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Tuesday 5 March 2013
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Keeley Hawes and Tom Hollander line up for BBC2 comedy Our Men
Keeley Hawes: will play the ambassador’s wife. Photograph: Tristram Kenton
Keeley Hawes and Tom Hollander will star alongside David Mitchell and Robert Webb in the pair's new BBC2 comedy drama, Our Men. The new series, written by Rev co-creator James Wood and Rupert Walters (Spooks), will be set in the fictional central Asian republic of Tazbekistan. Mitchell will play the new British ambassador, with Webb his second in command. Hawes, who has previously guest starred in the pair's BBC2 sketch show That Mitchell and Webb Look, will play the ambassador's wife. Also starring in Our Men, which is being made by The Mitchell & Webb Company and Big Talk Productions, are Yigal Naor, Susan Lynch, Amara Karan (who made a striking film debut in Wes Anderson's The Darjeeling Limited) and Shivani Ghai. Rev star Hollander will take a guest spot as minor royal turned trade envoy Prince Mark (a minor echo of his role as Edward, of Edward and Wallis Simpson fame, in Channel 4's William Boyd adaptation Any Human Heart). Any resemblance to living people is presumably entirely coincidental. Hawes appeared in That Mitchell and Webb Look as Mitchell's "dream wife". Now she really will be his wife. Well, the ambassador's...
Posted byMonkey12.45 GMT -
Arnold Schwarzenegger – from dead baddies to dead trees
‘I want 500 words on steroid use in bodybuilding competitions, and I want them now!’ Arnold Schwarzenegger is to edit two fitness magazines. Photograph: SNAP/Rex
We're used to seeing him flexing his pecs on screen, but now it looks like Arnold Schwarzenegger is turning his intellectual muscle towards the media. The Terminator/Governator … and probably lots of other -ators … is going to add magazine editing to his repertoire of skills, reports i. Before the head honchos at titles such as the Spectator, Economist and New Statesman start fearing for their jobs, worry not, Arnie has reportedly been named executive editor of Muscle & Fitness and Flex magazines. Stick with what you know, big man.
Posted byMonkey09.16 GMT -
Monday 4 March 2013
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Guardian US fires off debut ad campaign
One of the Guardian US ads, which showcase opposing views on a series of issues
Guardian US has launched its first advertising campaign, "VoiceYourView", to promote its American digital operation. Outdoor ads will appear in targeted locations in New York, Chicago, Los Angeles and San Francisco. Each poster's Noma Bar illustration represents one side of an issue – internet privacy, the use of condoms in the adult film industry, gun control, women in the military – which when flipped showcases the opposing view. BBH New York's campaign also features mobile and social elements, with a VoiceYourView microsite for submissions on the issues covered by the campaign and people able to use Instagram and Twitter to post photos showing which side of each debate they support using the hashtag #VoiceYourView. As a public service to younger readers, here's how the Guardian marketed a similar message... back when this here internet malarky was all just fields.
Posted byMedia Monkey19.25 GMT -
Daily Mirror gives Ian Hyland a screen break
The Daily Mirror has hired Ian Hyland, formerly of the Mail on Sunday and News of the World, as its new TV columnist. Photograph: Martin Argles for the Guardian
After years of seemingly never ending cutbacks, Trinity Mirror's national titles are hiring again. The latest addition to the Daily Mirror is Ian Hyland, the TV columnist formerly of the Mail on Sunday and News of the World. Hyland is no stranger to Trinity, having started his Fleet Street career as a showbiz hack at the Sunday Mirror in 2000. He returns to the Mirror fold with a weekly TV column in the daily title, starting on Tuesday. The Mirror's previous TV columnist, Jim Shelley, thumbed his remote for the last time in November. Lloyd Embley, editor-in-chief of the national Mirror papers, described Hyland's appointment as "a fantastic signing". He is the latest high-profile addition to the Mirror's ranks since Embley took over in October 2012. His arrival follows the return of Andy Lines as chief reporter, and the introduction of new columns by Lord Prescott in the Daily Mirror and Carole Malone in the Sunday Mirror. Game on.
Posted byMonkey11.01 GMT -
Coronation Street: David Platt star adds a twist of Lemon
Coronation Street: Jack P Shepherd tees up trouble. Photograph: ITV
Coronation Street character David Platt may have (temporarily) outgrown his "evil" past, but the actor who plays him, Jack P Shepherd, has been showing a distinctly devilish streak on the soap recently. The Daily Star reports that Shepherd has been told off by Corrie bosses after sporting a T-shirt with the word "Sha-ting!" – based on a sound effect used by Celebrity Juice's Keith Lemon – on screen. Shepherd tweeted: "Some 'no-lives' have complained about the 'Sha-ting' T-shirt on Corrie so it has been taken off air. But I'm going to auction it off for charity so I will get the T-shirt next week and give you the details if ya want it." The star was previously banned from wearing a T-shirt with the slogan "Turn Me On" – and forced several scenes to be reshot after he wore a top emblazoned "Schwetty Nuts". Jack, don't be a dingbat.
Posted byMonkey10.01 GMT -
Sunday 3 March 2013
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Media Monkey's Diary: Simon Heffer, Martin Sorrell and swans
Heffer horror … Jennifer Lawrence was featured smoking a 'suspicious cigarette' in the Mail. Photograph: Mike Blake/Reuters
Posted byMonkey18.13 GMT -
Friday 1 March 2013
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Great British Bake Off set to whip some media types into shape
Muffin or mule? … TV bosses at Edinburgh will have to bake for Paul Hollywood and Mary Berry. Photograph: Amanda Searle
Registration has opened for the 2013 Guardian Edinburgh International Television Festival, while this year's opening session – a time honoured festival tradition in which top TV suits endure all manner of humiliation as contestants on a live version of the hit format du jour – will channel Great British Bake Off, under the watchful eye of Paul Hollywood and official national treasure Mary Berry. The roll call of TV types making tits of themselves in years past includes 2005's Strictly Come Dancing featuring Channel 5's then director of programmes Dan Chambers shaving his chest and leapfrogging his dance partner and former Sky and C5 exec Richard Woolfe sporting a tight black ensemble slashed to the navel. Woolfe, a serial offender who also did turns in GEITF versions of Stars In Their Eyes and Britain's Got Talent – joined on stage by 20 school children in traditional Irish dress for his Flatley-esque jig during the latter – was nonetheless outdone in the jaw-dropping awfulness stakes in the same 2009 contest by Jana Bennett. The then BBC Vision director's assault and battery of 60s hit The Letter was described by judge Amanda Holden as "music to slit your wrists to". Monkey can't wait – contestants, start your blenders!
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