Friday 2 November 2007

Life on Mars Symposium Deconstructs BBC Wales / Kudos Drama Series at ATRiuM, Hosted by Dr Ruth McElroy and Professor Stephen Lacey


Event Date November 16, 2007 9:30 a.m. – 5 p.m.

Location – ATRiuM

CCI researchers are hosting a one-day research symposium on the ground-breaking and critically-acclaimed BBC Wales/Kudos drama series Life on Mars, which finished its second, and final, series earlier this year.

"Starsky and Hutch meets Cracker...intriguing British drama"
The Toronto Sun

"...brilliant detective-noir"
The National Post

‘Life on Mars’ will attract academics from across the UK for what is the first research event devoted to a drama series that has emerged as one of the most significant of the 21st century.

Symposium fee (includes tea/coffee/lunch): £40 (full cost); £25 (student/postgraduate)

STOP PRESS! Both Claire Parker and Jane Featherstone of Kudos have confirmed their attendance

Life on Mars Series 2 Trailer x2



The conference will open with a keynote address by Professor Robin Nelson, whose book on ‘quality’ television drama (A State of Play, MUP, 2007) has recently been published, and will close with a panel discussion with some of the leading figures behind the series; so far, Claire Parker of Kudos, who produced Life on Mars, Julie Gardner, Head of Drama for BBC Wales who commissioned it, and Ashley Pharoah, one of the series’ devisers and main writers, have provisionally agreed to attend.



Papers will be given on a range of topics, including the role of nostalgia in audiences’ responses to the series, the re-working of the iconography of the 1970s, the programme’s relationship to other police series and the role of the uncanny.



The symposium is organised by Dr Ruth McElroy and Professor Stephen Lacey, and will be one of the first research events to be held in the Atrium, the University of Glamorgan’s new base in Cardiff.

Life on Mars
One-day symposium
Friday 16th November 2007

Download a Registration form here!

[Please return this form by Friday November 9th]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/lifeonmars/

Life on Mars Schedule

9:45-10:00 Registration and Coffee


10:00-11:00 Keynote: Prof. Robin Nelson


11:00-11:15 Coffee

11:15-1:00 Panels 1 and 2

Panel 1: Sam’s Stories - Narrative and Genre
Panel 2: Producing Audiences for the Past



1:00-2:00 Lunch

2:00-3:15 Discussion with members of the production team:
Julie Gardner (BBC Wales)
Claire Walker and Jane Featherstone (Kudos)
Ashley Pharoah (writer)

3:15-3:30 Tea

3:30-5:00 Panels 3 and 4
Panel 3: Nostalgia and the Uncanny Media
Panel 4: Locating the 1970s



Life on Mars Panels

Panel 1: Sam’s Stories - Narrative and Genre
Nichola Dobson (??)
‘Am I mad, in a coma, or back in time?’ Generic and narrative complexity in Life on Mars

Karen Devlin (University of Hull)
Voices Bleeding Through: The Strange Journey of Sam Tyler in Life on Mars

Ross Garner (Cardiff University)
Make Another World: Expressing the Nostalgia Affect in the Diegesis and Narrative of Life on Mars

Angelina Karpovich (Brunel University)
Life on Mars and the Dialectic of Suicide

Panel 2: Producing Audiences for the Past
John Cook (Glasgow Caledonian University)
‘Moonage Daydreams’: Industrial and Cultural Memory contexts of Life on Mars

Brett Mills (University of East Anglia)
‘American Remake – Shudder’: Online Debates about Life on Mars and ‘Britishness’

Justine Mortimer (University of Winchester)
‘Knowing’ Quality: Exploiting Popular Cultural Capital, and Producerly and Audience Expectations

Panel 3: Nostalgia and the Uncanny Media
Matt Hills (Cardiff University)
The Media is the Monster…or the Message? Uncanny Test Cards and Interactive OU Lecturers in Life on Mars

Elisa Oliver (Central St Martins, University of the Arts, London)
Longing to Return-Seeing the 1970s. Life on Mars: Britain, Nostalgia and Art

Peter Jachimiak (University of Glamorgan)
‘Through the TV Screen’ – The Test Card Girl, the Uncanny and a ‘70s Childhood

Panel 4: Locating the 1970s
Teresa Forde (University of Derby)
Location, Location, Location: What does the 1970s look like?

John Curzon (University of Warwick)
Sam Tyler and the New North

Andy Willis (University of Salford)
Memory Banks Failing! Life on Mars and the politics of re-imagining the 1970s



AIM: ATRiuM Intelligent Media

Chapter Arts Centre Cardiff

Cardiff School of Creative & Cultural Industries

mwoods[at]glam[dot]ac[dot]uk

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