Peter Jukes
Encyclopedia
Peter Jukes is a British
author
, screenwriter
, playwright
, literary critic and blog
ger.
, with 90 minute or two hour long stories originally broadcast on the BBC, retransmitted abroad in the United States of America, most of Europe, Russia, and Asia.
Jukes devised and wrote most of the three seasons of the BBC One
prime time undercover thriller In Deep starring Nick Berry
and Stephen Tompkinson
; two 90-minute film length episodes of the BBC One series Inspector Lynley Mysteries;. Burn Out, the two-hour first episode of the first season of the Emmy Award
winning 'cold-case' series Waking the Dead
; achieved 8.4m viewers and a 38% share. He and Ed Whitmore
wrote the second series of the paranormal/science thriller Sea of Souls
which won the 2005 BAFTA Scotland
Award for Best Drama. Jukes' opening episode of the third season of Holby City
was described by The Guardian
as the "televisual equivalent of Crack Cocaine."
In October 2009, Jukes wrote a critical piece for Prospect
magazine, contrasting the standards of UK Television drama negatively with the standard of television dramas in America
. In the essay Why Can't Britain Do the Wire he argued that high quality drama in the UK had suffered from a concentration of commissioning power, the dominance of soaps (such as the twelfth series of Holby City), and the lack of show runners or writer producers that characterise US TV drama production.
Soul Motel (a drama taking place entirely in social networking space similar to Bebo
or Facebook
) and, with the comedian and actor Lenny Henry
, the plays Bad Faith and Slavery: The Making of. The latter formed part of the BBC's 2007 programming series to commemorate 200 years since Britain abolished the slave trade, "managed to extract maximum humour from the grimmest of subject matters." by using the form of a semi-comic mockumentary
. As The Spectator
explained: "Greg Wise
plays the harassed producer trying to put together a drama for which Lenny Henry has provided sheafs of research printouts from the internet -- but no script... 'Whose story is this?' demands Adrian Lester
in an angry exchange with Brian Blessed
. Were they in character? Or were they arguing for real?"
In 2008, Lenny Henry starred in another "dark comedy by veteran writer Peter Jukes" called Bad Faith: "Imagine the movie Bad Lieutenant
transplanted to Birmingham, with Harvey Keitel's morally bankrupt copper replaced by Lenny Henry as a police chaplain who has lost his faith, and you have Peter Jukes's black comedy.". Paul Donovan of The Sunday Times
called Bad Faith "the best radio drama I have heard in ages, and clearly destined to become a series....". In February 2010 three further episodes were broadcast on BBC Radio 4. to more positive reviews: "The scripts are strong, taut, bang up-to-the-minute, salted with ironic humour. (Lenny Henry's) performance is brilliant" according to Gillian Reynolds in The Daily Telegraph
., and according to The Stage
:
in the UK in 1990, and by Farrar, Straus and Giroux
and the University of California Press
in the US. This "unusual but addictive book" (according to The Washington Post
) is a series of essays and montages about modernity and city life, centred on London
, Paris
, Saint Petersburg
and New York City
. The Journal of Sociology
compared the book favourably to the work of Jane Jacobs
: "He is less shrill than Jacobs, more confident in his materials, and yet more sensitive and critical." But it was the format of the book ("a courteously lucid deconstructionist text,which is part documentary lecture, part collage of quotations and photographs" according to The New Yorker
) which was commended by John Berger
a "dream of a book" following the traditions of Walter Benjamin
:
Following through in these themes of urbanism and city development Jukes also co-authored, along with Anna Whyatt, Stephen O'Brien and the sociologist Manuel Castells
, the monograph Creative Capital: 21st Century Regions.
's Traverse Theatre
: Abel Barebone and the Humble Company (1987) and Shadowing the Conqueror (1988). Shadowing the Conqueror, which transferred to Washington D.C, was described in the Washington Post as "a depiction of the travels of Alexander the Great (Grimmette) and a contemporary photographer named Mary Ellis (Laura Giannarelli) - based very loosely on the relationship between Alexander and Pyrrho of Elis, a painter who accompanied the warrior on his expedition to the Orient - is most of all a lofty debate between two intensely committed, opposing forces." Jukes wrote the book of the London stage musical Matador
, with lyrics by Edward Seago and music by Mike Leander
, starring John Barrowman
and Stephanie Powers, which premiered at the Queen's Theatre, Shaftesbury Avenue in April 1991.
and the New Statesman
on themes as diverse as nationalism, art in the computer age, and apocalyptic religion.
