by the intense and focused DI Hardy, forcing her to gain a fresh perspective on the community which she loves and to see her friends and neighbours as potential suspects.

Played by Olivia Colman
Also seen in:
TV Peep Show, Twenty Twelve, Rev, Green Wing, The Accused, Doctor Who
Film I Give It A Year, The Iron Lady, Hot Fuzz, Tyrannosaur




Arthur Darvill

Reverend Paul Coates
Paul Coates is a young priest in his first parish and it is one that should, by rights, be peaceful and trouble free. He has made great efforts to be embraced by the Broadchurch community, even teaching IT at the local school and playing 5-a-side football in addition to his church duties. Even the older residents of the town have accepted him and he is seen as something as a figurehead. He tries his best to offer support in the wake of the tragedy.

Paul is completely dedicated to the church and his role; however he too has secrets from his past and he is among those who becomes affected by the fallout from the murder.

Played by Arthur Darvill
Also seen in:
TV Doctor Who, The Paradise, Little Dorritt
Film Sex & Drugs & Rock & Roll




Charlotte Beaumont, Jodie Whittaker, Andrew Buchan, Susan Brown & Oskar McNamara

Mark Latimer
Mark is husband to Beth and father to Chloe and to the deceased boy, Danny. He and Beth married young and their relationship is not what he was: they are distant and barely communicate. Mark himself is quite angry, but the grief of losing his son utterly consumes him. At the same time he has to be the rock for the rest of the family

Played by Andrew Buchan
Also seen in:
TV Garrow’s Law, The Nativity, Cranford, Party Animals

Beth Latimer
Beth is the mother to Danny Latimer and also to Chloe, and wife to Mark. Beth is broken by the discovery of her son’s body following her frantic search for him. She is devastated by her loss and finds it difficult to relate to people and events around her. Much of the backbone of the drama is the focus on the journey of Beth and Mark and their family following the tragedy.

Played by Jodie Whittaker
Also seen in:
TV Black Mirror, Marchlands, Cranford
Film Attack The Block, St. Trinian’s, St. Trinian’s 2: The Legend Of Fritton’s Gold




Carolyn Pickles, Jonathan Bailey & Vicky McClure

Karen White
Karen is another outsider, a national journalist for The Herald who arrives in Broadchurch in the wake of the tragedy in search of a story. She is dedicated to her job and has a ruthless side when necessary to get her story out, but she is sensitive when dealing with the families affected by Danny’s death.

It also seems that Karen has a particular interest in DI Hardy and may understand the reason behind his move to Broadchurch.

Played by Vicky McClure
Also seen in:
TV Line Of Duty, True Love, This Is England ’88, This Is England ‘86
Film This Is England, A Room For Romeo Brass

Olly Stevens
The junior reporter for the Broadchurch Echo. He is young and over-enthusiastic and desperate for his first scoop.

Played by Jonathan Bailey
Also seen in:
TV Leonardo, Me And Mrs. Jones, Campus

Maggie Radcliffe
The editor of the Broadchurch Echo who finds herself with a huge national story right on her doorstep

Played by Carolyn Pickles
Also seen in:
TV Doctors, Land Girls
Film Harry Potter And The Deathly Hallows: Part 1




Joe Sims, Will Mellor, David Bradley, Simone McAullay & Pauline Quirke


Susan Wright
Susan is a mysterious and scruffy woman who lives alone save for her devoted Labrador dog (played by Pauline’s own dog Bailey) in a caravan park. She is a suspicious and dark character who lurks on the outskirts of the community, always watching and listening. She seems without emotion, save the affection she bestows upon her dog, but she does seem to have something of her own to hide.

Played by Pauline Quirke
Also seen in
TV Emmerdale, Missing, Cold Blood, Birds Of A Feather

Steve Connelly
Telephone engineer Steve finds himself the focus of attention when he admits that he has a special connection to the case

Played by Will Mellor
Also seen in:
TV In With The Flynns, White Van Man, Two Pints Of Lager And A Packet Of Crisps

Jack Marshall
Jack owns and runs the local newsagents, JGM News.

Played by David Bradley
Also seen in:
TV Doctor Who, Mount Pleasant, Blackpool
Film Hot Fuzz, The Harry Potter movies

Becca Fisher
The hotelier is one of the local business people who become implicated when the effects of the murder in the community start to have an effect on their livelihoods.

Played by Simone McAullay
Also seen in:
TV The Strip, Home And Away

Nige Carter
Nige is a plumber by trade and the workmate and friend of Mark Latimer. He supports Mark through the tragedy.

