Alan Yentob’s imagine… will return to the BBC with episodes dedicated to the opening of the Aviva Factory Studios and Russell T Davies.
The 4 films for BBC One and BBC iPlayer also feature the Pet Shop Boys and French & Saunders.
Opening the series will be imagine… Manchester’s New Factory (working title), which will tell the story of the multimillion pound cultural venue.
Described as the most “important cultural development in Europe” the documentary will focus on Danny Boyle’s Free Your Mind the retelling of the 1999 film The Matrix, which opened the venue.
But it will also go back to the routes of Manchester’s cultural regeneration as well as the pressure on the venue to be a success – it came in at a cost of £240m, more than twice its original budget.
The programme will hear from local performers, artists, city leaders and students, and will watch as the Free Your Mind cast take to the stage for the first time with a performance that, in the words of Danny Boyle, seeks to, “hand over the keys of the building to the people of Manchester”.
The second Manchester-influenced film is imagine… Russell T Davies: The Doctor and Me (w/t).
Cameras follow him as he returns as the showrunner for Doctor Who.
Going behind the scenes at the Bad Wolf Studios in Cardiff, it features Ncuti Gatwa, the Fifteenth Doctor, ahead of his tenure as the Time Lord, after the unexpected regeneration of David Tennant.
But it won’t just focus on the now, it will trace the evolution of Russell T Davies’ writing, from his beginnings at Granada Television – its Quay Street site was next-door to the new Factory studio. He worked on soaps including Coronation Street and later Channel 4’s landmark gay series Queer As Folk, as well as 2021’s critically acclaimed AIDS drama, It’s A Sin.
The film will hear from David Tennant, Helena Bonham Carter, Olly Alexander, Sally Wainwright and Caitlin Moran.
imagine… is a BBC Studios Specialist Factual Production for BBC One and BBC iPlayer.
Alan Yentob is the Series Editor; Executive Producer is Tanya Hudson, Producer/Directors of the series are Catherine Abbott, Alex Harding, Laura Blount and Louise Lockwood. It was commissioned for BBC Arts by Mark Bell.
