The BBC is piloting a comedy chat-show format hosted by a CGI Vladimir Putin. The British broadcaster is testing out the semi-scripted talk show featuring a pastiche of the bear-wrestling global strongman. Tonight with Vladimir Putin will launch on BBC Two as two episodes of 12 minutes. The episodes will feature Tony…

Former INXS frontman Michael Hutchence is the subject of a new BBC feature doc co-produced by Studio 54 and Searching For Sugar Man producer Passion Pictures. The British public broadcaster is to air Mystify: Michael Hutchence on BBC Two, which will feature personal footage filmed by Hutchence and his former partner…

24 Hours In A&E producer The Garden Productions is making a factual entertainment format about newborn babies arriving in the world for the BBC. The ITV-owned producer has scored four-part primetime series The Arrival (w/t) for BBC Two. The show will capture every moment in the weeks immediately following birth…

The BBC is making its own film about Michael Jackson – days before the controversial HBO and Channel 4 co-pro Leaving Neverland is set to air. The British public broadcaster has commissioned Michael Jackson: The Rise And Fall (w/t), written and presented by Jacques Peretti. The British journalist has previously made…

Roseanne and The Connors exec producer Tom Werner has partnered with the creators of British cult comedy The Inbetweeners for a new soccer comedy. BBC Two has commissioned Afternoons (w/t), a six-part comedy that follows the off-the-pitch misadventures of three young soccer players on a fictional English Premier Club…

Vice Studios has scored a Brexit documentary for the BBC – the latest third party commission for the youth-skewing media company's fledgling production arm. The British public broadcaster has ordered Inside The Brexit Storm (w/t) from Vice Studios. The one-hour film will go behind-the-scenes following BBC political…

King Arthur star Freddie Fox and Trust star Anna Chancellor are two of the A-list actors featured in a feature-length BBC documentary about Oscar Wilde. The pair will feature in The Importance of Being Oscar alongside Outnumbered's Claire Skinner and Four Weddings and a Funeral's James Fleet, which is produced by…

Game of Thrones star Jamie Sives and Catastrophe star Mark Bonnar are to front a four-part dark crime caper for the BBC. Guilt, written by Eric, Ernie And Me writer Neil Forsyth, will be the first drama for BBC Scotland's new digital channel and will then air on BBC Two. Sives, who starred as Jory Cassel in the HBO…

The BBC is to examine Rupert Murdoch's influence over the British press in a major three-part documentary series. The British public broadcaster has commissioned A Tabloid Empire (w/t) from Trump: An American Dream producer 72 Films. The three-part series, which will air on BBC Two, will explore the extraordinary…

The BBC has signed up British entertainers Paddy McGuinness and Freddie Flintoff to replace Matt LeBlanc as the hosts of global motoring format Top Gear. This comes after the former Friends star revealed that he would be leaving Top Gear after the next series of the BBC Studios-produced show. The 26th season of the…

The first five years of David Bowie's career is to be the focus of a new documentary for the BBC – the third in a trilogy of docs about the Star Man singer. David Bowie: The First Five Years will launch on the British public broadcaster's BBC Two channel in 2019. It follows David Bowie: The Last Five Years, which was…

Sin City star Eva Green and The Knick's Eve Hewson are to star in BBC Two adaptation of The Luminaries. The pair will star in the six-part drama, produced by Working Title Television alongside New Zealand actor Marton Csokas, who starred in Lord of the Rings. Green plays Lydia Wells, while Hewson stars as Anna…