During the 1980s and 90s Jukes was an active member of the British Labour Party and was involved in the investigations around the cash for questions scandal. More recently Jukes became an active Barack Obama
supporter during the 2008 Democratic presidential primaries
, writing for Daily Kos
and then MYDD
when it became a heavily pro-Clinton site. Later he recorded his online experiences of the Primary 'Flame Wars' for Prospect Magazine. Following the primaries, he was one of 25 regular bloggers who began writing for a new political blog, The Motley Moose.
British people
The British are citizens of the United Kingdom, of the Isle of Man, any of the Channel Islands, or of any of the British overseas territories, and their descendants...
author
Author
An author is broadly defined as "the person who originates or gives existence to anything" and that authorship determines responsibility for what is created. Narrowly defined, an author is the originator of any written work.-Legal significance:...
, screenwriter
Screenwriter
Screenwriters or scriptwriters or scenario writers are people who write/create the short or feature-length screenplays from which mass media such as films, television programs, Comics or video games are based.-Profession:...
, playwright
Playwright
A playwright, also called a dramatist, is a person who writes plays.The term is not a variant spelling of "playwrite", but something quite distinct: the word wright is an archaic English term for a craftsman or builder...
, literary critic and blog
Blog
A blog is a type of website or part of a website supposed to be updated with new content from time to time. Blogs are usually maintained by an individual with regular entries of commentary, descriptions of events, or other material such as graphics or video. Entries are commonly displayed in...
ger.
Television
Jukes' television writing has mainly been in genre of prime time thrillers or TV detective fictionDetective fiction
Detective fiction is a sub-genre of crime fiction and mystery fiction in which an investigator , either professional or amateur, investigates a crime, often murder.-In ancient literature:...
, with 90 minute or two hour long stories originally broadcast on the BBC, retransmitted abroad in the United States of America, most of Europe, Russia, and Asia.
Jukes devised and wrote most of the three seasons of the BBC One
BBC One
BBC One is the flagship television channel of the British Broadcasting Corporation in the United Kingdom. It was launched on 2 November 1936 as the BBC Television Service, and was the world's first regular television service with a high level of image resolution...
prime time undercover thriller In Deep starring Nick Berry
Nick Berry
Nicholas "Nick" Berry is a British television actor and musician. He is best known for his roles as Simon Wicks in the British soap opera EastEnders from 1985 to 1990 and as PC Nick Rowan in the British drama television series Heartbeat from 1992 to 1998.-Career:Berry started acting at the age of...
and Stephen Tompkinson
Stephen Tompkinson
Stephen Tompkinson is a British actor. He is best known for his work in comedy and drama productions such as Drop the Dead Donkey, Ballykissangel, Grafters, In Deep, Wild at Heart and DCI Banks....
; two 90-minute film length episodes of the BBC One series Inspector Lynley Mysteries;. Burn Out, the two-hour first episode of the first season of the Emmy Award
Emmy Award
An Emmy Award, often referred to simply as the Emmy, is a television production award, similar in nature to the Peabody Awards but more focused on entertainment, and is considered the television equivalent to the Academy Awards and the Grammy Awards .A majority of Emmys are presented in various...
winning 'cold-case' series Waking the Dead
Waking the Dead (TV series)
Waking the Dead is a British television police procedural crime drama series produced by the BBC featuring a fictional Cold Case Unit comprising CID police officers, a psychological profiler and a forensic scientist. A pilot episode aired in September 2000 and there have been a total of nine series...
; achieved 8.4m viewers and a 38% share. He and Ed Whitmore
Ed Whitmore
Ed Whitmore is a British screenwriter. He has written for a number of successful British TV series such as Waking the Dead. In 2003 he wrote the Waking The Dead episode Multistory, directed by Robert Bierman, which won the show an Emmy for Best International Drama Series...
wrote the second series of the paranormal/science thriller Sea of Souls
Sea of Souls
Sea of Souls is a BBC paranormal drama series, based around the fictional activities of a group of investigators into psychic and other paranormal events. Produced in-house by BBC Scotland, initially in association with Sony Pictures Television International, the series debuted on BBC One in the UK...
which won the 2005 BAFTA Scotland
BAFTA Scotland
BAFTA in Scotland is the Scottish branch of the British Academy of Film and Television Arts. Formed in 1997, the branch holds an annual awards ceremony, the British Academy Scotland Awards , to recognise achievement by performers and production staff in Scottish film, television and video games...
