✕ ✕
Turning tips into memories
Login
Signup

You have reached the limit of free articles.


To enjoy unlimited access to Culture Whisper sign up for FREE.
Find out more about Culture Whisper

Please fix the following input errors:

  • dummy

Each week, we send newsletters and communication featuring articles, our latest tickets invitations, and exclusive offers.

Occasional information about discounts, special offers and promotions.


OR
LOG IN

OR
  • LOG IN WITH FACEBOOK

Thanks for signing up to Culture Whisper.
Please check your inbox for a confirmation email and click the link to verify your account.



EXPLORE CULTURE WHISPER
✕ ✕
Turning tips into memories
Login
Signup

Please fix the following input errors:

  • dummy
Forgot your username or password?
Don't have an account? Sign Up

OR
  • LOG IN WITH FACEBOOK

If you click «Log in with Facebook» and are not a Culture Whisper user, you agree to our Terms & Conditions and to our Privacy Policy, which includes our Cookie Use

Support Us Login
  • Home
  • Going Out
    • Things to do
    • Food & Drink
    • Theatre
    • Visual Arts
    • Cinema
    • Kids
    • Festival
    • Gigs
    • Dance
    • Classical Music
    • Opera
    • Immersive
    • Talks
  • Staying In
    • TV
    • Books
    • Cook
    • Podcast
    • Design
    • Netflix
  • Life & Style
    • Beauty
    • Fashion
    • Gifting
    • Wellbeing
    • Lifestyle
    • Shopping
    • Jewellery
  • Explore
  • Shopping
  • CW SHOPS
  • Support Us
  • Get Started
  • Tickets
  • CW SHOPS
Get the Best of London Life, Culture and Style
By entering my email I agree to the CultureWhisper Privacy Policy (we won`t share data & you can unsubscribe anytime).
TV

Press, BBC One review ★★★★★

Your new autumn obsession: Press, from the creator of Dr Foster, comes to BBC One

By Helena Kealey on 7/9/2018

2 CW readers are interested
Press, BBC One
Press, BBC One
Press, BBC One review 4 Press, BBC One review Helena Kealey
We hate to state the obvious, but setting your new BBC drama in two London based newsrooms is never going to enamour you to your critics.


TRY CULTURE WHISPER
Receive free tickets & insider tips to unlock the best of London — direct to your inbox
Journalists were falling over themselves to praise the TV writer Mike Bartlett when the focus of his stinging dramas was Prince Charles in Charles III, or mad ex-wives in Dr Foster.


But now, poor old Bartlett has had to hand over his latest six-part series to be critiqued by the very people who come under fire in the show, and who absolutely, definitely know more about the inner workings of a newsroom than its creator. Mmmm. We wonder how it’ll be received.


Well, think of it this way. If Bodyguard had to go through the Met’s Specialist Protection Office before release, or ER was scrutinised by the A&E department of St. George’s hospital, we’d all be laughing at how batty and teeth-grindingly unrealistic the whole thing is, too.




Certainly Press has its moments of madness. How likely is it, really, that owner of the tabloid paper The Post – a badly disguised, shady Rupert Murdoch figure – would be pressing his ‘well-oiled’ editor (Ben Chaplin) for real journalism and be unconcerned with sales?


Or that the deputy news editor of The Post’s lefty rival paper The Herald (Charlotte Riley) would be lumbered with giving some horrid celebrity a tour of the building? She might have some stuff to be getting on with, you know?


And worst of all, that the journalists all take their sweet time laying up beautiful papers rather than just bashing news stories out as quickly as their arthritic fingers will carry them, to be the first to have their story break online.


But, really, who cares? Bartlett gives us deep, thoughtful characters who are either pushing their morality to its very limits (tabloid journalists) or throwing themselves with enthusiasm into the pursuit of justice (scruffy Guardian-style 'proper-news' journalists). And between these two opposing, formidable institutions, there's fraternisation and plotting, making the whole thing feel a bit like Romeo and Juliet.


Underneath all the hysteria, there's a nugget of truth. The gleefully manipulative tabloid editors taking distasteful pleasure in skewering uppity MP’s with their past mistakes feel like Piers Morgan in his kinder moments, our morose and lonely protagonist (Charlotte Riley’s Holly Evans) could be your housemate, and the surrounding cast of oddballs and weirdos and go-getters are exactly the kind of people who would stock newsrooms. Even if journalists don’t like to admit it.


BBC Press release date: September 6


What Press, BBC One review
Price £n/a
Website



Most popular

Things to do in London this weekend: 24–26 March. Photo: The Parakeet, Kentish Town
Things to do in London this weekend: 24–26 March
Irene Maiorino and Alba Rohrwacher in My Brilliant Friend season 4, HBO/Sky Atlantic (Photo: HBO)
My Brilliant Friend, season 4, Sky Atlantic: first-look photo, release date, plot, cast
Best art exhibitions in London. Photo: Thin Air at the Beams
Top exhibitions on now in London

Editor's Picks

House of Peroni, Lincoln's Inn Fields
House of Peroni, Lincoln's Inn Fields
Maniac, Netflix
Maniac on Netflix: here's everything you need to know
Florence Pugh and Alexander Skarsgard in The Little Drummer Girl
The Little Drummer Girl episode one review
Forever, Amazon Prime
The funniest TV show of the year? Forever, Amazon Prime
Vanity Fair ITV
Vanity Fair ITV review:
The raunchiest show on BBC One? Wanderlust airs this autumn
Wanderlust, BBC One review
Sign up to CW’s newsletter
By entering my email I agree to the CultureWhisper Privacy Policy (we won`t share data & you can unsubscribe anytime).
2

You might like

  • Olivia Colman in The Crown season 3, Netflix

    The Crown season 3, Netflix review ★★★★★

  • Maniac, Netflix

    Maniac on Netflix: here's everything you need to know

  • Florence Pugh and Alexander Skarsgard in The Little Drummer Girl

    The Little Drummer Girl episode one review ★★★★★

  • Forever, Amazon Prime

    The funniest TV show of the year? Forever, Amazon Prime

  • Forever, Amazon Prime

    The funniest TV show of the year? Forever, Amazon Prime

  • Vanity Fair ITV

    Vanity Fair ITV review: ★★★★★



  • The Culture Whisper team
  • Support Us
  • Tickets
  • Contact us
  • Press
  • FAQ
  • Privacy
  • Terms and conditions
  • Cookies
  • Discover
  • Venues
  • Restaurants
  • Stations
  • Boroughs
Sign up to CW’s newsletter
By entering my email I agree to the CultureWhisper Privacy Policy (we won`t share data & you can unsubscribe anytime).
×