Back at the turn of the century, it could be something of a challenge to persuade film and television talent that Wales was the place to make world-class drama.

Twenty-odd years on, figures reveal that Cardiff’s creative sector is growing more rapidly than any UK city apart from London. And this weekend Bafta Cymru is celebrating a “golden age” for film and television production in Wales at its annual awards ceremony.

From Doctor Who and His Dark Materials to Men Up, which tells how Viagra was developed in Swansea, and the thriller Dal y Mellt (Catch the Lightning), the first Welsh language-only show to be bought by Netflix, the hits keep coming.

“It is definitely a golden age for Wales-based production in TV and film,” said Angharad Mair, the chair of Bafta Cymru. Mair said young people keen to get into the industry no longer had to leave for London or Hollywood. “If I was a young person now in school in Wales, with aspirations to work in television or film, I would be so enthused. I’d think, wow, I can be part of that without having to work out how to get away. That’s a massive change.”

Figures from the Centre for the Creative Economy at Cardiff University found business turnover in the Welsh capital’s audiovisual media sector between 2021 and 2023 grew by 55% – the highest for any UK city outside London.

More than 15% of enterprises in Cardiff are in the creative industries, and south Wales is said to have more television and film studios than anywhere in the UK outside London. The Welsh government has ploughed millions into the sector, with regional and local authorities also seeing it as a priority for economic growth.

One of the architects of this golden age, Julie Gardner, the co-founder of the production company Bad Wolf, which is behind shows including Dr Who, A Discovery of Witches and The Winter King will receive an outstanding contribution to television award at the Bafta Cymru ceremony.

Mair said: “What they are doing there in Wolf Studios is absolutely incredible – a centre of excellence producing some of the best work that’s ever come out of Wales. They are very involved with local schools and colleges. They bring young people in and show them that this great work is happening in Wales.”

Gardner said there were negative preconceptions about Wales two decades ago: “There was suspicion and a lack of confidence that Wales could produce the sort of projects the country is creating now. When I would be doing meetings with talent, I’d ask them how long they thought the journey from London to Cardiff was. Everyone thought Cardiff was five, six hours away. No one thought it was two hours. It felt like such a distant place. There were a lot of preconceptions.”

She said the revolution began in the early 2000s when the rebooted Doctor Who was based in Wales. “It was such a major moment in the evolution of the creative industries in Wales. In terms of network television, it was a lightning rod. And as Russell T Davies [the Doctor Who show runner] always says, work begets work.

“When we were setting up Bad Wolf, we knew we wanted to come home to Wales. Knowing how great the crews are, how great the locations are, how extraordinary the Welsh government is in supporting that sector. This is an incredibly fertile, joyful time for Welsh-based production.”

Also receiving a special award is Mark Lewis-Jones, who is recognised globally for his work on shows such as The Crown and Baby Reindeer – but also starred in Welsh hits such as Men Up (six Bafta Cymru nominations) and works in Welsh and English.

The success of the industry is boosting Cymraeg, the Welsh language. Shows such as the dark comedy Pren ar y Bryn/Tree on a Hill, which has five nominations, have been shot “back to back” – in Welsh and English.

Sara Pepper, the deputy director of Media Cymru, a 22-partner consortium delivering projects in and for the sector in Wales, said: “We are witnessing impressive growth in Wales, particularly within the Cardiff capital region’s media cluster.”

Moves are afoot to form a film and TV “supercluster” with Bristol, the city with the second-highest growth rate, at 41%.

Pepper said: “The potential for further growth is apparent. To build on existing successes and create new opportunities, it’s essential that innovation remains a top priority.”

The Bafta Cymru ceremony will be livestreamed from 7pm on Sunday on the Bafta YouTube channel.

IN the mid 80s she was part of a formidable group of emerging talent that was, perhaps unfairly, dubbed The Brat Pack.

Though Charli XCX has very much rebranded the term Brat into a positive this year, it had adverse repercussions for actress Ally Sheedy four decades ago as she struggled to break free from the cloak it put around her and peers like Demi Moore, Robert Downey Jr and Rob Lowe, among others.

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The moniker, a play on the famous Rat Pack nickname given to 50s and 60s crooners like Frank Sinatra and Nat King Cole – came to be after a bunch of young up and comers appeared alongside one another in multiple coming of age movies like St Elmo’s Fire and The Breakfast Club.

At the height of those films’ success, Ally didn’t feel particularly concerned, and why would she, as one of the industry’s hottest new stars.

She told Vanity Fair in 2022: “Movies and working in film and TV and all that— it was this all-consuming love affair in my 20s. This is what I want to do….

