TMS to appear on BBC TV in ‘Call the Midwife’!

The Maidstone Singers have recently completed filming with the BBC and are to appear next year as a choir in the new series of ‘Call the Midwife’. We are unable to go into more detail about our role at this stage but…stay tuned! You may be interested in the following publicity release.

Made by Neal Street productions for BBC One, the award-winning drama series began filming this month for a Christmas special in 2013 and new series of 8 episodes in 2014. Written and created by Heidi Thomas, the third series continues filming on location at the historic Chatham dockyard with its base now housed at studios in Chertsey, Surrey. Based on the best-selling memoirs of the late Jennifer Worth, audiences can expect to see all the well-loved cast returning to the streets of Poplar with some new faces in residence too.

Call the Midwife was the biggest new drama series on BBC One in over a decade, and the second series averaged a consolidated series average of over 10 million which firmly establishes the series as the highest rated drama this year on any channel.

The series 2 finale saw Nonnatus House under threat of demolition, a baby boy for Chummy and PC Noakes and a romantic marriage proposal between Dr Turner and Sister Bernadette.  In series 3 it’s 1959 and the eve of the swinging Sixties. The winds of change are sweeping through the country and the residents of Nonnatus House face some momentous changes of their own.

Call the Midwife has won accolades across the industry including 2013 BAFTA Craft awards for director Philippa Lowthorpe and Christine Walmesley-Cotham for Make Up and Hair Design. The series also won TV Choice Awards for ‘Best New Drama’ and ‘Best Actress’ for Miranda Hart last year. She also took home the same title at the National Television Awards this year and the series won ‘HD Drama Programme of the Year’ at the TRIC awards.

Nominations for the first series include the 2013 BAFTA Radio Times Audience Award, last year’s BAFTA TV award for Miranda as ‘Supporting Actress’ and BAFTA’s Craft Award for Amy Roberts in the ‘Costume Design’ category.  The show was nominated for ‘Best Drama Series’ at the RTS awards and Jessica Raine was a ‘Times Breakthrough’ nominee at the 2012 South Bank Sky Arts Awards.

Call the Midwife has also seen worldwide success, particularly in America, where the first series on PBS saw a fifty percent ratings boost in the slot and Series 2 received great acclaim. The Holiday Special episode recently received a Christopher Award in the ‘TV/Cable’ category.  Series 1 was also one of the highest rated dramas in Australia last year, outperforming the channel’s slot average share and ranking first in its time slot against all competition in New Zealand. Call the Midwife peaked in Sweden with 1.2 million viewers, outperforming SVT1’s slot average share by 45% for its peak episode.

Call the Midwife is written and created by Heidi Thomas, Executive Producers are Pippa Harris and Heidi Thomas. Executive Producer for the BBC is Christopher Aird and for PBS is Donald H. Thoms, with Hugh Warren returning as Producer.