Played by Joe Sims
Also seen in:
TV The Colour Of Magic, Casualty


Cast
DI Alec Hardy - David Tennant
DS Ellie Miller - Olivia Colman
Mark Latimer - Andrew Buchan
Beth Latimer - Jodie Whittaker
Karen White - Vicky McClure
Rev Paul Coates - Arthur Darvill
Susan Wright - Pauline Quirke
Steve Connelly - Will Mellor
Maggie Radcliffe - Carolyn Pickles
Joe Miller - Matthew Gravelle
Becca Fisher - Simone McAullay
Olly Stevens - Jonathan Bailey
Danny Latimer - Oskar McNamara
Chloe Latimer - Charlotte Beaumont
Liz Roper - Susan Brown
Tom Miller - Adam Wilson
Nige Carter - Joe Sims
Jack Marshall - David Bradley
Dean Thomas - Jacob Anderson


Broadchurch begins on Monday 4th March at 9pm on ITV.

Find out more about the series here

David Tennant and Olivia Colman are featured on the cover of the current issue of Dorset magazine.
You can purchase the magazine online via their official website www.dorset.greatbritishlife.co.uk
Click here to buy online for £2.75

Thanks to the Broadchurch Facebook fanpage

David Tennant and Olivia Colman are interviewed today in the Radio Times about their starring roles in the new ITV crime drama Broadchurch.

Read what they have to say here here:











Broadchurch begins on ITV on Monday 4th March. Find out all about the drama here

The 2nd - 8th March issue of the Radio Times is on sale in the UK from today.

David Tennant bounds into a serviceably plush meeting room at ITV, a ball of bonhomie and enthusiasm, engaging and engaged: all the attributes that make him such a crowdpleaser. He’s 41 now, but his boyish ebullience, carefully dishevelled hair and tweed trousers (okay, maybe not those) mean he could easily pass for ten years younger. ‘The notion of having to be attractive and manly is something I find very difficult to come to terms with,’ he says, wriggling uncomfortably in those tweed trousers, but it’s hard to imagine any previous occupant of the Tardis pulling off wearing Converse.

This is a big year for Tennant, as he bids to step out from the long shadow cast by ‘Doctor Who’ once and for all. He already has an electrifying run of Shakespearean leads behind him, most notably 2008’s lauded ‘Hamlet’. His fourth in a row will open in October. ‘I’m working my way through my student wishlist,’ he says of playing the king in ‘Richard II’ at the RSC (where he also sits on the board), before the production transfers to the Barbican in December.

His latest television project is ‘Broadchurch’, in which he plays a policeman – only his second, no mean feat in the crime-ridden world of TV drama. A claustrophobic, tightly scripted eight-part series from occasional ‘Doctor Who’ contributor Chris Chibnall, it examines the ripple effects of a child murder on a coastal community. But while his high-calibre co-stars, including Olivia Colman, Jodie Whittaker and Andrew Buchan attempt West Country accents with mixed results, Tennant dodges that bullet. ‘As long as my character came from a big city, it didn’t matter which,’ he chortles with delight. ‘And what do you know? It turned out to be Glasgow!’

Tennant grew up just outside the city in Paisley, the son of a Church of Scotland minister. ‘Being a minister is sort of like acting,’ he has said, but from the age of three it was young David who was telling everyone he wanted to be an actor. ‘I’ve always been fairly single-minded about it,’ he laughs now at his precocity. ‘I don’t know what else I would have done. I remember watching “Grange Hill” and thinking: How do they all get to be in things and I’m in Paisley, doing my O-Levels?’

‘I went to a Saturday-morning drama club that I got two auditions out of, neither of which worked out, which was kind of infuriating. But I’m glad I didn’t spend my childhood doing that – I look back on some of my early stuff and it’s quite arse-clenching.’ Now, arse at ease, he’s thoughtful about the craft of acting, but absolutely firm on the practicalities. ‘It’s a lovely life when it works. The trouble is there’s no structure, or justice, or logic to it. You shouldn’t encourage anyone into it. But I really don’t hand out advice about acting, because who the fuck knows?’

Well, he does. He really does. Having carved out a growing reputation on stage and on the small screen, his arrival in ‘Doctor Who’ turned an unexpectedly impressive revival into a globe-straddling phenomenon. It was a career-defining role, one which he seized with the enthusiasm of a lifelong fan and the skill of an under-appreciated talent now given its head. It turned him from an actor into a star – so it would be odd if he was excluded from this year’s fiftieth anniversary celebrations, even if he’s ‘beginning to give up hope that anything’s going to happen’.

‘You can’t ever shrug it off,’ Tennant says of the role he coveted since childhood. ‘Sometimes it’s a really lovely thing – even people who don’t watch the show love the idea of it. But you can’t switch it off when you’re buying a coffee and want to get home quickly, and five kids want a photograph taken.’ He looks sheepish, and hurriedly adds, ‘That makes it sound like a trial, and it’s not, but you can’t choose it. It’s part of the deal and it changes the practicalities of your life.’

Such hassles didn’t necessarily stop when he put down the sonic screwdriver in 2010. ‘Twitter! It’s like being stalked by committee!’ he shouts. ‘Come and say hello if you want, but not for the sake of twittering about it.’ It’s a reminder that Tennant guards his privacy carefully. A master of deflection, his stonewalling over his personal life is all the more impressive for being carried out with a smile.
'I’m as happy doing “Postman Pat” as I am doing “Hamlet”'

‘This is where I try not to answer the question you’ve asked, isn’t it?’ he says, puffing out his cheeks and tapping the sofa nervously as we circle the subject. He’s now married to Georgia Moffett, the daughter of fifth Doctor Peter Davison (yes, really), who is expecting their second child. And that’s more or less all we know.

