Being Human 3 officially an awesome foursome {TV}

As you can tell, we here at Frost can’t wait to watch the new series of Being Human. We’ve scoured the net to find behind the scenes clips and brought you the views of the actors and creators.

Like all re-commissioned supernatural series, it’s expanded from the original premise and everyone seemingly has a supernatural element to them. It’s no longer ‘a werewolf, a vampire and a ghost share a house in Bristol’ as Nina, the new werewolf, will be going with the original three to the new residence in Wales.

Werewolf couple George (Russell Tovey) and Nina (Sinead Keenan), and reformed vampire Mitchell (Aidan Turner) have fled their beloved shared house in Bristol and are looking for a new house to rent in Barry, Wales. They are also without ghost Annie (Lenora Crichlow), who is stuck in purgatory and desperately trying to escape.

The BBC have released a George & Nina trailer and some new artwork of the four in the world’s tidiest supermarket to keep us all excited…and it’s working. Click on the image below for a larger version. Wait… chicken, steak and tea in the same aisle?

Series three boasts an impressive array of guest-stars, including Lacey Turner in her first role after EastEnders as Lia, who Mitchell meets in purgatory; Robson Green (Wire In The Blood) as primitive werewolf McNair; Michael Socha (This Is England ’86) as McNair’s son Tom; Paul Kaye (It’s All Gone Pete Tong) as twisted vampire Vincent; Craig Roberts (Young Dracula) as teenage vampire Adam; Nicola Walker (Spooks) as social worker Wendy; James Fleet (Vicar Of Dibley) as George’s father George Snr; and Jason Watkins making an eventful return as vampire leader Herrick.

An online extension to Being Human will also launch online mid-way through the third series. Created by Toby Whithouse, and written by Brian Dooley, Jamie Mathieson and John Jackson, Becoming Human is set in a fictional college and will follow a new group of characters over nine episodes.

Being Human returns to BBC Three on Sunday 23rd January 2011

Being Human Series 3 Trailer {TV}

That award winning BBC3 show Being Human’s back for a 3rd series and we’ve found the teaser trailer and sneak peek videos for you. The housemates will be relocating from their Bristol abode to a new residence in Wales. Russell Tovey, Aidan Turner and Lenora Critchlow will all be back and the eight episode series will also see a guest appearance from Lacey Turner fresh from her dramatic exit from Eastenders.

Teaser Trailer

Director Colin Teague

Sneak peek at the read through

Interview with the Make Up Artist

Director Phil on his view of the new series and the special guest star

Being Human returns to BBC Three on Sunday 23rd January 2011

BBC comedy brings you Episodes {TV}

BBC Two and Hat Trick have created ‘Episodes’ a seven-part comedy series from the highly acclaimed writing partnership of David Crane (Friends) and Jeffrey Klarik (Mad About You).

The show tells the story of a happily married English couple, Sean and Beverly Lincoln, who also happen to be successful producers of a hit British TV show called Lyman’s Boys.

At an awards ceremony in London they are wooed by a hugely powerful and charismatic US network executive who persuades them to move out to LA and remake their hit show for an American audience – with disastrous results.

Things begin to unravel at Sean’s and Beverly’s first studio meeting. It soon becomes clear that the network president has never even seen their show. To make matters worse, he insists they replace their lead actor, an erudite Royal Shakespeare Company veteran (played by Richard Griffiths) with… Matt LeBlanc. Sean and Beverly are appalled. But the decision is out of their hands.

Matt comes on board and they find themselves in a complicated triangle, which threatens to destroy not just their TV show but also their marriage.

The quintessential US comedy star Matt LeBlanc plays a larger than life version of himself. Joining him are Tamsin Greig (Tamara Drewe, Green Wing, Love Soup), Stephen Mangan (Free Agents, Never Better, Green Wing), Kathleen Rose Perkins (Without A Trace, Tell Me You Love Me), Mircea Monroe (Scrubs, Without A Trace), Daisy Haggard (Psychoville, Sense And Sensibility) and Richard Griffiths (The History Boys, Withnail And I).

Jimmy Mulville comments: “These are some of the best scripts I’ve read in a long time by two writers at the top of their game.

“To have the opportunity to make a show with David Crane andJeffrey Klarik, with Matt LeBlanc playing a hilarious version of himself, and then to make that show for both Showtime and the BBC, whose combined portfolios of comedy are second to none, is both a thrill and a great privilege. Episodes promises to be one of the great comedy treats of 2011.”

Matt LeBlanc adds: “This is a great idea from David and Jeffrey – I love it. I am really excited to be working with Showtime and the BBC. And I am also so glad I got the part; seeing someone else playing Matt LeBlanc would have been devastating.”

Start watching Episodes from Monday 10 January 2011 at 10pm.

Take a Peek at BBC's Christmas {TV}

Take a look at some of the highlights of the BBC’s bumper selection of festive TV fare with our Christmas showreel.

