Acorn grows into BBC drama

Love, Lies & Records
will star Ashley Jensen

US-based subscription VoD operator Acorn TV has joined as North American coproduction partner on an upcoming BBC drama.

Love, Lies & Records (6×60’), set in the English city of Leeds, follows a registrar juggling her personal life with the daily drama of births, marriages and deaths.

Acorn Media Enterprises, the UK-based development division for the Acorn brand of parent company RLJ Entertainment, will coproduce the series with the BBC and Leeds-based Rollem Productions.

The series, from Bafta-winning writer Kay Mellor, begins filming next month and will be distributed globally by All3Media International. Acorn also holds the distribution rights in UK, Ireland, Australia and New Zealand.

Shane Murphy, MD at Acorn Media Enterprises, said: “Given the popularity of our first Acorn TV original series, Agatha Raisin, with our subscribers, we’re thrilled to offer them another first-rate series starring Ashley Jensen.”

Acorn has been ramping up its originals slate over the past 12 months, offering three shows last year and five shows in 2017. They include the BBC adaptation of Agatha Christie’s The Witness for the Prosecution, Irish legal drama Striking Out and ITV murder mystery Loch Ness.