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About Behind the Author's Desk: Dramas of Famous Writers' Real Lives

18 biographical dramas based on the lives and loves of celebrated writers These surprising, revealing dramas take a behind-the-scenes look at some of our best-loved authors, mingling fact and fantasy to explore their extraordinary hidden lives. From love affairs, friendships and family relationships to traumas, tragedies and journeys of self-discovery, we glimpse the unwritten worlds that shaped their unforgettable fiction. Among the star casts are Andrew Scott , Toby Jones, Richard Dormer, Glenda Jackson, Bella Ramsey, Julia Davis , Ian McDiarmid, Haydn Gwynne, David Threlfall, Alistair McGowan, Tom Goodman-Hill , Hattie Morahan, Rosie Cavaliero, Julian Rhind-Tutt, Paul Ritter and Lia Williams Jane and Tom - Writing to her sister, Jane Austen describes her love for Tom Lefroy - a love that would lead to Pride and Prejudice . When Fanny Met Germaine - A delightful romp through the passionate, scandalous friendship between two 18th Century writers: Fanny Burney and Mme de Stael. Comrade Ackland - Dorset, 1936. Newly returned from an illicit trip to Civil War Spain, Sylvia Townsend Warner and her lover Valentine Ackland have an unexpected visitor.... Tongues of Fire - 1913. When a Nobel laureate visits Dublin's Abbey Theatre, fireworks erupt between WB Yeats and Sean O'Casey. A Year at the Races - Approaching the end of his career, Groucho Marx meets a wisecracking fan determined to teach him new comedy tricks. Spike and the Elfin Oak - A comic fantasy inspired by Spike Milligan's madcap attempts in the mid-1960s to preserve a curious sculpture in Kensington Gardens. Everybody's Got Conditions - Casting Bette Davis in his play The Night of the Iguana proves the biggest mistake in Tennessee Williams' career... I Believe I Have Genius - Humble and obscure, young Charlotte Brontë travels to Brussels to study at a girls' school. Marian and George - Marian Evans (aka George Eliot) must choose between her adored brother and the love of her life... Lying Low - An intriguing drama imagining what happened to Samuel Beckett during his mysterious three weeks in Folkestone in 1961. A Terrible Beauty - WB Yeats travels to France to propose to beautiful Maud Gonne, soon after her husband's execution in the 1916 Easter Rising. The Watcher on the Wall - Dramatised from his letters, this is the story of Louis MacNeice's transatlantic love affair and the poetry it inspired. Edith Sitwell in Scarborough - Returning to her birthplace, Edith Sitwell sets out to wreak revenge. Mrs Tolstoy - A five-part drama charting the tempestuous marriage between Leo and Sofya Tolstoy. The 'B' Word - The opening night of George Bernard Shaw's Pygmalion causes a scandal and sparks a passionate love/hate triangle... The Rules of Palship - The young Noël Coward demanded fierce loyalty from his friends - but did he live up to his own high standards? The Lost Road - A playful tribute to the long friendship between CS Lewis and JRR Tolkien and how it influenced their respective masterpieces. Luxembourg Gardens - Re-imagined from Katherine Mansfield's stories, letters and journals, this Mansfieldesque play explores her last day in Paris, where she is dying of consumption aged 34. Copyright © 2021 BBC Studios Distribution Ltd (P)2021 BBC Studios Distribution Ltd