Typically, he characterises his caution as a matter of courtesy: ‘You’ve got to be consistent for your own sanity. It’s a bit unfair to be doing one interview talking about it and then clam up in others. People want to know, and I understand the impulse, but when I realised how interested people were, it made me feel a bit queasy about giving it away.’

He’s quite happy to acknowledge that no such planning or strategy goes into his career. ‘If a nice script comes along and I don’t want someone else to do it,’ he says, ‘then that feels like the reason to do something.’ Professional jealousy? He laughs guiltily. More a series of accidents, then – and largely happy ones, at that. There has been the very occasional misstep: he tentatively refers to a stint hosting C4’s patchy panel show ‘Comedy World Cup’ as ‘an excursion into another world to see what it felt like’.

This urge to test his genuine versatility is understandable. But the enduring mystery is how a man with such a heavyweight CV in theatre, radio and television has never quite made his mark on the big screen. When I suggest that his cinema work has been lighter than the rest, he looks thoughtful. ‘I suppose that’s broadly true, isn’t it?’ he says. ‘But then I think a lot of film is. The gritty indie films are a lot rarer than the films that aspire to fill multiplexes.’

And if films like ‘Nativity 2’, ‘St Trinian’s 2’ and ‘Fright Night’ haven’t exactly filled multiplexes or wowed critics, he seems genuinely unflustered. Nor should his upcoming voiceover work in ‘Postman Pat: The Movie’ unduly trouble awards panels. ‘I just hanker for things that are good,’ he grins. ‘I’m as happy doing “Postman Pat” as I am doing “Hamlet”.’ Really? ‘They both have challenges and they both have delights. You’re just trying to do your best for the audience.’

Not that he isn’t up for a struggle. There’s a sudden flash of steel when talk turns to the government’s cuts to the arts. ‘It’s miserable, isn’t it? I don’t understand any of the policies any more, other than this sense that although it may not be working, we said we were going to do this, so we’re going to keep doing it so we don’t look stupid. Well, I’d rather you looked a little bit stupid than we all go down the toilet together.’

His anger is startling, but stems from an innate generosity of spirit – that others might be denied opportunities he had as a young stage actor. Opportunities that eventually led him to ‘Richard II’. He’s excited by the play, though taken aback by comments made by director Gregory Doran (who also directed ‘Hamlet’) suggesting the role’s volatility and fragility might be ‘alien to David’s character’. ‘I wouldn’t have thought that’s true at all,’ he muses, his voice rising an octave. ‘But that’s obviously how he perceives me. Either that or he was trying to come up with a soundbite. In “Hamlet” I spent a lot of time terrified to my bones, but maybe I’m quite good at hiding it.’

Perhaps his apparent self-assurance is what made him such a good Doctor Who. However eccentric his career choices might appear, he’s happy with them. If people enjoy his projects, even better. If they don’t, that’s okay too. David Tennant is unusual indeed: an actor as happy in his own skin as he is in anyone else’s.

‘Broadchurch’ begins on ITV at 9pm, Mon Mar 4.

Jodie Whittaker, who plays bereaved mother Beth Latimer in Broadchurch has spoken to TV Choice magazine about her role in the drama.
Jodie Whittaker - Broadchurch
Interview by Jon Peake

When a child dies, the finger of suspicion points at the residents of a small coastal town in ITV's new drama Broadchurch. Jodie Whittaker plays Beth Latimer, the mother of murdered boy Danny in the series that also co-stars Andrew Buchan, Olivia Colman, David Tennant, Pauline Quirke, Arthur Darvill and Vicky McClure…

What is the relationship like between Beth and her husband Mark (Andrew Buchan)?

Not good. They’ve been together for 15 years, she got pregnant at 15, and as any childhood sweethearts might be, it’s a very normal stage to be at when you’ve been with someone for half your life. Of course the pressure following a child bereavement is immense, nothing compares to it. So any marriage would be severely tested.

No one really trusts each other in the town and anyone could be a suspect — even the parents?

In this case — and in fact in any child murder investigation — the family always comes under suspicion first. The police have to start in the home as there’s quite a high likelihood that the person who died knew their killer.

Did you do any research into the subject matter?

There’s no problem tracking similar cases down as the internet is full of them. You read about these things and never expect them to happen to you. Beth and Mark wonder why it’s happened to them. When you’re reading this stuff you realise that none of these families ever expected such a thing, that they would be part of this kind of story, people would know their names and they’d end up on the front of national newspapers. Now, you’d never say I’m going to Soham without people immediately knowing where Soham is and what happened there. Be grateful you’ve never had to think about this kind of thing in your own life. As an actor you’ve really got to commit to this role — you can’t just phone it in — as it’s happened to real people and you have to do it justice.

