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PBS introduced Funny Woman to the American public a year ago, in January 2024. The somewhat awkwardly titled series (based on the Nick Hornby book Funny Girl, necessitating alterations) stars Gemma Arterton (The Critic) as Barabra Parker, 1960s Blackpool Beauty Queen, who has plans to take her success on the
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In anticipation of Vienna Blood’s fourth (and likely final, though I have thoughts about that) season arriving on PBS on January 5, it’s a good moment to revisit highlights of the previous three seasons of this often-delightful odd couple solving murders in the waning days of the
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Despite the awkwardness of the series name, critics and reviewers loved Gemma Arterton's first season of Funny Woman. (So-called because it's adapted from the Nick Hornsby novel Funny Girl, a title already taken by a rather famous musical.) However, viewers, assuming the title was a
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When Vienna Blood initially debuted in January 2020 in the post-Sanditon slot, it was an awkward fit, to say the least. Not only did the heavily masculine Mystery of the Week series not fit tonally with Andrew Davies' Jane Austen fanfic, created from her final, unfinished novel, but
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Following her near-death in the finale of Magpie Murders, editor-turned-amateur detective Susan Ryeland (Lesley Manville) has left London for the gorgeous vistas of Crete in Moonflower Murders, where she is running a hotel with her longtime boyfriend Andreas (Alexandros Logothetis). But there’s trouble in paradise: running
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Magpie Murders is the brainchild of Anthony Horowitz, the prolific writer known for television titles like Foyle’s War. This tale began as a novel (also penned by Horowitz) and is part of his Susan Ryeland Series. As much a meditation on why we love mystery stories as it is
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PBS' newest addition to the period drama lineup, Funny Woman (based on the novel Funny Girl by Nick Hornby, with the title altered for obvious reasons), was commissioned for a Season 2 by producer Sky around the same time it landed an American distributor. As luck would have it,
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It's been about a week since the RadioTimes first dropped an exclusive look at Moonflower Murders (sadly unembeddable for the rest of us, but you can watch it here). Those of us who keep an eye on such things knew when it arrived over the weekend that there
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Series finales have a lot of work to do, and that sometimes can go double for the finale of a show’s first season as it tries to stick the landing for the first time. The goals they aim for can support and/or undermine one another. That baked-in
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Sophie was flying high in last week's Funny Woman; this week, she’s laid low. Some would say she has only herself to blame, and to those people, I issue a very loud and rude raspberry while showing them the door directly out. We have neither time nor
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Funny Woman’s fourth episode is a dizzying bunch of swings and roundabouts — Sophie and Clive enjoy a honeymoon period, a bubble that can’t help but be burst; the entire Jim and Barbara team produce their funniest and sharpest episode yet, only to see CTV head of light entertainment
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This week on Funny Woman, a slew of firsts for Sophie: her first live recording of a sitcom before a live studio audience (an episode that then airs on tv! And is approved for an entire six-episode run!), first tampon use, first chat show appearance and groovy nightclub visit,