Award for Best Drama. Jukes' opening episode of the third season of Holby City
Holby City
Holby City, stylised as Holby Ci+y, is a British medical drama television series that airs weekly on BBC One.The series was created by Tony McHale and Mal Young as a spin-off from the established BBC medical drama Casualty, and premiered on 12 January 1999...
was described by The Guardian
The Guardian
The Guardian, formerly known as The Manchester Guardian , is a British national daily newspaper in the Berliner format...
as the "televisual equivalent of Crack Cocaine."
In October 2009, Jukes wrote a critical piece for Prospect
Prospect (magazine)
Prospect is a monthly British general interest magazine, specialising in politics and current affairs. Frequent topics include British, European, and US politics, social issues, art, literature, cinema, science, the media, history, philosophy, and psychology...
magazine, contrasting the standards of UK Television drama negatively with the standard of television dramas in America
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
. In the essay Why Can't Britain Do the Wire he argued that high quality drama in the UK had suffered from a concentration of commissioning power, the dominance of soaps (such as the twelfth series of Holby City), and the lack of show runners or writer producers that characterise US TV drama production.
Radio
His recent radio credits include the original BBC RadioBBC Radio
BBC Radio is a service of the British Broadcasting Corporation which has operated in the United Kingdom under the terms of a Royal Charter since 1927. For a history of BBC radio prior to 1927 see British Broadcasting Company...
Soul Motel (a drama taking place entirely in social networking space similar to Bebo
Bebo
Bebo is a social networking website launched in July 2005. It is currently owned and operated by Criterion Capital Partners after taking over from AOL in June 2010....
or Facebook
Facebook
Facebook is a social networking service and website launched in February 2004, operated and privately owned by Facebook, Inc. , Facebook has more than 800 million active users. Users must register before using the site, after which they may create a personal profile, add other users as...
) and, with the comedian and actor Lenny Henry
Lenny Henry
Lenworth George "Lenny" Henry, is a British actor, writer, comedian and occasional television presenter.- Early life :...
, the plays Bad Faith and Slavery: The Making of. The latter formed part of the BBC's 2007 programming series to commemorate 200 years since Britain abolished the slave trade, "managed to extract maximum humour from the grimmest of subject matters." by using the form of a semi-comic mockumentary
Mockumentary
A mockumentary , is a type of film or television show in which fictitious events are presented in documentary format. These productions are often used to analyze or comment on current events and issues by using a fictitious setting, or to parody the documentary form itself...
. As The Spectator
The Spectator
The Spectator is a weekly British magazine first published on 6 July 1828. It is currently owned by David and Frederick Barclay, who also owns The Daily Telegraph. Its principal subject areas are politics and culture...
explained: "Greg Wise
Greg Wise
Greg Wise is an English actor and producer. He has appeared in many British television works, as well as several feature films .- Early life :...
plays the harassed producer trying to put together a drama for which Lenny Henry has provided sheafs of research printouts from the internet -- but no script... 'Whose story is this?' demands Adrian Lester
Adrian Lester
-Personal life:Lester was born in Birmingham, England, the son of Jamaican immigrants Monica, a medical secretary, and Reginald, a manager for a contract cleaning company. He sang as a boy treble in the choir of St. Chad's Cathedral, Birmingham...
in an angry exchange with Brian Blessed
Brian Blessed
Brian Blessed is an English actor, known for his sonorous voice and "hearty, king-sized portrayals".-Early life:The son of William Blessed, a socialist miner, and Hilda Wall, Blessed was born in the town of Goldthorpe, West Riding of Yorkshire, England...
. Were they in character? Or were they arguing for real?"
In 2008, Lenny Henry starred in another "dark comedy by veteran writer Peter Jukes" called Bad Faith: "Imagine the movie Bad Lieutenant
Bad Lieutenant
Bad Lieutenant is a 1992 crime-drama film directed by Abel Ferrara and starring Harvey Keitel as the eponymous "bad lieutenant". The screenplay was written by actress-model Zoë Lund. She also played a small role in the film. Lund had been discovered by Ferrara and had starred in his earlier film, Ms...
