Categories Bramwell TV series

“Bramwell” starts on the Drama Channel – Saturdays at 1pm

Drama Channel in the UK will be showing “Bramwell” starting tomorrow at 1pm. It looks like 4 episodes each Saturday:

More information at the Drama Channel Website.

Categories Articles & Interviews Bramwell Media Press & Interviews TV series

Acting World’s latest Redgrave has a British take on Dr. Quinn

We’re concluding our “quotes by Jemma” series with another interview from 1996 where Jemma talked about the complexity of her character Eleanor Bramwell. You can read the interview below:

You’ve heard of the Redgrave sisters: Vanessa and Lynn. Then, there’s their father, Sir Michael, and Vanessa’s acting daughters, Natasha and Joely Richardson. Now meet Jemma Redgrave – England’s answer to Dr. Quinn.

Redgrave stars in “Bramwell,” a four-part “Masterpiece Theatre” series that concludes at 9 p.m. Sunday on PBS (Channel 28). The British actress plays a Victorian-era doctor who perseveres through the prejudices of the time, much like our own homespun frontier doc, CBS’ Michaela Quinn.

“She’s very complex, and contradictory. She’s so courageous, bold and unconventional for her time,” says Redgrave of her character, Dr. Eleanor Bramwell. “And, she’s vulnerable. She’s naive about men and relationships.”

“Bramwell” runs as a regular TV series in England; here, new episodes of the series will run as another four-part series, slated for the fall.

The daughter of actor Corin Redgrave (Vanessa’s brother) and his wife, Deidre, Redgrave says she knew from an early age she wanted to act.

“I don’t know – it’s in the genetic code, I guess,” she says.

There were trepidations.

“The only reservations I had about acting is that I didn’t know whether I had an aptitude for it,” she says. Until, that is, she received “incredible notices” for her stage debut, in a play called “Easter,” and her mind was set at ease.

“Then I felt absolutely sure that I wasn’t going to embarrass my family,” she says.

Now, how would she feel if her son Gabriel, now 2, decided to follow in the footsteps of the theatrical Redgrave family, rather than in those of her husband, Tim, a lawyer?

“I think I’d just try and encourage him – and give him a few phone numbers,” she says, laughing.

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Categories Articles & Interviews Bramwell Media Press & Interviews TV series

Jemma’s set to turn up the heat

Jemma Redgrave will have temperatures rising when she returns to our screens as Dr Eleanor Bramwell.

For in the new series, we discover more about Dr Bramwell’s private life as her romance continues with Finn O’Neill – and it promises to be streamy.

As Jemma explains: “Victorian life wasn’t as stuffy as we are led to believe. People did have sex as well as blazing rows.

“She is human, warts and all. I would like to have her as a friend. But I think she would be exhausting and demanding.”

Meanwhile, Jemma revealed that her number one fan is her three-year-old son, Gabriel.

The wee fellow is a regular on the set of Bramwell.

Jemma said: “He particularly likes the microscope. It’s great that I am able to take him to work.”

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Categories Articles & Interviews Bramwell Media Press & Interviews TV series

The day I had to saw off a man’s leg; INTERVIEW: Jemma Redgrave

Thought to shake things up a little so we’re having a few new/old interviews posted on the website soon. This is a fav of mine…

STAGING an underground train crash was tough enough for the makers of Victorian medical series Bramwell (ITV, 9pm). But there was one drama that was completely unrehearsed.

The set was invaded by 30 armed men in balaclavas.

Jemma Redgrave, who plays pioneering doctor Eleanor Bramwell, says: “They rushed out of one tunnel and disappeared into the other and totally ignored us. Later we discovered they were security services on a training mission. They didn’t seem the least bit fazed by seeing us. But we were all stunned – to put it mildly.”

The set for the dramatic opening episode of the new series was created at the now disused Aldwych London Underground station.

Equipment had to be manhandled down 165 stairs. But that wasn’t the only difficulty. In the train crash, Eleanor has to operate on a man whose leg has been crushed in a derailment. The problem was how to make the operation look authentic. The answer: a joint of pork.

“I have to say that working with a leg of pork under hot lights in a cramped set for several hours made the scene reek of authenticity,” says Jemma.

“Our producer was never allowed near because he would pass out at the sight of blood. But I relish the operations because I’m not squeamish. I find the medical aspects of the stories fascinating – and you don’t have to worry about motivation when you are sawing through a leg.”

In the new series, Eleanor is involved with a fellow doctor but her father disapproves.

“He thinks the man is a scheming opportunist,” says Jemma, who is married with a two-year-old son, Gabriel. “He thinks she’s a hussy.”

Jemma says it’s too early to say whether her own son will follow in the famous Redgrave acting family footsteps.

“It’s hard to tell what dramatic talent he might have,” she says. “When I was a child, I loved being around the theatre and becoming an actress was the natural thing to do.

“Having the Redgrave name was a problem only in that I didn’t want to let myself or my family down.”

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