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Film focusing on 1960s model’s affair with photographer David Bailey joins arts documentaries in BBC4 spring/summer lineup Doctor Who star Karen Gillan is to play 1960s model Jean Shrimpton in a BBC4 drama about her love affair with photographer David Bailey. The project, with a working title We’ll Take Manhattan, will be Gillan’s first major drama role since she was cast as the Doctor’s companion Amy Pond in 2009 . Bailey is still to be cast and production has yet to begin. The drama will focus on a 1962 Vogue photo shoot in New York. “We’ll Take Manhattan reveals how a young, visionary photographer refused to conform and insisted on using the unconventional model Jean Shrimpton on an important photo shoot for British Vogue, inadvertently defining the style of the 1960s along the way,” the BBC said. Kudos, the independent producer of Spooks and Life on Mars, is making the drama. John McKay is writing and directing, with Rebecca Hodgson producing. Executive producers are McKay, Claire Parker and Ruth Kenley-Letts for Kudos and Lucy Richer for the BBC. The project is being co-financed by US cable arts channel Ovation. The Shrimpton/Bailey drama follows in a long line of BBC4 biopics on subjects including Hattie Jacques, Enid Blyton, Gracie Fields, Frankie Howerd, Kenneth Williams and Tony Hancock. Plans for We’ll Take Manhattan were announced by the BBC4 controller, Richard Klein, as he unveiled the digital network’s spring/summer 2011 programming lineup. The Prince of Wales will present The Prince and the Composer, a BBC4 documentary about Jerusalem composer Hubert Parry. BBC4 is marking the 100th anniversary of the birth of Terence Rattigan with a documentary about the playwright fronted by Sherlock actor Benedict Cumberbatch; while Richard E Grant will present The Secrets of the Arabian Nights. Upcoming BBC4 shows include Scrapheap Orchestra, in which junk, broken furniture and the contents of roadside skips are turned into instruments to be played by the BBC Orchestra, led by conductor Charles Hazlewood. The orchestra will attempt to perform a medley of three classical pieces, including Tchaikovsky’s 181 Overture, in a programme aiming to show how instruments work and the science of music. Afterlife, another BBC4 science show, looks at decay and decomposition through an Edinburgh Zoo exhibition to be displayed during the city’s annual festival. The exhibition will feature a typical kitchen and garden in a purpose-built box and visitors to the event and online viewers will be able to witness the decay of everyday foods and substances over a two month period. The results will also feature in a BBC4 programme to be presented by Oxford University’s George McGavin. BBC4 programming seasons later this year will include Botany, tracing the history of plant science, including the three-part series Botany – A Blooming History; while Iceland explores Icelandic culture. “We’re curious about the world around us and will continue to take an in depth exploration of subjects that you rarely see on television, from botany to Icelandic culture, as well as dramatising moments that have changed the course of cultural life, for example when David Bailey and Jean Shrimpton created an image that redefined the 1960s,” said Klein. He added that BBC4 had had a good start to 2011, increasing its audience share from 1.1% in 2010 to 1.3% for the year to date, helped by the success of shows including Hattie and The Killing. •