Nominations for the OAP drama Last Tango in Halifax and an adaptation of Shakespeare demonstrate the enduring appeal of substance over style
TV is frequently accused of being obsessed with youth, but this year's nominations for the industry's most-desired prizes are notably a triumph for two great septuagenarian actors and a famous 449-year-old dramatist.
Sir Derek Jacobi, 74, and Anne Reid, 77, feature in the leading performer shortlists of the 2013 Bafta awards for their portrayals, in BBC1's Last Tango in Halifax, of a Yorkshire widower and widow who appal their children by starting an autumnal love affair.
The judges' decisions are not only welcome recognition of the enduring excellence of two high-power performers but also justify a commission that defied several conventional televisual wisdoms, being not only concerned with the lives of the elderly but also specifically northern in both setting and characters.
The show is also noticed in the best drama serial category. Writer Sally Wainwright may be relieved to have told her story in six parts rather than one, as the screenwriters in the single drama category have to go up against William Shakespeare, who is nominated for Richard II, part of the BBC's The Hollow Crown sequence of his history plays.
Much like Last Tango in Halifax, the Bafta recognition of The Hollow Crown – which also gets acting nominations for Ben Whishaw's Richard II and Simon Russell Beale's Sir John Falstaff – cheeringly rehabilitates an unfashionable genre of TV. After the largely disastrous BBC TV Shakespeare in the 1970s, it was widely believed that the Bard was too hard to do on the small screen. But producers Sam Mendes and Pippa Harris – and their directors, including Richard Eyre – found a way of filleting and filming the history plays that made sense to modern audiences.
Away from the unexpectedly high profile for older performers and Elizabethan dramatists, these lists provide further confirmation of some soaring careers. The writer-producer Jimmy McGovern, who previously pretty much owned the Baftas with The Street, repeats the domination with its successor The Accused, which features a different criminal defendant in each episode. And actors Sheridan Smith and Olivia Colman, who have recently scored highly in theatre and movie awards, add broadcasting to their honours, with Smith singled out for impersonating Ronnie Biggs's wife in Mrs Biggs and Colman chosen for drama in The Accused and comedy in the Olympic sit-com Twenty Twelve.
There is also a unique case of a TV celebrity getting an unwanted Bafta nomination, although he isn't around to protest: The Other Side of Jimmy Savile is surely a shoo-in in the documentary category. Reported by guardian.co.uk 5 hours ago.
TV is frequently accused of being obsessed with youth, but this year's nominations for the industry's most-desired prizes are notably a triumph for two great septuagenarian actors and a famous 449-year-old dramatist.
Sir Derek Jacobi, 74, and Anne Reid, 77, feature in the leading performer shortlists of the 2013 Bafta awards for their portrayals, in BBC1's Last Tango in Halifax, of a Yorkshire widower and widow who appal their children by starting an autumnal love affair.
The judges' decisions are not only welcome recognition of the enduring excellence of two high-power performers but also justify a commission that defied several conventional televisual wisdoms, being not only concerned with the lives of the elderly but also specifically northern in both setting and characters.
The show is also noticed in the best drama serial category. Writer Sally Wainwright may be relieved to have told her story in six parts rather than one, as the screenwriters in the single drama category have to go up against William Shakespeare, who is nominated for Richard II, part of the BBC's The Hollow Crown sequence of his history plays.
Much like Last Tango in Halifax, the Bafta recognition of The Hollow Crown – which also gets acting nominations for Ben Whishaw's Richard II and Simon Russell Beale's Sir John Falstaff – cheeringly rehabilitates an unfashionable genre of TV. After the largely disastrous BBC TV Shakespeare in the 1970s, it was widely believed that the Bard was too hard to do on the small screen. But producers Sam Mendes and Pippa Harris – and their directors, including Richard Eyre – found a way of filleting and filming the history plays that made sense to modern audiences.
Away from the unexpectedly high profile for older performers and Elizabethan dramatists, these lists provide further confirmation of some soaring careers. The writer-producer Jimmy McGovern, who previously pretty much owned the Baftas with The Street, repeats the domination with its successor The Accused, which features a different criminal defendant in each episode. And actors Sheridan Smith and Olivia Colman, who have recently scored highly in theatre and movie awards, add broadcasting to their honours, with Smith singled out for impersonating Ronnie Biggs's wife in Mrs Biggs and Colman chosen for drama in The Accused and comedy in the Olympic sit-com Twenty Twelve.
There is also a unique case of a TV celebrity getting an unwanted Bafta nomination, although he isn't around to protest: The Other Side of Jimmy Savile is surely a shoo-in in the documentary category. Reported by guardian.co.uk 5 hours ago.