Among the great clips watch the hair-raising moment when the Top Gear presenters realise which country they have landed in and what lies ahead; see Matt Smith as the ghost of Christmas past in Doctor Who – A Christmas Carol, laugh as the Royle’s prepare for Christmas day in The Royle Family and see some of the drama that lies aheads for the residents of Albert Square in EastEnders and take a look at a selection of Matt Lucas and David Walliams‘ latest comic creations from their new show Come Fly With Me.

Entertainment
Featuring impressive entertainment from Top Gear Special, Strictly Come Dancing Christmas Special, Giles And Sue Live The Good Life, The Rob Brydon Show and Jools’ Annual Hootenanny.

Drama
Featuring stunning drama from Doctor Who – A Christmas Carol, Whistle And I’ll Come To You, Upstairs Downstairs, Toast, Eric And Ernie and EastEnders.

BBC conjures up series four of Merlin {TV}

Smash hit, family favourite, Merlin has been recommissioned for a fourth series of magical adventure for BBC One.

The fantasy drama; starring Colin Morgan as Merlin, Bradley James, Anthony Head, Katie McGrath, Angel Coulby and Richard Wilson; continues to enchant audiences on Saturday nights. The current series on air is pulling in an average of over six million viewers and a total of 24.3 per cent share of the audience.

Ben Stephenson, Controller Drama Commissioning, says: “Merlin continues to perform outstandingly well against X Factor and offers audiences an alternative treat on Saturday nights. I’m pleased to confirm that the magical world of Camelot will be returning next year for a fourth series of this fresh and modern retelling of a classic British legend.”

Johnny Capps and Julian Murphy, executive producers for Shine TV, said: “We are both delighted with the continuing success of Merlin, and relish the chance to take the series to the next level with the long-awaited arrival of the Knights of the Round Table.”

Series three has seen a host of high-profile guest-stars including: Emilia Fox, Tom Ellis, Miriam Margoyles, Warwick Davies and Pauline Collins. Series three will continue on Saturday evenings on BBC One until the nail biting finale on the 4 December.

The new 10 part series will begin filming in March.

Merlin has also enjoyed phenomenal international success, selling to 180 countries internationally, with series two providing a smash hit success for the Syfy channel in the US, which has already bought the third series currently in production.

BBC 2 Electric Proms trailer represents first project for BNS London.

Production company and design studio Brand New School London is very proud to announce its role in designing and directing a 30″ promo trailer and additional visual content for advertising agency Fallon’s campaign promoting the BBC Radio 2 Electric Proms. Radio 2’s Electric Proms is dedicated to creating new moments in music. Created under the direction of Fallon’s executive creative director Augusto Sola, art director Gary Anderson and copy writer Tony Miller, the innovative stop-motion trailer directed by BNS’s Jonathan Notaro and Mario Stipinovich debuted yesterday on the BBC. The trailer promotes this year’s Electric Proms performances from Elton John, Robert Plant and Neil Diamond, taking place from Thursday, 28 October, until Saturday, 30 October at the Roundhouse in London.

“This is always such an exciting event, and we are always really thrilled to be part of it,” said Fallon CEO Gail Gallie. “The campaign captures all of that excitement in a really fresh and original way.”

BBC “Electric Proms” from Brand New School on Vimeo.

“We were thrilled to be asked by Fallon to submit a treatment for this amazing, high-profile project, and then to be awarded the job” began Kayt Hall, executive producer for BNS London. “The main idea behind the script was creating the faces of these iconic artists from actual pop memorabilia. We could not be happier with the results: It plays to all our strengths – strong design, great animation, and an end product that everyone is delighted with.”

As Notaro explained, “In keeping with the agency’s sentiments, we proposed producing the content practically through stop-motion animation, knowing that making physical objects move together to create readable portraits would give the idea the payoff and spectacle it deserved.”

Planning for the ambitious production involved gathering, and in some cases, producing, props of the proper scale, anticipating that each face would be approximately 6 metres wide when assembled. Over the course of six days on a set in East London, in close collaboration with director of photography Toby Howell and using a Canon EOS 5D Mark II with Milo and Juno motion control rigs, the crew hand-animated the prescribed actions in reverse order (beginning with the final collages), capturing each sequence completely in-camera with single takes. The project was finished in Adobe After Effects at BNS London’s studio.

In addition to Notaro, Stipinovich, and Hall, credits for BNS London also include producer Kat Harrison, lead animator Andy Biddle, art director Andy Kelly, editor Jamie Foord, compositors Cassiano Prado and David Pocull, and rotoscope artist Rebecca Clay. Audio post is courtesy of Wave.

More information on Electric Proms is available online at www.bbc.co.uk/electricproms.

About Brand New School

With offices in New York, Los Angeles and London, Brand New School is a vertically integrated production company and design studio that delivers extraordinary media on all platforms. Offering a new model for creative digital production, we are filmmakers, developers, designers, animators, editors, illustrators, and producers dedicated to driving communications to new heights. Akin to leading academic institutions, our guiding philosophies prize experimentation and learning, and our commitment to discovering the best ideas for our clients is absolute. For more information, please visit www.BrandNewSchool.com.

