Lindsay Salt is director of BBC Drama. She talked with Televisual for its annual drama report.
Earlier this year, we were thrilled to see how This City is Ours connected with audiences across the UK. Stephen Butchard’s series exemplified the best of what BBC drama has to offer, with such specificity of place, complex character writing, breakout performances, and exceptional direction.
We’re lucky to have worked again this year with Sally Wainwright on her latest series, Riot Women. In her inimitable way, Sally created a show that spoke deeply to viewers who saw themselves reflected in that core group of women whilst leaving plenty of chairs at the table for everyone else. It was an unflinching, emotionally expansive, prescient and joyful piece of ensemble storytelling and we’re very excited to be underway on a second instalment.
Now into its third series, Blue Lights continues to go from strength to strength. A police procedural that manages to deliver razor sharp plotting alongside unforgettable characters is no small feat, but the show’s creators Adam Patterson and Declan Lawn, somehow manage to deepen and reinvent with each successive series.
And I have to give a shoutout to What It Feels Like for a Girl. It’s a great demonstration of how backing new talent can result in innovative, timely drama whilst launching stars of the future.
This City is Ours
Some of the highlights coming up
2026 is shaping up to be a fantastic year for BBC Drama. Amongst the many shows we’re excited about, we have
Richard Gadd’s Half Man, which promises to be exactly the kind of unmissable, distinctively authored, captivating drama we’re always seeking to deliver for our audience.
After the play’s success, James Graham’s adaptation of Dear England will hit our screens in a World Cup year – an inventive, heartfelt and ambitious take on factual, state of the nation drama.
Elsewhere, the long-anticipated return of The Night Manager will showcase our ongoing appetite for prestige, stylish, mainstream drama, whilst Charlotte Regan’s Mint underscores our commitment to backing visionary British talent.
With classic adaptations like Lord of the Flies, emotional journeys like Babies and The Other Bennet Sister, absorbing worlds including The Cage, The Split Up and Boarders, and many more besides, there’s lots to look forward to from BBC Drama in the year ahead.
The Night Manager S2
What next for BBC drama?
At the moment, we’re quite well covered across espionage, gang / organised crime, legal, medical, domestic thrillers, romance, and period classics.
Looking ahead, we’d like to find a new addition to the iconic BBC crime and detective shows from recent years. Where the likes of Happy Valley, Luther, and Life on Mars brought a fresh and distinctive spin on their genre, we’re similarly looking for brave, ambitious ideas that could add a new definition to crime and detective storytelling.
Our commitment also continues to finding authored, resonant stories that tackle the shared and urgent themes that underscore our times, in the vein of I May Destroy You, This Is Going To Hurt, and What It Feels Like for a Girl. In the thriller space, we’re looking for visceral, sharp concepts like The Capture, and invitations to fascinating, rich worlds we don’t often get to see, such as Conclave which did so well in the feature film space.
More recently, we’ve been looking at what the BBC’s take might be on elevated-yet-grounded genre shows like Severance and Pluribus.
Find out more about what the drama commissioners are looking for and the wider picture of demand for UK produced drama in the new issue of Televisual, out now in print, or available via our subscription site Televisual +
Pippa Considine
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