Ten Pound Poms returns to BBC One and iPlayer on Sunday, March 9, with series one available to stream now on BBC iPlayer.
Ten Pound Poms returns for a second series on Sunday, March 9, with all episodes on BBC iPlayer starting at 6am. The series will begin its weekly BBC One transmission at 8pm that evening. Ten Pound Poms is written and created by the BAFTA award-winning Danny Brocklehurst (Fool Me Once, Ordinary Lies, Brassic) and is made by Eleven (Sex Education, Red Rose) for BBC iPlayer and BBC One in a co-production with Stan, which airs the series in Australia.
Ten Pound Poms follows a group of Brits leaving post-war Britain to embark on a life-changing adventure on the other side of the world. After a challenging first year in Australia, series two follows nurse Kate Thorne (Michelle Keegan) and the Roberts family (led by Faye Marsay and Warren Brown) into 1957 on their adventure down under, each determined to achieve their slice of the Australian dream against all odds. But with each determined to make Australia everything they hoped it would be for a fresh start, will Kate, Terry and Annie finally get a slice of the dream they were promised?
Ten Pound Poms – Ray (SAM DELICH); Maggie Skinner (MAYA STANGE); Padraig (TOMMY JAMES GREEN); Birdie (CLARE HUGHES) ©BBC PICTURES
Writer and Executive Producer Danny Brocklehurst on what’s new in series two.
Q: Can you tell us about bringing series two to the screen?
We had both a problem and an opportunity for series two. The problem was that we’d left a lot of cliffhangers in series one that we needed to resolve. We had to continue those stories forward and deal with them satisfactorily. But we also wanted to bring in new stories, so we had to cleverly weave a continuation of certain things from series one to series two but also bring in the new, particularly for the Roberts family. We meet a new family who kickstarts the new story that thrusts you across the next six episodes.
Q: Can you tell us a little more about the new characters we meet in series two?
The Skinners are an Irish family who have travelled to Australia for a new start. The father and one son are mysteriously following on, so we initially only meet Maggie, Ray and Birdie. The three make an instant impact on our characters, especially Birdie, who attracts the eye of young Peter. But soon, the family’s new lives down under are forever changed by an unforeseen event.
We also meet Benny Bates, a self-assured businessman who owns numerous properties in Sydney that are in need of TLC. Terry is drafted in to work on the slum housing but is soon making a connection with Benny and being offered a different proposal. Christine and her children live in one of the properties that Benny owns, and Christine’s a single mother after the untimely death of her husband. Terry finds friendship with Chrissy and her kids and enjoys being with them in a way he missed out on with his own children because of war and his post-war drinking. For Chrissy, it is nice to have someone looking out for them, but there might be a blurring of the lines in their friendship…
Q: Can you talk about the key themes in series two?
There’s a consistent theme about not being able to escape yourself. You can go to the other side of the world and try to build a new life in the sunshine, but, in the end, you always take yourself with you, and the baggage of yourself comes along, too. Whereas the first season was about the arrival and the sense of what we encountered when we got there, series two is much more about “We’re here now; how do we bed-in; how do we become Australian?”.
Q: What do you think viewers enjoyed most about series one, and what can we expect from the tone of series two? How do you approach striking the right balance between darkness and fun?
I think what appealed most to people was the sense that it was about a world they may not have heard about, the ‘Ten Pound Poms’ assisted migration scheme, and that it tapped into the idea of escape. In terms of tone, we thought a lot about it moving into our second series. From the research that we did, we knew there were so many original stories of real people migrating to Australia in the 50s and 60s. For me, it was about creating a show that would air on Sunday nights and feel optimistic whilst also dealing with some of the darkness and the reality of what a lot of those people encountered when they arrived in Australia – because they were sold a dream, and that dream was to some degree a lie.
Ten Pound Poms – Robbie (NIC ENGLISH); Kate (MICHELLE KEEGAN); Terry (Warren Brown); Annie (FAYE MARSAY) ©BBC PICTURES
Q: Your work often focuses on incredible networks of families and relationships. Is there a reason why you like writing in that way?
A lot of the work I’ve done over the years has been focused on an ensemble of characters who end up being a family for each other in some way, be it the workforce or elsewhere. Ten Pound Poms was the ultimate expression of that, really, because these people travelled to the other side of the world. They were all there for different reasons, but what they found when they arrived at the camp was that they had a shared experience – they had all given up their lives in the UK. This was a time before planes when you had to spend six weeks on a boat to get to the other side of the world. You may never see people from home ever again.
Q: How do you balance an ensemble cast and the various storylines?
We tend to have a rule of thumb that the Roberts family – Terry and Annie in particular – alongside Kate, are the spine of the series. These three characters have most of the through line, and then other storylines hang off that.
Can we expect to see more of life outside the camp in series two?
We love Galgownie camp, but we also wanted to get out of it more in series two. There are so many wonderful places around Sydney where we wanted to film. For instance, the Blue Mountains are amazing, and we loved it there. It hasn’t changed that much from the 50s, so I thought it was a perfect place to set a romantic trip. But you’ll have to watch the series to see what happens.
Ten Pound Poms series one is available to stream now in full on BBC iPlayer.
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