Broadchurch begins on ITV on Monday 4th March at 9pm. Find out more here
Source:TV Choice

Series one, episode one
A heavyweight cast steps up for the second missing-child drama of the week, with David Tennant and Olivia Colman the ill-matched investigators charged with finding the killer of a young boy in a seaside town. Jodie Whittaker and Andrew Buchan are superb as the bewildered, grieving parents, and expect Vicky McClure’s nosey Fleet Street hack and Arthur Darvill’s footballing vicar to play bigger roles as the eight-part drama unwinds over the coming weeks.

Ostensibly a more traditional police procedural than its BBC counterpart ‘Mayday’, ‘Broadchurch’ scores strongly on the emotional realities of grief: the cracks in Whittaker and Buchan’s relationship are already opening up, while Colman’s local copper struggles to keep a professional distance. Chris Chibnall’s script is compact and reasonably plausible, but the production works a little too hard to build up the atmosphere (easy on the slowmo, guys). There’s really no need, with a cast of this calibre and a locale with such personality.

Arthur Darvill has spoken to Digital Spy about his role as local vicar Paul Coates in the new eight part ITV drama series Broadchurch. He said of being offered the role by writer Chris Chibnall,
"Chris came up to me on the set of Doctor Who and said, 'I've written you a part in my new TV show - would you like to do it?' - so that was an amazing honour. I think Chris is such a brilliant writer and this is a huge thing for him - it's so brilliantly written, so I would've been an idiot to have turned it down!"

The drama has an impressive ensemble cast which includes David Tennant, Olivia Colman, Vicky McClure, Andrew Buchan and Jodie Whittaker. Arthur also talked about working with David Tennant, who plays investigating officer DI Alec Hardy, and the anticipation among Doctor Who fans of this former Doctor and former Doctor's companion working together for the first time.

"Yeah, we do share scenes," he said. "David's not a very well-liked character in the series, he's an outsider coming to investigate quite a sensitive subject. He's quite blunt at times and our characters really don't get on. That's all I can really say - our personalities within the show don't fit together very well at all. Whereas actually, we get on really well!
“We've got a couple of really great scenes together actually - I haven't seen the final versions… but yeah, there's some really good stuff."

On the frequent comparisons between Broadchurch and Danish drama The Killing, Arthur added, " I don't think they're the same show at all, but there are similarities and it's good to be compared to something so brilliant. Broadchurch is very different, but it's equally as good as The Killing - if not better."

Broadchurch begins at 9pm on Monday 4th March on ITV. Find out more about the series here

Read the full interview on Digital Spy

Broadchurch writer Chris Chibnall has opened up to Broadcast magazine about the writing, development and shooting of the new ITV drama series starring David Tennant and Olivia Colman. Read what he had to say here:



I’d wanted to write a big ensemble piece for 10 years, but inspiration finally came on a walk along the cliffs near my home, says Chris Chibnall


Broadchurch started when I was out walking. Lin Coghlan, my writing tutor at Soho Theatre, always said “take a problem out for a walk”. It’s how I work out my script quandaries, across the cliffs and beaches of West Dorset where I live. In 2011, after writing United for BBC2, I wanted my next project to be as authored and personal as that film.

I’d wanted to write a big ensemble drama, set in a small community, for the best part of 10 years. And as I walked, I began to realise that I lived in the perfect setting: my corner of Dorset has an epic, cinematic landscape.

So, over a few months, I wrote just for fun. A first episode, on spec, just for myself: no production company, no broadcaster. I then story lined the series with Sam Hoyle. We sat in my back garden, drinking tea and writing on whiteboards. I told director James Strong about it. He came and walked the cliffs with me.
I wanted James to lead direct, as he’d done such a beautiful job on United. We both felt we could make a beautiful, epic piece where landscape was key, and the visuals were bold. But I’m not sure any of us thought it would lead anywhere.

In the autumn, I rang Laura Mackie at ITV. I had a script, and some storylines, for this new secret project, would she like to read it? She read it and within days paired me with Kudos. Suddenly, my little back garden spec was taking on a life.

The greenlight decision was made speedily: the show had to be shot in the height of summer – and ITV wanted us to deliver eight episodes for TX in early 2013. They pushed us to make the show distinctive and authored. With our HoDs, we compiled images and shot test footage. We showed all this to ITV at a pre-shoot tone meeting.

We got a good budget, but we needed more to achieve the scale of what I’d written. My big ensemble drama was just that: 17 regular speaking parts. ZDF read the scripts and came on board early, while BBC America would do the same a little later on. Both invested in the show before we’d started shooting.
It was clear early on that we couldn’t shoot the whole piece in Dorset, due to the lack of transport links, studio facilities and crew. Our studio base was in Bristol, where Skins had recently vacated, and where we built the interior of our police station.

But the key piece of the jigsaw became Clevedon, just outside Bristol, which matched with our Dorset locations to make the fictional town of Broadchurch. We shot in real houses and buildings wherever possible, to give the scenes as much reality, and connection to the landscape, as possible.