“So I understand myself in my 20s, and I also understand how dangerous it can be to simply decide this is my path—period, end of story, nothing else matters. But that’s in your 20s. You’re passionate.”

However, that attitude began to change as she became increasingly pigeon-holed and was urged to change her style in order to compete for more prominent roles.

The shallow nature of Hollywood irked her and she had no desire to transform herself into a stereotypical ‘pretty girl’ to land roles.

It was something she had enough difficulty doing while in character during a pivotal scene in The Breakfast Club when her character, Allison, is given a glam makeover that then makes her more attractive to boys.

She told The Independent in 2020: “I never liked the makeover. Listen, it was Hollywood in the Eighties. They wanted to take the ugly duckling and make her into a swan.

“As far as I was concerned, that wasn’t what I was doing with that character, but that was what they wanted.”

Ally lamented the misogynistic culture within Hollywood at the time and the pressure on women to conform to the standards set out by the “white men’s club” in charge.

She said: “Acting started to just feel more and more to me like something that I didn’t want my life to necessarily be about.”

Despite her disillusionment, Ally has remained in the industry, though has been selective with the roles she has taken and the people she works with.

In 1998, the romantic comedy High Art renewed interest in her acting career.

Ally played alluring, party-loving photographer Lucy, who lives with her heroin-addict girlfriend in the flat above aspiring high fashion snapper Syd.

After a chance meeting, Lucy and Syd’s lives start to become complicatedly entwined both professionally and romantically.

Ally has gone on record as calling it her favourite role, loving every aspect of it from the direction to the script and filmography.

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Now 62, mum-of-one Ally splits her time between acting and working as a professor in the theatre department at the City University of New York.

She recently spoke out about her class and how she deals with students who might not be as committed to the course as they should.

“There’s so much to get out of this class, it’s really great,” she said. “If you don’t avail yourself of what’s here, then that’s on you. If I can see a particular kid who’s on their phone all the time, I’m not going to say anything. It’s just you’re missing out.”

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If you’re a queer person who watches television – as almost all of us naturally do – you are told a lot of things. You are told that TV is gayer now than it ever was. It’s true enough: where once the very idea of depicting same-sex romances on screen was taboo, now LGBT+ characters are everywhere you look. You are told that TV series such as Netflix’s Heartstopper, with its earnest and sentimental exploration of young queer romance, are seismic and significant. You are told again and again, if only a series like this existed when I was growing up. You are told that queer joy is an end in itself.

But we shouldn’t believe all we are told. It’s true that Heartstopper, which returned for its third season earlier this month, is an affirming and well-intentioned fairytale – and maybe even a necessary one. Queer people, however, deserve more than just fairytales. The vision of gay life that Netflix’s effusively received drama offers is one that’s utterly palatable and comprehensible to straight audiences, one that shies away from the more interesting realities of queer existence.

Kit Connor, one of the show’s stars, recently summed up the show’s appeal in an interview with the i: “In queer media, gay sex can often be just super hyper-sexual… which is in many ways true, but not all gay sex is just that, you know?” If the idea that gay sex shouldn’t be too sexual seems blatantly oxymoronic, just watch a bit of Heartstopper, and you’ll see that such a contradiction is indeed possible to synthesise. Season three goes further than previous years in its depiction of sexuality – but it’s much the same animal as before.

The shortcomings of Heartstopper as TV’s modern gay success story are thrown into even starker clarity by another series that aired this month: FX’s school-set comedy English Teacher (streaming on Disney+ in the UK). Created by and starring Brian Jordan Alvarez, the actor and internet personality behind the cult YouTube gem The Gay and Wondrous Life of Caleb Gallo, English Teacher is one of the very best series of 2024, and one of the funniest sitcoms in years. It’s also deeply, unapologetically gay. If Heartstopper offers idealised queer joy for young and impressionable “baby gays”, then English Teacher captures, and satirises, queer reality for jaded adults.

The finale of season one, released on Tuesday, begins with a familiar enough scene. A child in a Texan high school approaches his teacher after class, and confides in him a secret: he thinks he might be gay. He’s gone to this teacher, Evan Marquez (Alvarez), because he is an out gay man; he’s asking for advice. Evan, bewildered by the question, scowls at him: “What!? You’re scared to come out? It’s 2024, just go in the hall and say, ‘I’m gay’!”

It’s a brilliantly unsentimental rug-pull, one that flies in the face of the sort of bottomlessly gentle storytelling that now pervades queer stories on screen. “If you want somebody to talk to, go to one of the many out gay kids at this school,” he says, adding: “But be careful: don’t talk to one of those non-specific queer kids who may or may not be doing it for clout… Those people are mostly straight. Don’t tell anybody I said that.” It’s the sort of joke that most modern queer series would baulk at – sharp and mean-spirited and politically incorrect. But it’s also honest.

