Midsummer crime’s dream
With Shakespeare & Hathaway back for a long-awaited fifth season, BBC Studios executive producer Neil Irvine tells DQ about the return of the murder-mystery comedy-drama, working with stars Mark Benton and Jo Joyner, and the secret to its success.
It’s been three years since Shakespeare & Hathaway: Private Investigators last aired. Yet while the launch of the fifth season marks the start of a new broadcast deal for the show, its core DNA – a blend of comedy and murder mystery set against the picturesque backdrop of Stratford-upon-Avon – remains intact.
Shakespeare & Hathaway centres on the titular pair of unlikely private investigators, starring Mark Benton as hardboiled ex-cop Frank Hathaway and Jo Joyner as warm-hearted ex-hairdresser Luella Shakespeare, who work together to solve thrilling cases and murders most foul.
Previous seasons of the show premiered on the BBC. But under a new agreement, the 10-episode new season launched first on UKTV’s U&Alibi, and will later come to the BBC and BBC iPlayer. Produced by BBC Studios Drama Productions in Birmingham, Shakespeare & Hathaway is also part of the BBC’s ongoing commitment to investment in the Midlands, which has also hosted BBC Studios productions Father Brown and Sister Boniface Mysteries.
With an average of 2.3 million people tuning into Shakespeare & Hathaway S4, it was the BBC’s second biggest daytime series in 2022. Subsequently, executive producer Neil Irvine says it always made a lot of sense to bring back the series created by Paul Matthew Thompson and the late Jude Tindall.
Though Frank and Lu have gone their separate ways, it’s not long before they’re forced back together again alongside “luvvie assistant” Sebastian (Patrick Walshe McBride). This season, a remote team-building retreat featuring paintballing and a corporate spy offers them the perfect opportunity to test their loyalties – until their client is electrocuted right in front of them.
“Jude sadly passed away last year, but she was always really passionate about bringing it back as well. So we managed to get a deal together and were able to let her know it was coming back, and she was over the moon about it,” he tells DQ. It’s also something of a homecoming for the exec, who started working on the show with Thompson and Tindall in 2015 and was a script producer on the first two seasons.
Now he’s back in a more senior role, “the DNA of the show fundamentally remains the same,” he says. “I didn’t want to reinvent the show with S5. I wanted to give the audience something they knew and loved. With each episode, I’m really interested in a really clear and defined world which has comedy baked into it as well. So it was really key for me to make those episodes as punchy and as comic as possible.”
What has evolved, however, is the show’s format – a direct response to the changing nature of TV viewing habits – which has been infused with hooks to make it a more serialised, bingeable prospect beyond its traditional case-of-the-week structure.
“I just want to give the audience a bit more to make it a bit more bingeable,” he says. “One of the things I decided to do is to use the time difference, the gap between season four and five, as part of the story. So when you come to S5, Frank and Lu are apart. There’s a question about why they’ve split up, and they work on a case that brings them back together. By the end of the series, you find out why they split up in the first place, and there is a satisfying climax and payoff to that as well.”
Elsewhere, an invitation to a school reunion murder mystery reunites Frank with an ex-girlfriend, but it’s game over when the team find themselves trapped in an isolated mansion with a real killer on the loose; Stratford’s annual ‘Horror-upon-Avon’ convention is rocked when a movie director is killed after reportedly being terrorised by his own creations; and when Lu returns from holiday to discover her house has been stolen, Frank, Sebastian and tech whizz Spider pull out all the stops to help find the culprit before Lu loses everything.
Irvine also points to an episode set at a TV shopping channel as one of the season’s highlights. “Frank has his Guy Goma moment,” he says, referring to the time hapless job candidate Goma was famously mistaken for a technology reporter and unwittingly interviewed live on BBC News in 2006.
“It’s just priceless. [Frank is] up there live on television, and he shouldn’t really be,” Irvine says. “We have a lovely episode for Lu this series where she gets home from a holiday in Australia to discover her house has been sold while she’s away. So that is a really personal and evolving case for Lu, and she ends up having to go and stay at Frank’s flat, which for Lu is her worst nightmare. Frank has a rat as well, so she ends up interacting with the rat.”
Though their relationship might be strained this season, the enduring partnership between Frank and Lu – and the chemistry between “two immensely talented comic actors” in Benton and Joyner – is undoubtedly one of the secrets of the show’s success. “Add Patrick Walshe McBride into the mix and you’ve got magic,” Irvine says. “His undercover roles, disguises and accents are real comic highlights of every episode, and this series we get to see more of Frank and Lu undercover. Our costume designer Claire Collins and makeup designer Helen Smith add so much comic value.”
Irvine is also an exec producer on both Father Brown, which wrapped filming on its 13th season this summer, and spin-off Sister Boniface Mysteries, and has seen first-hand how the cosy murder-mystery genre is “flourishing” at a time when viewers are seeking familiar, comforting television. “It’s escapist and reassuring,” he says. “Obviously, we’re in unsettling times, and shows that give comfort to the viewer are to be cherished. In these shows, justice is restored and the world is put to rights. It’s entertaining, it’s fun. They can be watched with all the family.”
