Latest news with #JoSpain
The Guardian
15-07-2025
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
Mix Tape review – nails the heart-stopping excitement of new love
A few questions before we begin. Did you come of age in or around 1989? Do you look back on your teenage years with fondness or horror? Did you have a great, formative love during the above? Did you let him/her go and never even do a cursory online search as to their whereabouts in the intervening decades? Did I just startle you by referring to the intervening decades between 1989 and now? Because that's what there are. I know. I had to check, too. How great is your tolerance for the depiction of young love on screen now that you are past youth yourself? Will you sit on the sofa wreathed in smiles and yearning or will you put a boot through the telly? How well-disposed do you feel to the idea of a Sally Rooney-esque endeavour aged up to cover those who came of age in or around 1989 and how their lives have played out since? This is important. I'm talking contemplative scenes, wry smiles at memories, melancholic suffusion, mood above action. Have you read and enjoyed the acclaimed novel Mix Tape by Jane Sanderson? Your answers to the above will help determine how much you enjoy Mix Tape, an adaptation by Jo Spain of Sanderson's novel. The four-part, double-timelined drama tells the story of freelance music journalist Dan O'Toole (Jim Sturgess) and author Alison Connor (Teresa Palmer), who grew up as teenagers in Sheffield and were each other's first loves. Their younger selves are played (excellently) by newcomer Rory Walton-Smith and Florence Hunt respectively. Their scenes capture all the excitement and novelty, the heart-stopping importance of every minute spent together that teenagers in love conjure for themselves. Dan's mother (Helen Behan) has some misgivings – she would rather he were playing the field a bit – but his father (Mark O'Halloran) is a romantic and is happy just to give his boy a little life advice along the way, especially as Alison is almost as fond of his racing pigeons as he is. Dan only wishes that Alison would let him meet her parents. Or even tell him where she lives and let him walk her home. Unfortunately, Alison's dad is long gone, her mother is an alcoholic and her boyfriend is a deeply unlovely piece of work called Martin (Jonathan Harden), whose malevolent presence suggests nothing but bad things are coming for the family. So it turns out, though the languorous pacing of Mix Tape, which is slightly too pleased with itself, means that it takes too long to get there. Things are even slower in the present as we wait for Dan and Alison's paths to cross again. When Alison's new book is released, Dan sends her – hesitantly – a friend request online. She – hesitantly – accepts it. For a long time – a long time – they communicate by sending Spotify links to each other, of songs that accompanied pivotal moments in their lives and relationship. Dan is now married to Katja (Sara Soulié), one of those screen wives who exist merely to irritate. She insists that now (their only child has just departed for university) is the time for them to start travelling together, regardless of the fact that a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for Dan to collaborate with a music legend on his memoir is on the horizon. Women, eh! Alison is married to a successful surgeon (one day I want the story of an unsuccessful surgeon – one who's scraping by, his mortality rates just good enough to keep him in gainful employment but nothing to write home about) and trying to keep him from bouncing their daughter, Stella (Julia Savage), into a termination that she may not want. So neither adult life is perfect. Does this mean they should meet up and see what spark remains from 1989? Is the grass always greener on the path not taken? Why did they break up? Did he find out where she lived, and about her mum and Martin? Should they just hurry up and shag? Is your own life worthless because you do not have an intense, formative teenage romance to look back on that has shaped and haunted you in ways known and unknown ever since? The questions multiply. Sign up to What's On Get the best TV reviews, news and features in your inbox every Monday after newsletter promotion Mix Tape is full of impressive performances and hard work from everyone involved but it never quite catches fire. Or perhaps that's just because, when I remember the first boy who made me a mix tape, I want to vomit into the nearest bin. I wish you happier memories and greater enjoyment. Mix Tape aired on BBC Two and is on iPlayer now
Irish Times
15-07-2025
- Entertainment
- Irish Times
Mix Tape review: Unspools like a glorified cover version of Sally Rooney's Normal People