In shows such as Heartstopper (and the likes of Sex Education or Schitt’s Creek), there is often a self-imposed need to portray queer people in a sanctified light. It’s easy to see why this is – it’s a corrective to decades of erasure or otherwise bigoted portrayals across all media. But sainthood has a limited horizon. In opting for something spikier and messier – problematic characters, sexual frankness, messy and unconventional situationships, a gleeful air of not giving a f*** – English Teacher manages to find affirmation in truth.

There is a place for fantasies such as Heartstopper. But it’d be nice if queer shows made for queer adults got a fraction of the attention. At a certain point, it’s time to grow up.

Season one of ‘English Teacher’ is streaming now on Disney+

BIG Brother fans are convinced Rosie and Nathan’s romance is fake after they appeared to take their romance to the next level.

ITV2 viewers insisted their courtship is a ‘showmance’ following the discovery of a used condom in their shared bedroom with the other housemates.

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In the opening scene from tonight’s installment, Izaaz asked: “Why is there a condom on the floor?” before the camera cut to a smirking Rosie and Nathan.

The dental assistant, who was renamed Baked Potato following a dare in the first week, said: “I’m coming over here, I don’t give a s**t anymore,” as she made her way to Nathan’s bed.

But fans weren’t buying it and rushed to X, formerly Twitter with their confusion.

One asked: “WHAT TF HAPPENED LAST NIGHT PLEASE WHY IS THERE CONDOMS?”

Someone else said: “This Nathan/Baked Potato romance just feels slightly fake,” with another agreeing: “I don’t care for this baked potato and Nathan romance, I’m sorry.”

A fourth fumed: “Rosie fake AF. Knows a showmance increases your odds of staying in till the end.”

Someone else said: “Sorry but I’m not buying this… it’s giving concocted showmance…”

Shortly afterwards, Rosie was asked by Big Brother whether she had fallen for the pork salesman.

Despite their bedroom PDA, she replied: “He’s fine. If I were to meet him on the outside world, I would not like him.”

She went on to say: “He’s a tall lanky bastard but maybe I am as well.”

Fans were surprised when the pair revealed saucy feelings for one another during Thursday night’s show.

Nathan confessed he felt attracted to Rosie just minutes before she walked into the Big Brother house.

But Lily also leapt in with a surprise kiss.

The romance blossomed between Nathan and Rosie after a fire alarm evacuation where cameras recorded a secret chat.

The pair discussed dating each other when they get out, with Nathan asking Rosie if she’d like to visit a winery together when they emerge from the house.

But viewers have been speculating that it is all little too pre-planned and organised – and there must be more than meets the eye.

Big Brother is presented by Will Best and AJ Odudu and is on its second series on ITV and ITVX.

Big Brother 2024 cast

A brand new batch of Big Brother housemates are living it up in the famous compound.

Meet the cast of the 2024 series:

• Rosie, 29, dental assistant from Cornwall.
• Emma, 53, aesthetics business owner from Altrincham.
• Segun, 25, charity videographer from Watford.
• Nathan, 24, pork salesman from Dumfries.
• Daze, 24, climate activist from London.
• Khaled, 23, sales manager from Manchester.
• Martha, 26, NHS administrator from Scarborough.
• Lily, 20, Chinese takeaway server from Warrington.
• Ali, 30, Forensic psychologist from London.
• Thomas, 20 amputee footballer from Carlisle.
• Ryan, 28, marketing and events from Stockport.
• Hannah, 24, HR consultant from West London.
• Izaaz, 29, sales consultant from London.
• Sarah, 27, spa account manager from Shrewsbury.
• Marcello, 34, youth mentor from East London.
• Dean, 35, barber from East London

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THE second housemate to be evicted from the 2024 edition of Big Brother has been revealed.

AJ Odudu and Will Best took to the airwaves as another contestant was booted out of the infamous ITV compound.

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Lily, Ali, Daze, and Martha were the first four housemates who were chosen to face eviction.

The quartet were the first to be nominated by their fellow Big Brother housemates.

ITV2 viewers cast their votes in droves as they voted to evict the second housemate.

It was climate activist Daze who was revealed to have received the most votes by the presenters.

After the announcement, her fellow co-star dramatically broke down in tears.

Lily was sat next to Daze of the round sofa area and immediately went to hug her best pal in the house.