The locations were shot beneath the Jurassic Cliffs at West Bay in Dorset, which had previously been used, 15 years back, for Harbour Lights (one passer-by watched us shooting and asked: “Are you doing Harbour Lights: The Movie?”). The first week, in early September, was the only week of sunshine Dorset had had all summer.

As punishment, the second and third weeks, in October and late November, were miserable: cold, rainy and gale-force windy. So much so that the third location week had to be abandoned halfway through and rescheduled as, due to the forecast winds, the safety of our crews on the cliffs couldn’t be guaranteed. We decamped back to Clevedon, frantically rescheduling, and returned a few days later.

Throughout, we deliberately kept the identity of the killer(s) secret. It energised the production: the cast had a sweepstake, and the make-up truck collated a rogues’ gallery of suspects with odds and comments. At one point, I called a meeting to tell the whole production, but crew members collared me the night before on location and said they didn’t want to know. So we kept everyone in suspense even longer (I can still see Olivia Colman’s furious face that day).

The hardest thing in this industry is to ensure the execution of a piece matches your intention. We’ve all worked on shows that have fallen down the gap between the two. With Broadchurch, the extraordinary team who came together have matched and bettered my original intention. To me, it feels like that walk really did pay off.


Chris's Tricks Of The Trade

Write big images, not just dialogue.
Write parts that actors will want to get up at 5am in the morning to play.
That US screenwriting diktat that tells you not to describe the camera movements? Bollocks.
Set a clear, simple vision for the piece and stick to it. Watch rushes as soon as they’re up. Say when something is wrong and suggest how to put it right.
Get in the edit. Each cut is a new draft.
Be at the final mix. Sound and score are massive components. Make them as ambitious as everything else.


Find out more about Broadchurch here

Watch Broadchurch on ITV from 9pm on Monday 4th March


Source: Broadcast

The Independent have made new ITV drama Broadchurch their TV Pick of the Week for next week, placing it ahead of its scheduling rival Mayday on BBC One.

The Independent say:

Two similar dramas in a clash of scheduling – and scheduling techniques. BBC1's Mayday in which a close-knit community is pulled apart after the disappearance of a teenage girl, begins on Sunday and screens on five consecutive nights, while ITV's new drama, in which a close-knit Dorset community unravels after the murder of an 11-year-old boy, rations its storyline over eight weeks.

Written by Chris Chibnall (Torchwood) Broadchurch has the more appealing cast, with Olivia Colman and David Tennant as detectives, and Andrew Buchan and Jodie Whittaker as the dead lad's parents. It's a sort of British The Killing, although Chibnall says his influence is Steven Bochco's 1996 series Murder One, in which one case took up 23 episodes.

Broadchurch begins on ITV on Monday 4th March at 9pm. Find out more here.

Olivia Colman, who stars alongside David Tennant in the ITV series Broadchurch has spoken to The Independent in a new interview published today. Olivia plays DS Ellie Miller in the eight part crime drama, a local police detective who is paired with an outsider in the form of DI Alec Hardy (David Tennant) to solve the murder of a boy in her small home town. Olivia spoke of the inevitable comparison between Broadchurch and the acclaimed Danish drama The Killing and of the character of DS Miller.

From the Independent

"The Killing was so brilliant that it seems a bit up yourself to say this is 'the British Killing'," says Colman, characteristically averse to hyperbole. She plays a local police detective miffed when an abrasive outsider (David Tennant, giving good stubble) is parachuted in to lead the investigation, while an all-star cast of suspects (Andrew Buchan, Jodie Whittaker, Vicky McClure and Doctor Who's Arthur Darvill) slowly reveal their secrets. Colman's is a very personable breed of copper (Scott & Bailey are a pair of Dirty Harriets in comparison), which is hardly surprising since she's modelled on herself. "I wanted it to be me in the police force," she says. "I thought I could damage that by doing too much research, which is my lazy way of saying 'I couldn't be bothered'."

Read the full interview here

Broadchurch debuts on ITV on Monday 4th March at 9pm

The Region 2 release of Broadchurch on DVD will now take place one week earlier than originally published.

The DVD will now be released on Monday 20th May

Synopsis

A hot morning in July and the Dorset town of Broadchurch, is bracing itself for the tourist season, when Danny Latimer, an 11 year old schoolboy, goes missing.

His mother, Beth, frantically starts to search for him while her best friend, Ellie Miller (Olivia Colman), a local police officer, arrives at work to discover that the promotion she thought was hers has gone to D.I Alec Hardy (David Tennant), an outsider with a reputation for failure.

When Danny’s body is found beneath the picturesque cliffs that dominate the town opposites collide. Both Miller and Hardy are determined to solve the mystery of Danny's murder, Ellie perhaps too sensitive to the people in her community; Alec as efficient as he is blunt. When news of the crime spreads through the town, a chain reaction begins which will put Broadchurch under a national spotlight, pulling the town, its residents and its secrets, apart.

