"Wolf Hall" wins Best Drama Series, Leading Actor distinction for Mark Rylance
By Shawn Pogatchnik
DUBLIN (AP) --Rarely has an awards show begun on such a rousing note.
Sunday’s annual British Academy Television Awards, Britain’s equivalent of the Emmys, gave the night’s first prize for best drama series to BBC’s “Wolf Hall.” The director, Peter Kosminsky, seized the moment for a celebrity call to arms against a Conservative government keen to shift taxpayers’ money away from the publicly funded broadcaster.
Kosminsky said Culture Secretary John Whittingdale was only half-joking when he quipped this week that the demise of the BBC was “a tempting prospect.”
To rising cheers, the director declared that the quality of British broadcasting was “the envy of the world and we should stand up and fight for it! Not let it go by default. If we don’t, blink and it will be gone.”
Kosminsky warned that making TV production increasingly dependent on commercial interests would produce “a broadcasting landscape where the only determinant of whether something gets made is whether it’s likely to line the pockets of its shareholders. No! No! It is time for us to stand up and say no to this dangerous nonsense.”
The London crowd literally did, giving Kosminsky a thunderous standing ovation to the visible awe of presenters Justin Timberlake and Anna Kendrick.
“Wolf Hall,” a six-part historical drama depicting Tudor revolutionary Thomas Cromwell in the 16th-century court of Henry VIII, received eight Emmy nominations and won the Golden Globe for best miniseries.
Its Emmy-nominated star, veteran stage actor Mark Rylance, told reporters backstage that he owed his Oscar-winning performance as a Russian intelligence agent in Steven Spielberg’s 2015 film “Bridge of Spies” to Kosminsky’s 17 weeks of guidance on the set of “Wolf Hall.”
“I don’t think I would have acted it so well if it was not for ‘Wolf Hall,’” said Rylance, who also took home Sunday’s award for best actor for his portrayal of Cromwell. “Peter taught me so much confidence about thinking in front of the camera, and not displaying and showing things, and I will always be grateful.”
Here’s a rundown of BAFTA TV winners:
FELLOWSHIP
RAY GALTON AND ALAN SIMPSON
SPECIAL AWARD
LENNY HENRY
LEADING ACTOR
MARK RYLANCE Wolf Hall – BBC Two
LEADING ACTRESS
SURANNE JONES Doctor Foster – BBC One
SUPPORTING ACTOR
TOM COURTENAY Unforgotten – ITV
SUPPORTING ACTRESS
CHANEL CRESSWELL This is England ’90 – Channel 4
ENTERTAINMENT PERFORMANCE
LEIGH FRANCIS Celebrity Juice – ITV2
FEMALE PERFORMANCE IN A COMEDY PROGRAM
MICHAELA COEL Chewing Gum – E4
MALE PERFORMANCE IN A COMEDY PROGRAM
PETER KAY Peter Kay’s Car Share –BBC iPlayer
SINGLE DRAMA
DON’T TAKE MY BABY Jack Thorne, Ben Anthony, Pier Wilkie, Aysha Rafaele – BBC Documentaries Production/BBC Three
MINI-SERIES
THIS IS ENGLAND ’90 Shane Meadows, Mark Herbert, Jack Thorne, Rebekah Wray Rogers – Warp Films/Channel 4
DRAMA SERIES
WOLF HALL Peter Kosminsky, Peter Straughan, Mark Pybus, Colin Callender – Playground Entertainment, Company Pictures/BBC Two
SOAP & CONTINUING DRAMA
EASTENDERS Production Team – BBC Drama Production London/BBC One
INTERNATIONAL
TRANSPARENT Production Team – Amazon Studios/Amazon Prime Instant Video
FACTUAL SERIES
THE MURDER DETECTIVES Ben Brown, Bart Corpe, Neil Grant, Dave Nath – Films of Record/Channel 4
SPECIALIST FACTUAL
BRITAIN’S FORGOTTEN SLAVE OWNERS Production Team – BBC History Unit/BBC Two
SINGLE DOCUMENTARY
MY SON THE JIHADI Production Team – True Vision/Channel 4
FEATURES
THE GREAT BRITISH BAKE OFF Production Team – Love Productions/BBC One
REALITY & CONSTRUCTED FACTUAL
FIRST DATES Nicola Lloyd, Martin Conway, Adam Chapman, Rob Clifford – Twenty Twenty/Channel 4
CURRENT AFFAIRS
OUTBREAK: THE TRUTH ABOUT EBOLA (THIS WORLD) Dan Edge, Sasha Joelle Achilli , Eamonn
Matthews, Sarah Waldron– Mongoose Pictures/Quicksilver Media/BBC Two
NEWS COVERAGE
CHANNEL 4 NEWS: PARIS MASSACRE Jon Snow, Lindsey Hilsum, Jonathan Rugman, Ben de Pear – Channel 4 News/Channel 4
SPORT
THE ASHES Bryan Henderson, Mark Lynch, David Lloyd, Ian Ward – Sky Sports/Sky Sports 2
LIVE EVENT
BIG BLUE LIVE Production Team – BBC/BBC One
ENTERTAINMENT PROGRAM
STRICTLY COME DANCING Louise Rainbow, Vinnie Shergill, Sarah James, Nikki Parsons – BBC Entertainment/BBC One
COMEDY AND COMEDY ENTERTAINMENT PROGRAM
HAVE I GOT NEWS FOR YOU Richard Wilson, Mark Barrett, Danny Carr, Jo Bunting – Hat Trick Productions/BBC One
SCRIPTED COMEDY
PETER KAY’S CAR SHARE Peter Kay, Gill Isles, Sian Gibson, Paul Coleman – Goodnight Vienna
RADIO TIMES AUDIENCE AWARD (voted for by members of the public)
POLDARK
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