“It’s going to be fine,” insisted the reality star as she tried to get her house bestie to stop crying.

However, Daze was ordered to leave the premises immediately as she said her goodbyes.

The 24-year-old didn’t seem too bothered as she was resigned to her fate in the social experiment competition.

She enthusiastically made her way onto the platform to be greeted by cheers from the crowd outside.

However, many fans were absolutely gutted by the results as they took to social media in droves to complain about the decision.

Many thought that some of the other nominees should have been eliminated in her place.

On X – formerly known as Twitter – one person suggested: “What an odd choice, should’ve been Ali evicted instead!”

A second stated: “Sad to see Daze go… brought many debates, drama and laughter to the #BBUK house. After tonight I’m afraid I’d have had Martha go. Unpredictable eviction!”

Big Brother 2024 cast

A brand new batch of Big Brother housemates are living it up in the famous compound.

Meet the cast of the 2024 series:

• Rosie, 29, dental assistant from Cornwall.
• Emma, 53, aesthetics business owner from Altrincham.
• Segun, 25, charity videographer from Watford.
• Nathan, 24, pork salesman from Dumfries.
• Daze, 24, climate activist from London.
• Khaled, 23, sales manager from Manchester.
• Martha, 26, NHS administrator from Scarborough.
• Lily, 20, Chinese takeaway server from Warrington.
• Ali, 30, Forensic psychologist from London.
• Thomas, 20 amputee footballer from Carlisle.
• Ryan, 28, marketing and events from Stockport.
• Hannah, 24, HR consultant from West London.
• Izaaz, 29, sales consultant from London.
• Sarah, 27, spa account manager from Shrewsbury.
• Marcello, 34, youth mentor from East London.
• Dean, 35, barber from East London

“Daze was such a safe eviction, should have been Ali or Lily,” exclaimed a third fan.

While a fourth user suggested: “This abysmal eviction get ar daze back in.”

And a fifth added: “Out of the four Daze was a distant second behind Martha for eviction, and when I say distant I mean DISTANT.”

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Big Brother is available to watch on ITV2 and stream on ITVX.

BIG Brother fans will be in for a treat next week as a new eviction twist has just been revealed.

AJ Odudu and Will Best revealed the huge news on the ITV2 studio spin-off show, Late and Live.

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It was announced that next week will see the introduction of a twist that has never been done before in Big Brother.

Two housemates will be chosen to take up the coveted position of heads of house.

From there, the leaders will then put the rest of the contestants in sets of pairings.

AJ explained: “Tomorrow night the joint head of house will go to the secret basement, where they will be tasked with pairing up the rest of the housemates into duos.

Turning to the panel of Oti Mabuse, Sian Welby and evicted housemate Daze, she asked: “Will we see some tactical pairings from the heads of house?”

However, Will Best then revealed that each duo will then be forced to decide on their eviction nominations together.

“All the duos will nominate together as a pair and remember, the heads of house will be immune,” he explained to the live studio audience.

The Big Brother account on X, formerly known as Twitter, further confirmed the news.

It wrote: “As exclusively revealed on Big Brother: Late and Live, next week is double trouble!

“Not only will two housemates receive Head of House status, all housemates will also make their nominations in pairs.

Viewers couldn’t help but respond to the news with a rush of excitement as they also took to the social media platform.

One viewer said: “Omg I love this twist. Love them introducing more gameplay this year!”

A second suggested: “Nomination pairs is going to be interesting.”

“Nominations in PAIRS??? OH WOW,” exclaimed a third user.

And a fourth fan added: “OH NOMINATIONS IN PAIRS I LIKE THAT.”

Big Brother 2024 cast

A brand new batch of Big Brother housemates are living it up in the famous compound.

Meet the cast of the 2024 series:

• Rosie, 29, dental assistant from Cornwall.
• Emma, 53, aesthetics business owner from Altrincham.
• Segun, 25, charity videographer from Watford.
• Nathan, 24, pork salesman from Dumfries.
• Daze, 24, climate activist from London.
• Khaled, 23, sales manager from Manchester.
• Martha, 26, NHS administrator from Scarborough.
• Lily, 20, Chinese takeaway server from Warrington.
• Ali, 30, Forensic psychologist from London.
• Thomas, 20 amputee footballer from Carlisle.
• Ryan, 28, marketing and events from Stockport.
• Hannah, 24, HR consultant from West London.
• Izaaz, 29, sales consultant from London.
• Sarah, 27, spa account manager from Shrewsbury.
• Marcello, 34, youth mentor from East London.
• Dean, 35, barber from East London

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Big Brother is available to watch on ITV2 and stream on ITVX.