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Some actors have certain screen personas they make their own. Tom Cruise has often been at his best in roles that allow him to portray a cocky individual whose confidence is tested or chipped away. Michael Douglas has built a career playing self-centred, vain men whose flaws are exposed for the whole world to see. Watching Showtime's 10 episode miniseries 'Your Honor,' you cannot help thinking Bryan Cranston might be cornering the market in dodgy men in respected jobs who tend to get in a bit too deep. Based on the Israeli series 'Kvodo,' English screenwriter Peter Moffat's series sees Cranston's New Orleans judge Michael Desiato and his son, Hunter Doohan's Adam swimming in a tank full of sharks and doing whatever he can to get them out.  In Britain, Moffat has a solid background in crafting legal dramas. He was a writer for ITV's popular 'Kavanagh QC' with John Thaw and created Channel 4's legal firm tale 'North Square' with Phi

The American novelist John Updike once observed that people are most alive when they're in love. And that's why love affairs tend to fascinate writers, filmmakers and composers. Passionate affairs see people take risks and break away from the humdrum. But they can also be addictive and with addiction comes delusion and self-destruction. Nancy Mitford's hugely popular 1945 novel 'The Pursuit of Love' examines the tension between those who pursue romance and those who settle down into marriage. Part of a trilogy about an upper class English family comprising of 'Love in a Cold Climate' in 1949 and 'Don't Tell Alfred' in 1960, its popularity has endured and influence on other works has held sway. An omnibus edition of Mitford's novel pops up in the hands of Sarah Jessica Parker's Carrie Bradshaw in 'Sex and the City 2' and it can also be seen in Wes Anderson's short film 'Hotel Chevalier'. It has also been adapted twice b

  In a week when the world gushed over the  impact of 'Friends,'  another sitcom on the other side of the Atlantic garnered some attention. For six series, Robert Popper's  'Friday Night Dinner'  has taken Channel 4 viewers into the home of a north London Jewish family. Paul Ritter's eccentric fiftysomething dad Martin Goodman and his kind-hearted wife Jackie host dinner for their sons, Tom Rosenthal's estate agent Johnny and Simon Bird's advertising jingle composer Adam. Nothing ever goes according to plan, with Mark Heap's neighbour Jim and his German Shepherd, Wilson often adding to the mayhem. Add into the mix Jackie's fiercely loyal friend Auntie Val played by Tracy Ann Oberman, Rosalind Knight's Horrible Grandma, Frances Cuka's Nice Grandma and her bonkers boyfriend, Harry Landis's Mr Morris and you have one of the most consistently funny British sitcoms of the past decade. 'Friday Night Dinner' is old school farce, bril

Say the name Tom Clancy and you probably think of Jack Ryan. You probably think of 'The Hunt for Red October,' 'Patriot Games,' 'Clear and Present Danger,' 'The Sum of All Fears' and 'Shadow Recruit'. You will almost certainly think of Harrison Ford battling terrorists and duplicitous politicians and, before him, Alec Baldwin trying to guide Sean Connery's defecting Soviet Union submarine commander to safety. You might also think of Ben Affleck, Chris Pine or recently John Krasinski's deeds of derring-do as Ryan in the Amazon TV series. However Amazon is now diving into the Baltimore author's back catalogue in a bid to create another franchise. John T Clark - whose real name was John Kelly - was Clancy's second most popular character featuring in some of the Jack Ryan novels and stories of his own. Fans of 'Clear and Present Danger' will recognise him as the CIA operator in Colombia portrayed by Willem Dafoe in Philip Noyc

When we reach New Year's Eve this year, many of us will look back at HBO Max's 'Friends - The Reunion' as one of the most hyped TV programmes of 2021. There has been huge interest in the reunion show not just from those who avidly watched the sitcom over its 10 season run from 1994 to 2004 but subsequent generations who have caught reruns or come to it through streaming services. Broadcast in over 100 countries, 'Friends' was one of the defining US sitcoms of the 1990s. It made Jennifer Aniston, Courtney Cox, Lisa Kudrow, David Schwimer, Matthew Perry and Matt Le Blanc household names. It also spawned many imitiations like CBS's 'How I Met Your Mother,' BBC2's 'Coupling' and Fox's 'New Girl,'  However the story of Rachel's turbulent love affair with Ross, Chandler's eventual romance with Monica and Phoebe and Joey's adventures has endured in a way that those other shows haven't. In the 17 years since, Aniston h