This article was written for Annabel & Grace, which is now part of Rest Less.
When you read this, you are probably digging out your bunting, cooking the Coronation Quiche and dusting off your tiara from your kid’s dressing-up box. But by Sunday, you will have had enough of the Royals and will be longing for less drama and some real TV! So here are some of my suggestions for best TV series for the coming month.
THE DIPLOMAT | NETFLIX
Amid an international crisis, a career diplomat juggles her new high-profile job as ambassador to the United Kingdom and her turbulent marriage to a political star. This series stars Keri Russell, Rufus Sewell, David Giasi and Rory Kinnear.
Apart from being a geopolitical drama, it is the portrait of a marriage past its peak but not in ruins. Rufus Sewell has some very amusing lines, and the script is altogether brilliant. The Diplomat is a hugely enjoyable ride, and everyone I have recommended it to has loved it.
OBSESSION | NETFLIX
This is the naughty one we talked about in our Instagram Reel. And as you can see below, the trailer has restricted viewing!
Anyway, Grace and I have both watched it and were obsessed.
A respected London surgeon’s affair with his son’s fiancée turns into an erotic infatuation that threatens to change their lives forever.
It is quite racy but nothing we have not seen before on TV. It stars Richard Armitage, who bares all, which for a 50-something male is quite brave, especially when he shares the scene/s with a beautiful 20-something lady, Charlie Murphy. However, he carries it off. I wouldn’t say it is the best series on TV at the moment, as I preferred The Diplomat by a country mile, but Netflix is obviously trying to draw in another audience.
QUEEN CHARLOTTE: A BRIDGERTON STORY (4th May) | NETFLIX
Queen Charlotte, the new prequel to Rhimes’ racy Regency hit, is a lavish, thoughtful expansion of Julia Quinn’s saga.
Charlotte of Mecklenburg-Strelitz, Germany (India Amarteifio), is just 17 years old when she’s promised, sight unseen, in a marriage pact to Britain’s King George III. Still, she’s intelligent enough to discern that something must be amiss with the monarch if his court had to travel so far to find a bride. An initial meeting with the young sovereign (Corey Mylchreest) reveals him to be a charming gentleman with exquisite bone structure, but Charlotte’s marital bliss ends almost as soon as the wedding does.
ROUGH DIAMONDS | NETFLIX
In Rough Diamonds, Noah Wolfson (Kevin Janssens) returns home to Antwerp following the suicide of his younger brother, Yanki. Noah left his family — a respected dynasty of diamond dealers — and their Haredi Orthodox community to live a secular life in London, raising a young son. But when he discovers that Yanki was deeply in debt to bookies, he decides to stay in Antwerp and protect his family from forces that threaten their reputation, their financial future, and their lives.
UNSTABLE | NETFLIX
In this new Netflix comedy series ‘Unstable’, Rob Lowe is perfectly cast and delivers some of his finest work as the eccentric-but-not-quite-crazy biotech billionaire genius Ellis Dragon (he’s sort of a cuddly, apolitical version of Elon Musk, so I guess he’s really not like Musk at all). Lowe’s son John Owen Lowe is also perfectly cast (and quite good), given he’s playing Ellis’ prodigal son Jackson, who returns home to California from New York City to live and work with his father as they both process their grief following the death of Ellis’ wife/Jackson’s mother.
THE TAILOR | NETFLIX
This seven-part series is about a famous tailor who begins to sew a wedding dress for his best friend’s fiancée, but all three have dark secrets that will soon upend their lives.
Peyami, a young and famous tailor who inherited talent and a successful business from his grandfather. With the death of his grandfather, Peyami brings his biggest secret, his mentally ill father, to the core of his life in Istanbul and now has to take care of him without a soul finding out the truth. Esvet, running away from an abusive relationship, finds herself in the middle of this secrecy, with her own mystery.
FUBAR | NETFLIX
He said he would be back, and here he is. Arnold Schwarzenegger stars in this comedy-thriller.
A father and daughter have both been working as CIA Operatives for years, but each kept their involvement in the CIA hidden from the other, resulting in their entire relationship being a gigantic lie. Upon learning of each other’s involvement in the CIA, the pair are forced to work together as partners and against the backdrop of explosive action and espionage, learn who each other really are.
THE MOTHER | NETFLIX (12th May)
While fleeing from dangerous assailants, an assassin (Jennifer Lopez), comes out of hiding to protect her daughter she left earlier in life.