Pre-order your copy here

Watch Broadchurch on ITV from Monday 4th March at 9pm

Broadchurch stars David Tennant, Olivia Colman and Pauline Quirke all feature in a new behind-the-scenes video clip released by ITV today. ITN Meridian news reporter Divya Kohli caught up with the cast in West Bay, Dorset on a damp November day to find out more about the new eight part crime drama. The video clip also features some new, as yet unseen clips from the first episode.

David Tennant and Olivia Colman talk about the contrast between their two characters, the dour and abrupt outsider DI Alec Hardy and the upbeat local police officer DS Ellie Miller.

"I've been shipped in from a very metropolitan murder squad, " David says of Hardy, "And as I see it I've been dumped out in the sticks and I've got to cope with..."

"Smiley!" finishes Olivia Colman, who plays the friendly, likeable Miller "He's rude to everybody!" she adds of Hardy.

Bird Of A Feather actress Pauline Quirke plays the mysterious Susan Wright, one of many characters in the drama to have a murky past that will emerge over the next few weeks. "Everyone at Broadchurch has got a secret. We just don't know what it is yet." She also reveals how desperate she was to take part in the series. "I just stopped short of pleading!" she said.

Watch the clip here

Broadchurch is a new spine-tingling thriller created by Doctor Who writer Chris Chibnall . It is the story of a town wrapped up in the murder of a young boy and stars David Tennant, Olivia Colman, Arthur Darvill, Andrew Buchan, Jodie Whiitaker and Pauline Quirke. It was produced by Richard Stokes and directed by James Strong and Euros Lyn.

Click here for our Broadchurch pages for all the news, photos and video clips of the series

Watch the first episode of Broadchurch on Monday 4th March at 9pm on ITV

Saturday's Daily Star TV magazine featured the above articles about David Tennant's new drama Broadchurch.
Broadchurch starts Monday 4th March at 9pm on ITV.
To find out more and see photos, videos etc about the series visit our Broadchurch section here.

Saturday's issue of The Sun's TV magazine featured the above article about David Tennant's new drama Broadchurch.
Broadchurch starts Monday 4th March at 9pm on ITV.
To find out more and see photos, videos etc about the series visit our Broadchurch section here.

Today's Mail On Sunday TV magazine featured the above articles about David Tennant's new drama Broadchurch. The paper has chosen the drama as Pick Of The Week and Pick Of The Day...
Broadchurch starts Monday 4th March at 9pm on ITV.
To find out more and see photos, videos etc about the series visit our Broadchurch section here.

Arthur Darvill has spoken to the Liverpool Echo ahead of tomorrow's premiere of Broadchurch.
Speaking about the fact that Chris Chibnall wrote the role of Rev Paul Coates with him in mind Arthur says:
"He came to me while I was filming in Cardiff and said 'I've written you a part in a new TV series, will you do it?' I thought, I can't say no to that, that's amazing! We chatted about it, we discussed where the character would go, and I just found it really interesting so I jumped at the chance. That's the first time anyone ever written anything for me; it was very humbling. It's quite an honour."

Talking of working with David Tennant Arthur adds "Working with David was great. He's brilliant actually. He's very different on this. I think he'll impress."

Broadchurch starts on Monday 4th March at 9pm on ITV1.

It's the day we've all been waiting for as David Tennant's new ITV drama Broadchurch finally airs on UK television. The action kicks off with episode one airing tonight at 9pm on ITV1.
To find out more and see photos, videos etc about the series visit our Broadchurch section here.

Episode One Synopsis:

David Tennant and Olivia Colman star as detectives in this eight-part crime thriller written
by Chris Chibnall and directed by James Strong.
On a morning in July, the Dorset town of Broadchurch is bracing itself for the annual influx
of holidaymakers. But 11-year-old local boy Danny Latimer has gone missing. As his mother
Beth (Jodie Whittaker) starts to search frantically for him, local CID officer DS Ellie Miller (Colman)
returns to work after a family holiday. But she is shocked to discover that the promotion she thought was hers has gone to DI Alec Hardy (Tennant), whom she has never met before, an outsider to the town with a reputation for failure.
Then the call comes through – Danny’s body has been found on the beach. Preliminary findings suggest that Danny’s death is suspicious, so Miller and Hardy must break the terrible news to Beth, her husband Mark
(Andrew Buchan), and Danny’s sister Chloe (Charlotte Beaumont). Hardy believes that Danny must have been abducted and swears to the family he will find whoever is responsible for Danny’s death. As the investigation gets under way, can the friendly and engaging Miller and the rude and abrupt Hardy put aside their differences to work as a team

The Times have selected Broadchurch as one of their TV highlights today. The murder mystery series written by Chris Chibnall and starring an all-star ensemble cast led by David Tennant and Olivia Colman begins tonight on ITV at 9pm.

This preview may contain minor spoilers for the first episode. Do not read if you wish to avoid this information.



