MASTERPIECE Studio

*Warning: This episode contains spoilers for Episode One of Season Five of *Poldark. For the last five years, every season of  Poldark has adapted at least one of Winston Graham's original novels. For the fifth and final season, however, series creator and head writer Debbie Horsfield was forced to fill in a gap of 11 years between Graham's book, The Angry Tide , and the next novel,' The Stranger...

On this very first episode of Poldark , we meet all the key characters who will come to shape the series — Ross, Demelza, Elizabeth, Francis, Verity, Aunt Agatha, George, Prudie. We also meet our Mining Poldark podcast hosts — Robin Ellis, who the original Ross Poldark in the 1970s adaptation of Winston Graham’s novels, and Barrett Brountas, a MASTERPIECE staffer and Poldark superfan. Come along o...

*Warning: This episode contains spoilers for Episode Six of Season Four of *Grantchester. When Grantchester star Al Weaver was in drama school, his future Grantchester co-star, Tessa Peake-Jones, was his designated mentor. On screen this season, Weaver and Peake-Jones had a falling out, with their characters, Leonard and Mrs. C, nearly splitting after Leonard's relationship with Daniel came to lig...

*Warning: This episode contains spoilers for Episode Five of Season Four of *Grantchester. Detective Geordie Keating’s put-upon wife, Cathy, has faced marital betrayal, a growing family and a murder-obsessed husband with quiet grace, but this season in Grantchester, Cathy has her own career to worry about. Actor Kacey Ainsworth talks about working with Robson Green, the pleasures of a lived-in fic...

*Warning: This episode contains spoilers for Episode Four of Season Four of *Grantchester. The heavy burden of replacing Grantchester lead James Norton in the village vicar’s pulpit falls to none other than Tom Brittney, and it’s a role he’s thrilled to take up. With a warm welcome from fans and the on-set Grantchester family alike, Brittney reveals how it felt to motorcycle in to the sleepy villa...

*Warning: This episode contains spoilers for Episode Three of Season Four of *Grantchester. With the recent departure of his friend and castmate, James Norton, from the fields and dells of Grantchester , Robson Green is quick to reassure fans of his series that his character isn’t going anywhere just yet. As the fourth season continues along, Green describes what it meant to say goodbye to Norton,...

*Warning: This episode contains spoilers for Episodes One and Two of Season Four of *Grantchester. After a two-year gap, the crime-solving Rev. Sidney Chambers of *Grantchester *is back on the case — only to leave the village in pursuit of love and social justice abroad. We speak to series creator, head writer and executive producer Daisy Coulam about James Norton's final day on set, Robson Green'...

*Warning: This episode contains spoilers for Episode Two of Season Six of *Endeavour. In this sixth season of Endeavour , series lead Shaun Evans slips behind the camera for a change in a dramatic second episode. It’s a move that Evans found easy — and one he hopes to have the opportunity to continue elsewhere in his career. He explains how he did it — and how his Endeavour Morse continues to crac...

You already know the story…boy meets girl, pride meets prejudice, all in a beautiful wrapper: the dramatic Cornish cliffs and dazzling sea. And as we get ready for the final season of Poldark , we here at MASTERPIECE are starting a new podcast we’re calling Mining Poldark, so you can relive the romance, the adventure and the exploits of our flawed hero all over again. Hear co-hosts Barrett Brounta...

*Warning: This episode contains spoilers for Episode Six of *Les Miserables. After six dramatic episodes and several decades of on-screen struggle, Andrew Davies' masterful new adaptation of Victor Hugo's  Les Misérables has ended. In a special episode of MASTERPIECE Studio, we hear from Davies and series stars Dominic West and David Oyelowo about how it felt to bring the story of Jean Valjean and...

*Warning: This episode contains spoilers for Episode Six of Season Three of *Unforgotten. Alex Jennings is already a MASTERPIECE regular, with his role as the suave King Leopold in three seasons of  Victoria. He's become known for his ability to fully inhabit royal personas, like as the Duke of Windsor in Netflix's The Crown . As Dr. Tim Finch in the third season of *Unforgotten, *however, Jenning...

*Warning: This episode contains spoilers for Episode Four of *Les Miserables. Screenwriter Andrew Davies has been a true master of modern television adaptations, bringing such iconic works as Middlemarch and *Little Dorit *to the MASTERPIECE screen for decades. Now, as he looks ahead to the end of his critically-acclaimed recent adaptation of Victor Hugo’s Les Misérables , Davies also previews his...

