BBC One controller Charlotte Moore announces new commissions at TV Festival

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BBC One is boosting its drama, factual and comedy output with an assortment of commissions.

The slate of new programming was unveiled by the channel’s controller Charlotte Moore at this year’s Edinburgh Television Festival.

The first commission is a drama series The Living And The Dead which Moore says is “steeped in real history and mythology”. The 1888 set six-parter – co-written by Ashley Pharoah and Matthew Graham – will focus on Nathan Appleby, a farmer who is obsessed with proving the existence of the afterlife.

Meanwhile, the corporation has also greenlit a “powerful and provocative” four-part serial from Katie Baxendale. From Darkness focuses on former Greater Manchester Policewoman Clare Church, who has to face a return to the force when a number of bodies relating to investigations she oversaw are unearthed.

The final drama to be announced is A Song For Jenny, which will explore Julie Nicholson’s response to her daughter Jenny’s murder in the July 7th bombing at Edgware Road tube station. Written by Frank McGuiness, the 75-minute factual piece will star Emily Watson (The Book Thief, Appropriate Adult) as the grieving mother. Moore describes it as “a fitting tribute to those who lost their lives in the tragedy of the 7/7 London bombings”.

In comedy the beeb’s first channel will air Mountain Goats, an energetic studio sitcom that is set in the Highlands and focuses on a group of Mountain Rescue volunteers.

And in factual a new ‘immersive history’ series titled 24 Hours In The Past aims to reveal daily life as it really was for the poorest of the poor in Victorian Britain. Continuously filmed in original, authentic locations over four days and nights, six famous faces will travel back in time to undertake the endurance challenge of a lifetime as they struggle to cope with 24 hours in some of Victorian Britain’s toughest workplaces.