From The Times:

Broadchurch
ITV, 9pm

Another day, another murder series — but at least Broadchurch is a cut above the average. A small boy is found murdered below the cliffs on a Dorset beach. He belongs to a friendly community with one of the lowest crime rates in the country. The police investigation is led by an intense and unshaven David Tennant, who hails from out of town and seems to be dogged by some sort of controversy in the past. To complicate matters further, his junior officer (Olivia Colman) — a local woman who knows the family of the murder victim well — believes that she should have been put in charge. What makesBroadchurch worth watching is the energy and conviction of the performances. Unlike so many commonplace murder stories, this one at least recognises that murder is ugly and destroys the lives of the family as much as the victim, and the performances are coloured by a genuine sense of shock and a grim determination to find the killer. But their investigation is hampered by the media, with an enthusiastic young reporter (Jonathan Bailey) Tweeting sensitive information and an unscrupulous journalist from a national newspaper (Vicky McClure) stealing the victim’s teddy bear. Of all the stories of violent death on television this week, Broadchurch is the best of the bunch.


Source: The Times

Broadchurch is the TV Critic's Choice of the Day according to the Daily Telegraph. Read what the paper has to say about the first episode below. The account may contain some minor spoilers.


CRITIC’S CHOICE: Broadchurch
ITV, 9.00pm, tonight

Chris Chibnall’s new eight-part crime drama is set in the imaginary Dorset village of Broadchurch, and the opening moments cleverly draw us into local life with a flurry of news and gossip. It is first thing in the morning and the Latimer family – father Mark (Andrew Buchan), mother Beth (Jodie Whittaker) and stroppy 15-year-old daughter Chloe (Charlotte Beaumont) – are rushing to work and school. No one has seen 11-year-old Danny, but he’s probably on his paper round. For DS Ellie Miller (Olivia Colman) the day begins with the news that she has been passed over for promotion. Her new boss, DI Alec Hardy (David Tennant), arrives under a mysterious cloud. He keeps insisting that he was “exonerated”, so why are there concerns about his fitness to lead the enquiry when Danny’s asphyxiated body is discovered on the beach? Chibnall builds a convincing portrait of a strong community where everyone knows everyone else – and then adroitly introduces a gnawing worm of suspicion. Director James Strong – like Chibnall and Tennant a veteran of the BBC’s Doctor Who – resorts too often to slow-motion at moments of tension, but the powerful team of Tennant and Colman makes for gripping viewing.
Jane Shilling
Source: The Telegraph

Broadchurch is the TV Pick of the Day according to the Daily Express. Read what the paper has to say about the first episode below. The account may contain some minor spoilers.

Pick Of The Day: Broadchurch


A small community thrust into the glare of the media spotlight after the death of an 11-year-old boy is the subject of this thought-provoking eight-part drama.
With the events surrounding the death unresolved, the seaside town of Broadchurch becomes the focus of a major police investigation.
David Tennant (with Olivia Colman as DS Ellie Miller) plays DI Alec Hardy, an out-of-town newly promoted detective who takes the job local girl Miller believes should be hers.
As the case drags on the boy’s mother and father (Andrew Buchan and Jodie Whittaker) struggle to cope with the unwarranted attention thrust upon them and one by one the locals are put under pressure as they are drawn into the lengthy police inquiry.
Source: Daily Express

Broadchurch is today's Must See TV according to the Daily Mirror. Read what the paper has to say about the first episode below. The account may contain some minor spoilers.


Broadchurch - ITV1 9pm
The long Steadicam shot early on in this drama suggests that Broadchurch could have been twinned with Cheers.
It’s a town where everybody knows your name and Mark Latimer’s walk to work each morning is punctuated by hellos and good mornings to all the shopkeepers and friends he passes.
Even when a dead body is found on the idyllic beach, your immediate reaction might not be one of horror, but rather of wanting to visit Broadchurch as soon as possible – if you could only figure out what regional accent the cast were doing.
But make no mistake – this is a serious crime drama, not a travel brochure, and the cast is as good as you could wish for.
Heading up the investigation is DI Alec Hardy (a bearded David Tennant) who’s newly arrived under a bit of a cloud. There are murmurs of some kind of screw-up he made on a previous case and DS Ellie Miller, played by the fabulous Olivia Colman, is mighty annoyed that he landed the DI job she had been promised.
But DS Miller knows the dead boy and his parents (Andrew Buchan and Jodie Whittaker) and is unable to remain entirely detached. Other players in the first episode include an ambitious young local reporter and Vicky McClure as a more ambitious national newspaper journalist.
Pauline Quirke also stars, though she doesn’t have anything to say tonight, preferring to stand by her caravan and take it all in.
If you can’t decide whether you should be watching Broadchurch or Mayday, both produced by Kudos, the answer is, of course, that you should be watching both. Thank goodness for set-top boxes.
Source: The Daily Mirror

The following episode synopsis may contain spoilers. Do not read on if you don't want to know what will happen in Episode 2 of David Tennant's new ITV drama Broadchurch.

Broadchurch continues on Monday 11th March at 9pm on ITV1.


To find out more and see photos, videos etc about the series visit our Broadchurch section here.