*Warning: This episode contains spoilers for Episode Three of *Les Miserables. Actor Lily Collins tried her best to not lose herself in the devastating role of* Les Misérables*' Fantine. Collins explains how she stayed grounded on set, where she found inspiration for her iconic tragic heroine and why her onscreen injury was all-too painfully real.

*Warning: This episode contains spoilers for Episode Two of *Les Miserables. In Victor Hugo's landmark epic, Les Miserables, the Inspector Javert is a hard, cold man with a unflinching pursuit of his own personal justice. But in the critically-acclaimed new MASTERPIECE adaptation of the novel, actor and series executive producer David Oyelowo brings a subtle, sophisticated nuance to his performanc...

Warning: This episode contains spoilers for Episode One of Les Miserables. After a career of playing notable villains,  actor Dominic West says he’s ready to turn a new leaf. So his role as the tortured thief, Jean Valjean, in the new MASTERPIECE production of Victor Hugo’s classic novel, Les Misérables , is a helpful bridge to be a better man on screen. In an interview, he talks about what it mea...

*Warning: This episode contains spoilers for Episode Three of *Mrs. Wilson. The story of Alison Wilson’s relationship with British spy novelist and actual spy, Alexander Wilson, almost seems too wild for reality and too bizarre for the author’s own fiction. But the history, beautifully brought to life by Wilson’s granddaughter, Ruth Wilson, was real. It’s a genre-busting journey where series write...

*Warning: This episode contains spoilers for Episode One of Season Three of *Unforgotten. When writer Chris Lang created the MASTERPIECE Mystery! series *Unforgotten, *he looked to capture the very ordinary extraordinariness of a modern police force. With a new season on the way, Lang explains what viewers should watch out for as Cassie and Sunny unearth another unidentified body beneath a London...

*Warning: This episode contains spoilers for Episodes One and Two of *Mrs. Wilson. When actor Ruth Wilson's grandmother, Alison, died, she left her family a surprisingly candid memoir about her relationship with her secret agent husband, the mystery author Alexander Wilson. The truths that Ruth and her extended family came to learn form the backbone of the new series, *Mrs. Wilson. *Ruth explores...

*Warning: This episode contains spoilers for Episode Eight of Season Three of *Victoria. Victoria star Jenna Coleman lead a smashing third season of the series, with her royal character growing in roles both maternal and majestic. As the season wraps up, Coleman explores how the young Queen struggles to keep control of her country and her growing family, and reflects on the highlights of a thrilli...

*Warning: This episode contains spoilers for Episode Seven of Season Three of *Victoria. The scheming Princess Feodora snuck into Buckingham Palace early in the third season of  Victoria , surprising her half-sister, the Queen, and continuing to lurk in the background of the main royal drama. Actor Kate Fleetwood credits her just-so German accent for helping her sink into the role, but she also ac...

*Warning: This episode contains spoilers for Episode Six of Season Three of *Victoria. Actor Alex Jennings calls himself “a common boy from Essex,” but his career on stage and screen has included at least four different royal roles. Victoria ’s scheming King Leopold offers new insight into his role on the series, where he looks for inspiration when playing real-life characters, and why he sees Leo...

*Warning: This episode contains spoilers for Episode Five of Season Three of *Victoria. Laurence Fox is well known to MASTERPIECE viewers after his eight seasons on the beloved series *Inspector Lewis*, so his appearance on Victoria as the devious UK Foreign Secretary, Lord Palmerston, is a welcome return to the screen. Fox offers hints as to how he and actor Jordan Waller got up to mischief on se...

*Warning: This episode contains spoilers for Episode Four of Season Three of *Victoria. The irascible Nancy Skerrett snuck into her job as a dresser at Buckingham Palace under an assumed name, and came to win Queen Victoria’s heart in the past three seasons of the show. And as part of the audience-favorite couple, “Skerrettelli,” actor Nell Hudson has won viewers’ hearts as well. Hudson tells us w...

*Warning: This episode contains spoilers for Episode Three of Season Three of *Victoria. From the very first episode of MASTERPIECE’s *Victoria, *Lady Emma Portman has been the center of royal intrigue, even if very little of the drama focuses on her. Lady Portman knows who loves who, who spurned who, and what Queen Victoria is really thinking as political favors wax and wane. Actor Anna Wilson-Jo...

*Warning: This episode contains spoilers for Episode Two of Season Three of *Victoria. Among the many fictional Buckingham Palace servants and staffers on MASTERPIECE's  Victoria , Ferdinand Kingsley's Charles Elmé Francatelli is based on an actual royal chef and author. Kingsley's cook is a slight bit younger — and a bit more of a rogue — than the actual Francatelli, but he's convinced his on-scr...