TWO NEW home-produced dramas and 13 new lifestyle and entertainment shows are among the highlights of RTÉ's autumn and winter schedule, announced yesterday.
The public's fascination with hot-headed chefs will be catered for with Raw, a new six-part drama series set in a fictional Irish restaurant. The cast includes Charlene McKenna of Pure Mulefame, Keith McErlean from Bachelor's Walkand Shelley Conn, who recently appeared as a bisexual wedding planner in Mistresses.
The Lourdes Hospital inquiry into the activities of obstetrician Dr Michael Neary forms the basis of Whistleblower, a two-part fictionalised drama written by emerging writer, 26-year-old Lisa McGee.
RTÉ has shuffled some of its daytime presenters, with Síle Seoige replacing Joe O'Shea to work alongside her sister Gráinne in a new afternoon Seoigeseries.
The fashion show Off the Railswill make a return, but without its long-standing presenters Caroline Morahan and Pamela Flood, who are replaced by Brendan Courtney and stylist Sonya Lennon.
Courtney, who has presented The Clothes Showon UKTV, said the new show would be "a very different animal" to the previous one.
"The old show was great [but] they weren't stylists and I think RTÉ wanted to stamp a couple of stylists on it, just to lead it a little more and give it more direction," he said.
Kathryn Thomas will continue to present the travel programme No Frontiersbut will also co-host Winning Streakwith Aidan Power.
The Panelcomedy show will move to RTÉ One in the autumn, while Leitrim comedian Katherine Lynch will unleash six new characters on the unsuspecting public in Katherine Lynch's Wonderwomen.
Dates have not yet been set for the airing of US shows such as Lost, Desperate Housewivesand Brothers and Sisters, but screenings will begin in the autumn or early winter period, an RTÉ spokeswoman said.
RTÉ has also acquired Mad Men, the Golden Globe-winning series set in a New York advertising agency in the 1960s. There should also be interest in 90210, in which the Beverley Hills 90210cast is reunited. Wicklow actor Elaine Cassidy will star in another new US acquisition, Harper's Island, while The Mentalist, featuring Simon Baker from The Devil Wears Prada, will also feature.
Movie premieres in the coming months will include King Kong, Munich, Walk the Line, Transamericaand Harry Potter - the Goblet of Fire.