By Catherine Balavage

BBC turns back the clock on high street stores {TV}

High streets across the UK are going back in time this autumn as part of an exciting new BBC Learning Hands On History project and landmark BBC One series.

Across weekends in October, November and December, an empty shop in 11 different towns will be transformed into a Thirties grocer store, giving today’s shoppers the chance to travel back in time and experience living history.

The project, which is set to visit Armagh, Bradford, Chatham, Clacton, Louth, Paisley, Poole, Stockport, Sunderland, Truro and Wolverhampton, will give communities the chance to learn more about their local history in a fun, exciting and hands-on way.

Visitors will be able to touch, hear and even smell what life was like on their local high street around 80 years ago, as well as share their own memories, photographs and mementoes.

With the help of local history groups, museums and archives the BBC Learning team aims to explore the past of other shops in the towns using documents such as posters, ads, bills and letters, all helping to create a high street time line.

Communities can also help create a photographic “Now and Then” archive of their area with the project’s dedicated Flickr group, or download a special guide to researching the history of their high street at the BBC History website.

The shops are part of the new six-part BBC One series Turn Back Time – The High Street, which takes four empty shops back to the 1870s and propels them through 100 years of change.

Turn Back Time will see a group of shopkeeping families from a variety of trades travel back in time where they’ll face the challenge of living and working in six very different eras of British history, from Victorian Britain right through to the Seventies, all recreated in Shepton Mallet, Somerset. Turn Back Time starts in November.

And to bring the High Street history strand right up to date, BBC English Regions TV current affairs series Inside Out will be examining how our modern day High Streets are coping with the challenging economic climate across each of its 11 regional programmes. The films will be broadcast on BBC One across England in early December.

Launching the Turn Back Time shops, BBC Learning campaign executive Nina Bell said: “This is a fantastic opportunity to bring history alive and give everyone a chance to celebrate their high street. And it’s not just about the high streets with pop-up shops – BBC Learning is working with local history partners right across the UK to develop engaging, hands-on events to bring the history of their local area to life and encourage Britain to fall in love with its high streets again. You can find all the details on our website at bbc.co.uk/history/handsonhistory.”

Wallace & Gromit want your inventions{TV}

To launch the brand new BBC One series, Wallace And Gromit’s World Of Invention, world-renowned inventor Wallace and his ever faithful sidekick, Gromit, are asking the UK to get inventing.

From their self-built basement television studio in 62 West Wallaby Street, the inimitable pair are trying to track down Britain’s best amateur invention. Wallace and Gromit are asking enthusiastic kids and crackpot inventors to invent their very best contraption. The winner – chosen by a panel of judges, led by Nick Park – will be given the once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to have themselves or their invention immortalised in a future Aardman production.

To celebrate Wallace and Gromit’s debut as TV presenters, BBC One are unveiling a website and nationwide series of regional roadshows, that hope to get Britain inventing. In their brand new BBC One series the inimitable pair present a factual series for the very first time, uncovering the quirky, inspiring and accident-prone world of inventions.

But not everyone is as expert an inventor as Wallace, so the pair are planning to kickstart the UK’s inventive spirit through a series of regional inventors roadshows that will provide the tools and motivation needed to root out the inventor in all of us.

Nick Park, Oscar-winning creator of Wallace and Gromit, said: “It is an enormous honour for Wallace and Gromit to be asked to take up the torch (all be it solar powered) and shine it on the world’s top and most innovative inventors.”

Create your own cracking contraption:

Wensleydale-loving inventor Wallace knows just how powerful a great idea combined with only a little bit of engineering know-how can be. So, inspired by his favourite contraption, LAD, Wallace is asking the British public to unleash their inner inventor and create their own device. He’s asking budding inventors (complete novices included) to design and build their most inventive contraption, made entirely from bits and pieces around the home. It could be something that wakes up Wallace, helps Gromit complete his household chores or moves one (or both of them!) from A to B – anything goes, as long as it meets the judges’ criteria, which are available online.

Anyone can enter – individuals, teams of friends or even entire school classes. Entrants need to record a short video (maximum three minutes) of their creation, and upload it onto the BBC’s Wallace And Gromit website.

For full details, including judging criteria and terms and conditions, visit bbc.co.uk/wallaceandgromit.

Inspiring invention

The BBC have teamed up with Aardman Animations to create an exciting new roadshow event to accompany the new BBC One series Wallace and Gromit’s World Of Invention. Inspired by Wallace’s love of inventing, the BBC Learning roadshows will give budding inventors the opportunity to step into the world of Wallace and Gromit.

The tour will visit six UK shopping centres throughout November and December 2010 and will be open to the public on both Saturday and Sunday.

The roadshows will be accompanied by an entire Wallace and Gromit world online. To find out more about the secrets of invention, play in Wallace’s Workshop and find out more about the regional roadshows, visit bbc.co.uk/wallaceandgromit.