Rev. is a British television sitcom produced by Big Talk Productions. The show premiered on BBC Two on 28 June 2010 and ended on 28 April 2014. The show's working titles were The City Vicar and Handle with Prayer. The series revolves around a Church of England priest, played by Tom Hollander, who becomes the vicar of an inner-city London church after leaving a small rural Suffolk parish.
Hollander said: "[w]e wanted to define ourselves in opposition to the cliché of a country vicar, partly because we wanted to depict England as it is now, rather than having a sort of bucolic-y, over the hills and far away, bird-tweeting England - we wanted the complications of the multi-cultural, multi-ethnic inner-city, where everything is much harder."
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Plot
The Reverend Adam Smallbone is an Anglican priest who has recently moved from a small rural parish to the "socially disunited" St Saviour in the Marshes in Hackney, East London. Unable to turn anyone away from his pastoral care, Smallbone is faced with a series of moral challenges as he balances the needs of genuine believers, people on the streets, and drug addicts, as well as the demands of social climbers using the church to get their children into the best schools.
Adam has an impossibly difficult job being a modern city vicar. His wife Alex, who has her own career as a solicitor to worry about, provides fantastic support for him, seeing through his life as a priest, whilst not being involved with his work. He is also supported by lay reader Nigel, who believes he should be running the church. In supervision is Archdeacon Robert, who puts pressure on Adam to increase the congregation and church income.
Parishioners include Colin, a heavy drinking, unemployable lost soul who is Adam's most devoted parishioner; Adoha, well known for her romantic intentions towards the clergy; and Mick, who is homeless and appears on Adam's doorstep in different situations asking for money.
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Future
Interviewed in late April 2014, Tom Hollander has said that he did not know whether there would be a fourth series, and that after the third series "we all want to just pause". He added that "The idea of not doing it any more is sad but also quite attractive, because you wouldn't want for it to ever get worse."
Cast and characters
Main
- Tom Hollander as Adam Smallbone
- Olivia Colman as Alexandra (Alex) Smallbone
- Steve Evets as Colin Lambert
- Miles Jupp as Nigel McCall
- Simon McBurney as Archdeacon Robert
- Ellen Thomas as Adoha Onyeka
Recurring
- Lucy Liemann as Ellie Pattman (Series 1-3)
- Ben Willbond as Steve Warwick (Series 1-3)
- Jimmy Akingbola as Mick (Series 1-3)
- Sylvia Syms as Joan (Series 2)
- Vicki Pepperdine as Geri Tennison (Series 3)
- Joanna Scanlan as Jill Mallory (Series 3)
Production
Six episodes were produced for the first series by Big Talk Productions for BBC Two. The show was created by Tom Hollander and James Wood. The church scenes were filmed at St Leonard's in Shoreditch, east London. The BBC Two comedy was renewed by the BBC in September 2010 and filming began again in the middle months of 2011, with the second series of seven episodes premiering on 10 November 2011. On 1 August 2012, the show was renewed for a third series of six episodes to air in 2014.
Church of England priest Richard Coles has advised the show's writers and has been cited as an inspiration for the Adam Smallbone character.
Episode list
Series 1 (2010)
Series 2 (2011)
Series 3 (2014)
The six episodes of Series 3 commenced filming on 31 October 2013 and premiered on 24 March 2014.
Reception
The series was commended by The Independent as intelligent comedy, with Hollander "as good as ever" and a strong support cast.
In 2011, Rev. won the South Bank Award for best comedy and was nominated for the Royal Television Society Programme Awards for best scripted comedy and best comedy performance (Hollander). The series also won best sitcom at the 2011 British Academy Television Awards.
It is BBC2's highest rated sitcom and has sold to 140 countries.
DVD releases
2 Entertain released the complete first series on DVD on 21 November 2011.
The second series was released on 19 November 2012. A boxset containing the first two series was also released.
The third series was released on 5 May 2014, a week after transmission of the final episode. A boxset containing the first three series was also released.
Source of the article : Wikipedia
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