RAIN DOGS | BBC
Costello, brilliantly played by Daisy May Cooper, is a single mum with a sweet daughter/accomplice, Iris (Fleur Tashjian). In between plodding bored and half-naked around a pole in a joint in Soho, Costello spends her time just trying to pay the rent, like anyone else skint in London. Episode one, “It’s Hard to Be a Saint in the City”, sees her evicted, do a runner from a cabby, and narrowly escape being molested by a pervert offering her a free “room” (i.e. broom cupboard) with unspecified “conditions”, sleep in a car and eventually get rescued by a strange friend, Selby. Selby, played by Jack Farthing, is a pretty, shabby, genteel posh public school type who is just out of jail. On the basis of a few encounters at the glory hole and some success at the mahjong table, he secures enough cash in a day to get Costello and Iris their flat back.
COLIN FROM ACCOUNTS | BBC iPLAYER
This unfailingly funny, perfectly acted Australian sitcom begins, as all great love stories do, with a flash of boob. A 29-year-old medical student, Ashley (Harriet Dyer), is on her way to a safety seminar at the hospital when fortysomething microbrewer Gordon (Patrick Brammall) stops his car to let her cross the road. To thank him – and cheer herself up – she pulls the side of her top down briefly and goes on her way. Until, just behind her, she hears the sound of a distracted Gordon (who we are soon to learn has been single for a unicycle-buying-and-abandoning amount of time) running over an unaccompanied dog.
Before you know it, they are on the hook for a A$12,000 (£6,400) vet’s bill and Ashley has moved into Gordon’s place to take care of the dog while she looks for a house-share that will allow pets.
It’s honest, kind and goes from strength to strength.
TEN POUND POMS | BBC IPLAYER
Ten Pound Poms is a compelling, character-driven family drama, following a group of Brits as they leave post-war Britain in 1956 in search of a better life in Australia. But their new life isn’t quite as easy as they’d hoped for.
At the heart of the drama are Annie (Faye Marsay) and Terry Roberts (Warren Brown).
They try to make the best of the situation for their family, but the poor living conditions at the migrant hostel and local attitudes towards immigrants test them in ways they couldn’t have imagined.
They aren’t the only people at the hostel avoiding the truth. Kate (Michelle Keegan) is a young nurse who arrives without her fiancé and will do whatever it takes to try and rewrite her devastating past. Bill (Leon Ford) has lost his family business back home and is so desperate to prove he’s living the Australian dream that he’ll stop at nothing in order to get a lifestyle he can’t sustain.
And so the many stories unravel.
Once Upon a Time in Northern Ireland | BBC iPlayer
Just thought I would throw in a documentary. It is timely as we just commemorated the 25th anniversary of the signing of The Good Friday agreement.
MALPRACTICE | ITVx
Shot in and around Leeds, `Malpractice’ is a cat-and-mouse thriller following a medical investigation that tells the story of a damaged doctor caught up in a dangerous conspiracy. Dr Lucinda Edwards is a smart, battle-hardened doctor under investigation after an overdose patient dies. Despite the support of her medical supervisor, the grieving father demands an inquiry into her actions. As the pressure of the investigation intensifies, Lucinda’s confident professional exterior begins to deteriorate.
The NHS is at the forefront of the news currently with all the strikes, so this TV series shows an average A&E department battling it out on the frontline and how much we expect from our medical workers.
TOM JONES | ITVx
This four-part is series is a reimagining of Henry Fieldints’s classic 1749 novel, The History of Tom Jones a Foundling’. A Bridgerton-esque series stars relative newcomer Solly McLeod as Tom, a young man who was abandoned as a baby but was rescued and raised by a country gentleman, Squire Allworthy. Now he is charming, kind and popular with the ladies – but when he falls in love with wealthy heiress Sophia (Sophie Wilde), his low birth gets in the way.
As well as McLeod and Wilde, the series features a who’s who cast of acclaimed British actors, including James Fleet, Alun Armstrong, Shirley Henderson, Pearl Mackie, Susannah Fielding, Daniel Rigby and Hannah Waddingham.
FATAL ATTRACTION | PARAMOUNT+
This is a re-making of the 1987 film starring Glenn Close into an eight-part modern series. It stars Lizzy Caplan as Forrest, who becomes obsessed with her lover Dan Gallagher after a brief affair. Amanda Peet plays Dan’s wife, Beth, whose world is turned upside down when Dan’s indiscretion threatens to destory their family.