The rumours first emerged back in July last year, but now it’s official — BBC2’s twentysomething drama This Life is to return for a one-off feature-length special, marking the show’s tenth anniversary.
A very astute friend of mine told me about this last week, after seeing an interview with Jason Hughes, who played Warren in the series and is now starring in ITV crime series Midsomer Murders:
I’m contracted to Midsomer Murders for 10 months of the year but even though we have a break at the end of September I go straight into filming a one-off film of This Life, which catches up with everybody 10 years later. I start that on the 23rd of September, get married on the 24th, have the 25th off and then I’m back at work on the 26th!
Following a repeat on BBC2 of both series 1 and 2 of the original show, the special will reunite Warren with fellow original Benjamin Street housemates Miles (Jack Davenport), Anna (Daniela Nardini), Milly (Amita Dhiri) and Egg (Andrew Lincoln). There’s no news yet on whether Kira (Luisa Bradshaw-White) or her bisexual biker cousin Ferdy (Ramon Tikaram) will appear, or whether Natasha Little’s über-bitch, Rachel, ever survive the pasting she got from Milly in the final episodes.
Says the BBC:
One of the group has become a commercial success after writing a book based on their friendship, and a TV production company is keen to film the group’s reunion. Viewers will discover how the group’s lives have changed and whether they are friends, lovers or enemies – or all three!
The cast have had varying degrees of success on stage and screen — Jack Davenport, of course, stars in the Pirates of the Caribbean films; Hughes attends more improbable deaths in Home Counties villages than could be reasonably healthy; Tikaram is fresh from a turn at the ENO as Gaddafi — The Living Myth. But the show has proved a springboard for otrher successes, too: series creator Amy Jenkins is now a chick-lit novelist; supporting actor Cyril Nri would later become Superintendent Okaro in The Bill; background artist Martin Freeman went from nicking money from Milly and Egg’s bedroom at a party to starring in The Office; and the show’s music supervisor, whose track choices helped ground the series as perfect twentysomething fodder, has achieved a modicum of success, too.
His name? Ricky Gervais.
This Life — Ten Years On is expected to air sometime around Christmas.
