Peter Polycarpou

Not long after World War I and the devastating “Spanish Flu” pandemic, Charlie Chaplin wrote a hit tune that is now largely forgotten but provides an upbeat message still relevant in 2020. “The while you sing a song, your troubles fade away,” it goes, urging us to “just smile and swing along”. It is one of the songs featured in Peter Polycarpou’s new musical revue, Falling Stars, which mines the vast American and British (and sometimes French) songbook of the 1920s and 1930s. Originally due to be staged at London’s Union Theatre in November, it has been filmed for streaming online to help us through the dark days of lockdown.

He's a low level criminal with no future and just out of prison. She's a low level lawyer never noticed by others, a lost soul without a life. Their anger and hostility makes them serious criminals. Love happens in the strangest of places.

5.5/10
3.7%

Christopher Jefferies's life is turned inside out when one of his tenants disappears without a trace just before Christmas.

7.9/10

While working undercover as a bodyguard to arms dealer Harry, former-soldier-turned-secret-service-agent Ewan survives a bloody shootout with a member of an Islamic terrorist cell who steals Harry's briefcase full of Semtex explosives and escapes. Ewan's spymasters task Ewan with hunting down the cell members and retrieving the briefcase.

6.3/10
5.3%

Sweeney Todd by Stephen Sondheim at the Adelphi Theatre, West End, London in 2012.

Set in the Warsaw Ghetto during World War II, Imagine This focuses on a family of actors trying to stage a play about the siege at ancient Masada to inspire hope and optimism within the Jewish community.

Supernatural drama about ex-con Jimmy Collins, just released from prison, who begins experiencing paranormal visions whenever he touches people. His visions involve him in a high-profile murder case, assisting the police even while he himself is under suspicion.

6.6/10

This movie follows a mother who falls for a younger man while her daughter falls in love for the first time. Mother Nature messes with their fates.

6/10
6.4%

A tale of friendship between two men, one Jewish and the other Arab, as the state of Israel is being created.

6.1/10
3.5%

From Paris to Venice to Broadway to Hollywood, the lives of Cole Porter and his wife, Linda were never less than glamorous and wildly unconventional. And though Cole's thirst for life strained their marriage, Linda never stopped being his muse, inspiring some of the greatest sons of the twentieth century.

6.6/10
4.8%

Julie and The Cadillacs, a struggling young pop group, are enticed to London and signed up by London PR men...

5.4/10

Oklahoma! is a 1999 musical film directed by Trevor Nunn, choreographed by Susan Stroman, and starring Hugh Jackman as Curly McLain, Josefina Gabrielle as Laurey Williams, and Maureen Lipman as Aunt Eller. The production featured the entire 1998 London revival cast at the Royal National Theatre.

7.9/10

Sunburn is a British television series that followed the lives of a group of British holiday reps. It was broadcast on BBC One between 16 January 1999 and 1 May 2000, running for two series of six and eight episodes respectively. The first was set and filmed in Cyprus and the second in Algarve. The cast included Michelle Collins, Rebecca Callard, Sharon Small, George Layton and Sean Maguire, with Paul Nicholas joining later. The series was created by Mike Bullen, who was interested in the behind-the-scenes lives of holiday reps after watching the docusoap Holiday Reps. Bullen wrote most of the first series but scaled back his involvement in the second; most of that series' episodes were written by Lizzie Mickery and Sally Wainwright.

7.5/10

An American woman is stranded in a German airport when she witnesses someone sabotaging a plane.

3.8/10