While the “underlying principles” of these shows might be the same, “what’s different about Shakespeare & Hathaway is, because they are private investigators, the case comes to them, and then they inevitably get involved in that case. Then there’s a murder, so they end up solving both those cases,” Irvine notes.
But 1950s-set Father Brown is “a lot simpler – no CCTV, no DNA. It’s a really different world. What’s really lovely about Shakespeare & Hathaway is it’s a much more comic show. The comedy is baked into it. The characters are more comedic, and that’s part of the joy.”
That humour comes from the situations in which the title characters inexplicably find themselves in each episode, not least at a TV shopping channel. Memorably, Tindall’s S2 opener introduces a multimillionaire dog that is kidnapped. “So it’s just finding those scenarios and situations that have comedy baked in,” says Irvine. “And Mark and Jo, because they’re such funny actors, they bring a lot of that comedy. They breathe a lot of comedic life into the scripts as well. We’re really lucky with them and with Patrick.”
The casting process began with Benton (Early Doors, The Syndicate), before Joyner (EastEnders, Little Disasters) came in for a chemistry read – and the search for Lu was instantly over. “They bounced off each other,” the exec remembers. “Jo is actually a really brilliant comic actress, and maybe less known for that because of her EastEnders past, but actually, she went to Edinburgh and did all these amazing comedy shows and won awards. So the two of them, there was just a spark. That’s something the audience keeps coming back to.”
Making the series, huge importance is placed on the “colourful, distinct” guest precinct featured in each episode, allowing that instalment to become known as ‘The one where…’ This year, extra emphasis has been placed on elevating the look of the show, with series producer Erika Hossington arranging a drone shoot that enabled cameras to follow Lu’s Mini weaving through the streets of Stratford.
S5 also saw production designer Helen Watson build the interior of the detective agency in the show’s Stratford studio for the first time. “Having visited the real location many times, it was really strange to walk into a perfect reconstruction of it,” Irvine says. “But she’s built it in such a way that we can shoot much faster and with greater ease.”
Guest casting is also key, with the production team looking for actors “with comedy bones” who can bounce off Benton and Joyner. This time around, they are joined by Christine Bottomley, Derek Griffiths, Nick Helm, Poppy Lee Friar, Ronni Ancona, Emily Head, Amy-Leigh Hickman, Justin Edwards and Kacey Ainsworth.
In addition, Superman II star Sarah Douglas and Colin Baker, the sixth incarnation of Doctor Who, appear as themselves in the episode set within a horror convention. “So that was a lot of fun to get them in,” Irvine says. “Our fabulous script producer Lyn Washbrook and I have a cameo in that episode too, but blink and you’ll miss us.”
For a show with Shakespeare in the title, and set in William Shakespeare’s hometown, it’s also not surprising that the series has numerous nods to the Bard. Each episode title is a Shakespearean quote, while Sebastian is prone to quoting Shakespeare across the series.
That and Shakespeare & Hathaway’s “chocolate box” aesthetic add to the drama’s appeal to audiences both at home and abroad, with BBC Studios distributing the series to broadcasters including Ovation in the US.
“They love the puzzle element as well,” Irvine says. “It’s playing a guessing game with the audience, and Mark and Jo as well, they’ve got such great profile. It’s a pre-watershed show, but it’s a show you can watch with your gran. It’s cosy, it’s comforting. It translates and it sells.”
Despite the numerous elements that make up each episode of a murder-mystery series, they are often perceived as “deceptively easy” to make. But that isn’t the case, says Irvine. “The crimes have got to work. The characters have got to work. It’s got to have an emotional heart to it. It’s got to have the humour. There are just so many layers of things that have to work within a script. It’s quite a hard thing to do, but when it’s achieved, it feels effortless.”
Irvine is now working on the development of crime drama The Detection Club, which is set in 1930s London during the golden age of detective fiction, and imagines crime writers Agatha Christie, Dorothy L Sayers and GK Chesterton joining forces to solve real-life murders. Filming is due to take place next summer. BBC Studios is distributing the 10-part series, which comes from lead writer Kit Lambert and BBC Studios Drama Productions.
As for the future of Shakespeare & Hathaway, “we would love to make some more,” the exec adds, “so watch this space.”
Like that? Watch this! Suggested by AI, selected by DQ
Death in Paradise: A pragmatic British detective finds himself posted to a sun-drenched Caribbean island, where he is kept busy solving murders while adjusting to his new surroundings.
Rosemary & Thyme: Two gardening enthusiasts, each at a crossroads in life, team up to restore gardens across England – and frequently stumble upon bizarre murders, putting their investigative skills and horticultural knowledge to the test.
The Madame Blanc Mysteries: When her husband dies unexpectedly in France, antiques dealer Jean White discovers a talent for sleuthing, solving murders entwined with rare artifacts, quirky village life and her own search for answers.
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tagged in: BBC, Jo Joyner, Mark Benton, Neil Irvine, Shakespeare & Hathaway, UKTV