transplanted to Birmingham, with Harvey Keitel's morally bankrupt copper replaced by Lenny Henry as a police chaplain who has lost his faith, and you have Peter Jukes's black comedy.". Paul Donovan of The Sunday Times
The Sunday Times
The Sunday Times is a British Sunday newspaper.The Sunday Times may also refer to:*The Sunday Times *The Sunday Times *The Sunday Times *The Sunday Times...
called Bad Faith "the best radio drama I have heard in ages, and clearly destined to become a series....". In February 2010 three further episodes were broadcast on BBC Radio 4. to more positive reviews: "The scripts are strong, taut, bang up-to-the-minute, salted with ironic humour. (Lenny Henry's) performance is brilliant" according to Gillian Reynolds in The Daily Telegraph
The Daily Telegraph
The Daily Telegraph is a daily morning broadsheet newspaper distributed throughout the United Kingdom and internationally. The newspaper was founded by Arthur B...
., and according to The Stage
The Stage
The Stage is a weekly British newspaper founded in 1880, available nationally and published on Thursdays. Covering all areas of the entertainment industry but focused primarily on theatre, it contains news, reviews, opinion, features and other items of interest, mainly to those who work within the...
:
"Jukes’ writing is terrific - funny, deep, unafraid to move from the mundane to the reflective. Jake, his semi-heretical minister, is the most original creation of his kind that I can recall and Henry was born to play him.".
Non-fiction
Jukes's book A Shout in the Street was published by Faber and FaberFaber and Faber
Faber and Faber Limited, often abbreviated to Faber, is an independent publishing house in the UK, notable in particular for publishing a great deal of poetry and for its former editor T. S. Eliot. Faber has a rich tradition of publishing a wide range of fiction, non fiction, drama, film and music...
in the UK in 1990, and by Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Farrar, Straus and Giroux is an American book publishing company, founded in 1946 by Roger W. Straus, Jr. and John C. Farrar. Known primarily as Farrar, Straus in its first decade of existence, the company was renamed several times, including Farrar, Straus and Young and Farrar, Straus and Cudahy...
and the University of California Press
University of California Press
University of California Press, also known as UC Press, is a publishing house associated with the University of California that engages in academic publishing. It was founded in 1893 to publish books and papers for the faculty of the University of California, established 25 years earlier in 1868...
in the US. This "unusual but addictive book" (according to The Washington Post
The Washington Post
The Washington Post is Washington, D.C.'s largest newspaper and its oldest still-existing paper, founded in 1877. Located in the capital of the United States, The Post has a particular emphasis on national politics. D.C., Maryland, and Virginia editions are printed for daily circulation...
) is a series of essays and montages about modernity and city life, centred on London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
, Paris
Paris
Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...
, Saint Petersburg
Saint Petersburg
Saint Petersburg is a city and a federal subject of Russia located on the Neva River at the head of the Gulf of Finland on the Baltic Sea...
and New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
. The Journal of Sociology
Journal of Sociology
The Journal of Sociology is a peer-reviewed academic journal that covers the field of sociology with a focus on Australia. The journal's editor-in-chief is Andy Bennett...
compared the book favourably to the work of Jane Jacobs
Jane Jacobs
Jane Jacobs, was an American-Canadian writer and activist with primary interest in communities and urban planning and decay. She is best known for The Death and Life of Great American Cities , a powerful critique of the urban renewal policies of the 1950s in the United States...
: "He is less shrill than Jacobs, more confident in his materials, and yet more sensitive and critical." But it was the format of the book ("a courteously lucid deconstructionist text,which is part documentary lecture, part collage of quotations and photographs" according to The New Yorker
The New Yorker
The New Yorker is an American magazine of reportage, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons and poetry published by Condé Nast...
) which was commended by John Berger
John Berger
John Peter Berger is an English art critic, novelist, painter and author. His novel G. won the 1972 Booker Prize, and his essay on art criticism Ways of Seeing, written as an accompaniment to a BBC series, is often used as a university text.-Education:Born in Hackney, London, England, Berger was...
a "dream of a book" following the traditions of Walter Benjamin
Walter Benjamin
Walter Bendix Schönflies Benjamin was a German-Jewish intellectual, who functioned variously as a literary critic, philosopher, sociologist, translator, radio broadcaster and essayist...
:
Benjamin dreamed of making a book entirely of quotations, and there have been some remarkable books which are creative responses to that idea, like Peter Jukes's A Shout in the Street.
Following through in these themes of urbanism and city development Jukes also co-authored, along with Anna Whyatt, Stephen O'Brien and the sociologist Manuel Castells
Manuel Castells
Manuel Castells is a sociologist especially associated with information society and communication research....