Mix Tape ( BBC Two , 9pm) is a bit of a muddle. This underwhelming four-part romcom, adapted from a 2020 novel by Yorkshire author Jane Sanderson, debuted last month on Australian streaming service Binge. The show's writer, meanwhile, is Jo Spain , a former Sinn Féin political adviser and An Phoblacht journalist, and it was filmed in Dublin , often against very conspicuous local landmarks – despite being set in Sheffield. On one point, at least, the series is very clear: the late 1980s were the best time ever for music (it is set 10 years later than the novel, which celebrated the 1970s punk scene). It makes its feelings known by opening in 1989 to the riff from The Stone Roses Fool's Gold (which just about came out in 1989, being released that November). We're in the bedroom of music nerd Daniel (Rory Walton-Smith) – a young man with the world at his feet and a place in his heart for shy crush Alison (Florence Hunt), who he woos by creating mixtapes of his favourite tunes (The Cure, Nick Drake etc). These star-crossed teens are destined to be together. At least they are until dark secrets in Alison's life derail their romance. Fast forward to the present day, and Daniel is a middle-aged freelance journalist – portrayed as a tragic sad sack by Jim Sturgess (full marks for accuracy). Middle-aged Alison (Teresa Palmer), meanwhile, has fled both Sheffield and her Yorkshire accent and reinvented herself as a hot-property debut novelist in Australia. Inevitably, news of her literary breakthrough reaches Daniel, who immediately takes to mooching about like Robert Smith in the Just Like Heaven video. None of this is within yelling distance of plausible. If he was that hung up on Alison, Daniel would have stalked her on social media long before the excuse of her being a newly-published author. As is the tradition with romcoms, Mix Tape also insists we regard as adorable conduct what in the real world would be unhinged if not sociopathic – ie, Daniel and Alison jeopardising their marriages to moon after one another after decades of getting on with their lives. READ MORE Then there is the distracting Dublin-ness of the whole thing. An international audience might not blink as Daniel and his father are filmed on a barge at Grand Canal Dock, with Bolands Mill and those space-age new apartments over their shoulder. However, it's going to take an Irish audience out of the drama pretty quickly. As will a scene supposedly filmed at Sheffield United's 30,000-capacity Bramall Lane but which bears a much closer resemblance to a generic League of Ireland stadium. Nobody sits down to a romantic comedy expecting oodles of originality. Which is just as well because Mix Tape unspools like a glorified cover version of Sally Rooney's elevated romcom, Normal People – spritzed up with the weaponised schmaltz of Richard Curtis circa Notting Hill or Love Actually. It also cheats by casting leads much younger than their characters. As the story opens in 1989, Daniel and Alison are about 16 or 17. But Palmer was born in 1986: she would have been three-years-old when Alison's romance with Jim blossoms. Similarly, Sturgess was born in 1978, which makes him 11 when Fool's Gold came out. Why not feature age-appropriate actors? The answer is they would simply look far too old and beaten down by life for the story to have any lustre. There is also the fact that few in their 50s or beyond would risk everything for a teenage crush – a grim fantasy Mix Tape never sells. You've heard this tune before and done much better. Mix Tape airs on BBC2 on Tuesday at 10pm
Yahoo
01-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Harry Wild Renewed for Season 5 at Acorn TV
Acorn TV continues to be wild about Harry, and has renewed the Jane Seymour-led mystery series for a fifth season — ahead of this Monday's Season 4 finale. The Harry Wild renewed was announced this evening at the 2025 ATX Television Festival in Austinm Texas, during a conversation with series star and executive producer Seymour, who plays the titular amateur detective. More from TVLine The Chi Renewed for Season 8 Hacks Renewed for Season 5 at Max Yellowjackets Renewed for Season 4 'I am honored to have the opportunity to continue to bring Harry Wild to life for another season and am excited for her to solve a new batch of layered mysteries deeply rooted in literature with my castmates,' Seymour said in a statement. 'It has been so rewarding to work with everyone on this production and I'm thrilled to embark on another season with my Acorn TV family.' In Season 5 of Harry Wild, Harry is 'back with her most sensational and thrilling ride yet, including murder mysteries in the world of whiskey-making, theatre and musical-tattoos,' the official synopsis reads, 'not to mention a gang of middle-aged lady burglars and a murder close to home.' The Season 4 finale streams this Monday, June 2, and a special will air in December. Harry Wild is created and written by David Logan, along with writer Jo Spain, and executive-produced by Logan, Spain, Seymour, Daniel March, Klaus Zimmermann, James Gibb, David McLoughlin, Catherine Mackin, Bea Tammer, Frank Seyberth and Claus Wunn. Want scoop on , or for any other TV show? Shoot an email to InsideLine@ and your question may be answered via Matt's Inside Line! Best of TVLine 'Missing' Shows, Found! Get the Latest on Ahsoka, Monarch, P-Valley, Sugar, Anansi Boys and 25+ Others Yellowjackets Mysteries: An Up-to-Date List of the Series' Biggest Questions (and Answers?) The Emmys' Most Memorable Moments: Laughter, Tears, Historical Wins, 'The Big One' and More
