BBC's Wolf Hall leads Bafta TV award nominations

http://www.theguardian.com/media/2016/mar/30/bbc-wolf-hall-bafta-tv-award-nominations-idris-elba

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Wolf Hall is set to dominate this year’s Bafta television awards with four nominations including its star Mark Rylance who will compete with Luther’s Idris Elba for the best acting prize.

There was also a first nomination for singer Adele, for her BBC1 special Adele at the BBC, but nothing for ITV’s Downton Abbey in its last chance to break its Bafta TV awards duck.

BBC2’s Wolf Hall led the pack in the nominations announced on Wednesday, with three nominations each for Peter Kay’s BBC1 comedy Car Share and Channel 4 drama, This is England ’90.

But there was nothing for BBC1 drama Poldark, starring Aidan Turner, which became one of the most talked-about TV events of last year.

Downton Abbey, which ended on ITV last year, also missed out and has never won a Bafta TV award despite being one of the broadcaster’s biggest shows and leading the British invasion of US television. It had the consolation of a Bafta “special” award last year.

Rylance, who won an Oscar last month for his role in Steven Spielberg’s Bridge of Spies, will go up against Elba, Ben Whishaw for his role in BBC2’s London Spy, and This is England’s Stephen Graham.

Rylance’s Wolf Hall co-star Claire Foy is nominated for best actress alongside Sheridan Smith for BBC1’s The C-Word, Suranne Jones, star of BBC1’s Doctor Foster, and Ruth Madeley (BBC3’s Don’t Take My Baby).

Adele, who won four awards at the Brit awards last month following the record-breaking success of her third album, 25, is nominated in the entertainment category for her TV special in which she sang songs from the album and talked to Graham Norton.

She will compete against Chris Evans’s TFI Friday anniversary special on Channel 4, BBC1’s Strictly Come Dancing and Simon Cowell’s Britain’s Got Talent for ITV.

BBC1’s The Great British Bake Off, the most-watched TV programme of 2015, received its fifth consecutive Bafta nomination.

Two of the most acclaimed actors of their generation received best supporting actor nods – Ian McKellen for his role opposite Anthony Hopkins in BBC2’s The Dresser, and Tom Courtenay for ITV’s Unforgotten.

It is McKellen’s first Bafta TV nomination – he has been nominated four times in the film awards, but never won.

Wolf Hall was nominated for best drama series along with sci-fi drama Humans and Paul Abbott’s No Offence, both on Channel 4, and Sky Atlantic’s The Last Panthers, starring John Hurt.

Two BBC1 dramas, Doctor Foster and London Spy, were nominated for best mini-series, alongside This is England ’90 and Sky Living’s The Enfield Haunting.

Jack Thorne, who wrote This is England ‘90 and The Last Panthers, is up for a total of three awards, his nominations hat-trick completely by BBC3’s Don’t Take My Baby, nominated for best single drama.

Among the comedy nominations Peter Kay’s Car Share, which debuted on the BBC1’s iPlayer, led the way with performance nominations for both Kay and his co-star and co-writer, Sian Gibson.

Car Share was also nominated in the scripted comedy category, along with the final run of Channel 4’s Peep Show, E4’s Chewing Gum and People Just Do Nothing, on BBC3.

Amazon Prime’s transgender comedy Transparent, starring Jeffrey Tambor, is up for Bafta’s international prize - its first Bafta nomination - along with Netflix original production Narcos, French police drama Spiral and CBS’s the Good Wife.

Louis Theroux is nominated for the single documentary prize for his BBC2 programme, Transgender Kids, along with Channel 4’s My Son The Jihadi, BBC1’s Life After Suicide and Adam Curtis’s Bitter Lake, on the BBC iPlayer.

Other nominations include Turner prize winner Grayson Perry for Channel 4’s Grayson Perry’s Dream House in the specialist factual category and BBC2’s Stargazing Live: Brit in Space, about astronaut Tim Peake on the International Space Station, which is nominated for best live event.

In the news coverage category, both BBC1 and Channel 4 News are nominated for their coverage of last year’s Paris attacks.

Without a nomination in any of the main awards, Poldark – famous for its scenes of topless scything – also missed out at the Royal Television Society awards earlier this month.

But the drama remake did make the cut for Bafta’s Radio Times audience award, which is voted for by viewers and will also be presented on the night, one of a six-strong shortlist alongside Doctor Foster, Peter Kay’s Car Share, The Great British Bake Off, Humans and Netflix documentary series Making a Murderer.

The Bafta TV awards will take place at London’s Royal Festival Hall on 8 May.