, the monograph Creative Capital: 21st Century Regions.
Theatre
Jukes's early theatre work debuted at EdinburghEdinburgh
Edinburgh is the capital city of Scotland, the second largest city in Scotland, and the eighth most populous in the United Kingdom. The City of Edinburgh Council governs one of Scotland's 32 local government council areas. The council area includes urban Edinburgh and a rural area...
's Traverse Theatre
Traverse Theatre
The Traverse Theatre is a theatre in Edinburgh, Scotland. It was founded in 1963.The Traverse Theatre commissions and develops new plays or adaptations from contemporary playwrights. It also presents a large number of productions from visiting companies from across the UK. These include new plays,...
: Abel Barebone and the Humble Company (1987) and Shadowing the Conqueror (1988). Shadowing the Conqueror, which transferred to Washington D.C, was described in the Washington Post as "a depiction of the travels of Alexander the Great (Grimmette) and a contemporary photographer named Mary Ellis (Laura Giannarelli) - based very loosely on the relationship between Alexander and Pyrrho of Elis, a painter who accompanied the warrior on his expedition to the Orient - is most of all a lofty debate between two intensely committed, opposing forces." Jukes wrote the book of the London stage musical Matador
Matador (musical)
Matador is the title of a 1991 musical by Mike Leander and Edward Seago, with a book by Peter Jukes, which tells the story of the rise and fall of a fictional matador, loosely based on Manuel Benitez, El Cordobes. The show featured stunning choreography in traditional Flamenco style by Rafael...
, with lyrics by Edward Seago and music by Mike Leander
Mike Leander
Michael George Farr professionally known as Mike Leander was an arranger and record producer for Decca Records in the 1960s and Bell Records in the 1970s and worked with such artists as Marianne Faithfull, Billy Fury, Marc Bolan, Joe Cocker, The Small Faces, Van Morrison, Alan Price, Peter...
, starring John Barrowman
John Barrowman
John Scot Barrowman is a Scottish-American singer, actor, dancer, musical theatre performer and media personality. Born in Glasgow yet growing up in Illinois after his family emigrated to the United States when he was eight years old, Barrowman was encouraged to further his love for music and...
and Stephanie Powers, which premiered at the Queen's Theatre, Shaftesbury Avenue in April 1991.
Journalism and politics
Jukes has been a book reviewer and feature writer for both The IndependentThe Independent
The Independent is a British national morning newspaper published in London by Independent Print Limited, owned by Alexander Lebedev since 2010. It is nicknamed the Indy, while the Sunday edition, The Independent on Sunday, is the Sindy. Launched in 1986, it is one of the youngest UK national daily...
and the New Statesman
New Statesman
New Statesman is a British centre-left political and cultural magazine published weekly in London. Founded in 1913, and connected with leading members of the Fabian Society, the magazine reached a circulation peak in the late 1960s....
on themes as diverse as nationalism, art in the computer age, and apocalyptic religion.
During the 1980s and 90s Jukes was an active member of the British Labour Party and was involved in the investigations around the cash for questions scandal. More recently Jukes became an active Barack Obama
Barack Obama
Barack Hussein Obama II is the 44th and current President of the United States. He is the first African American to hold the office. Obama previously served as a United States Senator from Illinois, from January 2005 until he resigned following his victory in the 2008 presidential election.Born in...
supporter during the 2008 Democratic presidential primaries
Democratic Party (United States) presidential primaries, 2008
The 2008 Democratic presidential primaries were the selection process by which voters of the Democratic Party chose its nominee for President of the United States in the 2008 U.S. presidential election...
, writing for Daily Kos
Daily Kos
Daily Kos is an American political blog that publishes news and opinions from a progressive point of view. It functions as a discussion forum and group blog for a variety of netroots activists, whose efforts are primarily directed toward influencing and strengthening the Democratic Party...
and then MYDD
MyDD
MyDD is a collaborative politically progressive American politics blog. It was established by Jerome Armstrong in 2001. Its name was originally short for "My Due Diligence." In January 2006, the name was changed to "My Direct Democracy" as part of a site redesign, with the new tagline "Direct...
when it became a heavily pro-Clinton site. Later he recorded his online experiences of the Primary 'Flame Wars' for Prospect Magazine. Following the primaries, he was one of 25 regular bloggers who began writing for a new political blog, The Motley Moose.