_________________________________________________________________


In the second episode of the eight-part crime thriller
written by Chris Chibnall and directed by James
Strong, the ramifications of Danny Latimer’s murder
start to hit home. As the mystery around Danny's
death deepens, DI Hardy (David Tennant) and DS
Miller (Olivia Colman) must work fast to identify the
key suspects, but even the location of the crime
remains unknown. Holiday bookings are cancelled,
and the townspeople are becoming anxious.
Meanwhile, the Latimer family struggle to cope with
their grief, and the Rev Paul Coates (Arthur Darvill)
decides to speak to the local media. Hardy walks the route of Danny’s paper round and Miller leads the search of the Latimer house. Hardy finds an isolated cliff-top hut that arouses his curiosity as Miller finds some suspicious items taped under Danny’s bed and in his sister Chloe (Charlotte
Beaumont)’s room. When interviewed, Chloe tells Miller to talk to Becca Fisher (Simone McAullay).
Miller and Hardy question Becca, but she insists that she had nothing to do with Danny’s death.
Unable to sit in the house, Danny's mum Beth (Jodie Whittaker, pictured right) heads out to the supermarket. Noticing that people are staring, she breaks down – but Paul happens to be there to comfort her, and she tells him a secret, insisting that he keep it to himself.

BAFTA have released a podcast of the Q&A session that followed the screening of Episode 1 of Broadchurch on the 19th February. The screening took place at 195 Piccadilly and was attended by writer Chris Chibnall, director James Strong and series stars David Tennant, Olivia Colman and Jodie Whittaker. The Q&A session was compared by the Guardian's Vicky Frost.

Listen to the podcast here:

The UK press and media blog sites have been unanimously full of praise following the first episode of Broadchurch which aired last night.

David Tennant and Olivia Colman star as two police detectives attempting to solve the mystery behind the murder of a boy in a small coastal town. Andrew Buchan, Jodie Whittaker, Vicky McClure, Arthur Darvill, Will Mellor and Pauline Quirke also feature. The series is written by Chris Chibnall and the episode was directed by James Strong.

Check out the main reviews below

The Guardian
Broadchurch TV Review
From a masterfully choreographed single-take sequence in which a plumber walks down the high street of a seaside town, cheerily greeting characters who will all figure later, one can tell that Broadchurch is something that will stand out, even in the glut of good drama that has lately made going out in the evenings seem a rash choice.
Read the full review on the Guardian website

The Telegraph
Broadchurch, ITV, review
It is a wonderful moment when a much anticipated new post-watershed thriller turns out to deliver as well as Broadchurch (ITV) did last night … What stood out most was the intense, microscopic exposure of hurt. Broadchurch showed us the mauled insides of family grief, the sinewy speechless despair of the townsfolk who knew the boy
Read the full review here

The Independent
TV Review - Broadchurch, ITV
David Tennant's character seems to have been designed to look good on his fan website... Colman, effortlessly convincing in her distress when she recognises the dead boy, is something much rarer on television. Not an obsessive loner like Lund but a woman with a husband and children whose job is part of her life, not all of it.
Read the full review here

Daily Mail
Gruff, growling and grown up - Tennant takes charge
Broadchurch isn’t merely good. It’s exceptional.
David Tennant’s bitter, pitiless detective has a Glasgow growl thicker than the black stubble on his jowls. He proved in Spies Of Warsaw earlier this year, as the idealistic Frenchman pinned between Nazis and Communists, that he has left the juvenile days of Doctor Who far behind.
But this hard-eyed, untrusting policeman is his most adult role yet
Visit the Mail Online site for the full review

Metro
Broadchurch: Colman and Tennant deserve their own series
Where Broadchurch really scored was in creating a believable community in which you could invest some emotion ... Even the fractious relationship between the enigmatic new DI in town (David Tennant, looking like he hasn’t slept for a week) and Colman’s Ellie, on the surface a crime fiction cliché, felt instantly familiar yet fresh.
Read the full review here

Digital Spy
'Broadchurch' episode one review: David Tennant drama matched hype
Olivia Colman's brilliant Broadchurch premiered on ITV last night (March 4) amid a flurry of hype and lofty comparisons with the Godfather of Nordic Noir, The Killing. Thankfully, the opening episode more than matched the hype, managing to create a gripping whodunnit balanced alongside an emotionally powerful tale of parental grief.
Visit the Digital Spy website here

Den Of Geek
Broadchurch Episode 1 review
Everything about ITV’s new crime drama Broadchurch, from its intensely likeable cast to Chris Chibnall’s beautifully precise script and James Strong’s assured direction, tells us we’re in safe hands…Broadchurch hones in on emotional truths with startling aim.
Read the full review here

The Shropshire Star
TV review: Broadchurch
Broadchurch is quite unlike your run-of-the-mill police dramas. The focus frequently shifts from the grieving Latimer family, to the difficult relationship between Hardy and Miller and the finger pointing firmly at a wider community, one that appears to have more to disclose than last night’s opener revealed.
Read the full review here