The surviving members of Monty Python's Flying Circus are to reunite on stage.

Terry Jones, one of the iconic group of comedians, told the BBC: His announcement ended speculation following tweets by fellow Python Eric Idle yesterday and today in which he said:


and


It is understood that John Cleese, Michael Palin, and Terry Gilliam will join Jones and Idle for the press conference, which is expected to be held at The Playhouse Theatre in London, where the hit stage show Spamalot is playing.

The sixth member of the comedy group, Graham Chapman, died of cancer in October 1989.

The five surviving Pythons last appeared together at the 1998 Aspen Comedy Festival.

The comedy group started life as a BBC television sketch show that ran for four series between 1969 and 1974, spawning five films as well as various books and albums, and proved to be a massive influence on comedy.

UPDATE - FRIDAY 22nd NOVEMBER: The show will take place at the O2 Arena in London on Tuesday 1st July 2014, and will see the team performing some of their best-known sketches "with modern and topical Pythonesque twists", as well as new material. Tickets go on sale on Monday 25th November from 10am, with prices starting at £27.50 and going up to £95 (plus fees). More details are available via this link. The performance will be filmed and released commercially.

The first official picture from the third series of Sherlock was released today by the BBC.

Taken by Robert Viglasky, it shows Benedict Cumberbatch as the title character and Martin Freeman as his flatmate, friend, and colleague Dr John Watson.

The BBC One show's start date in the UK is yet to be confirmed, but in a press release the BBC said: Speaking about the return of the series, executive producer, writer, and co-creator Steven Moffat said: Fellow executive producer, writer, and co-creator Mark Gatiss, who has written the first episode The Empty Hearse, added:

As previously reported, series 3 will start in the USA on Sunday 19th January as part of PBS's Masterpiece strand.

Sherlock is inspired by the works of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. It has been made by Hartswood Films, with Sue Vertue as the producer. The executive producers are Beryl Vertue, Gatiss, and Moffat for Hartswood Films, Bethan Jones for the BBC, and Rebecca Eaton for Masterpiece. The drama was commissioned by Danny Cohen, former controller of BBC One (now director of BBC Television), and Ben Stephenson, the BBC's controller of drama commissioning.

UPDATE - 3.48pm: The BFI will be holding an exclusive preview screening of the first episode, followed by a question-and-answer session with cast and crew members, on Sunday 15th December at 1pm. Tickets go on sale to members tomorrow at 11.30am, with public booking opening on Tuesday 12th November from 11.30am. More details via this link.

Record-setting astronomy TV series The Sky At Night is to continue following a campaign to save the BBC show.

However, it will lose its 20-minute slot on BBC One and will move to BBC Four, where it is currently repeated in a 30-minute format.

Following the death last year of presenter Sir Patrick Moore, it was feared that the programme - which was first broadcast on 24th April 1957 - would be axed when last month the BBC said its future was being reviewed. That sparked a massive protest, with an online petition garnering more than 52,000 signatures.

Now the BBC has announced that the monthly programme will first air on BBC Four in a half-hour slot from February 2014, with repeats on BBC Two.

Kim Shillinglaw, the head of commissioning for BBC Science and Natural History, said: Cassian Harrison, BBC Four's editor, commented: Moore presented the show from its start to his death and only missed one edition in July 2004 - because of food poisoning - making it the longest-running programme with the same presenter in TV history. The series has been fronted by a team of presenters since Moore's death, including Jon Culshaw, Dr Chris Lintott, Dr Lucie Green, Dr Chris North, Dr Paul Abel, and Pete Lawrence. It is yet to be decided who will present it when it comes back.

Following the announcement of its reprieve, Culshaw tweeted: The next edition will be on Monday 4th November at 12.30am (except Scotland, when it will air at 1.15am). It will be off air in January, when the slot will be taken by the BBC Two astronomy show Stargazing Live, hosted by Professor Brian Cox and Dara O Briain.

The second series of BAFTA-winning BBC One romantic drama Last Tango In Halifax will be back on TV screens next month.

Made by Red Production Company and once again comprising six episodes written by Sally Wainwright, it will see Derek Jacobi and Anne Reid returning as the love-struck septuagenarians Alan Buttershaw and Celia Dawson, who rediscover their love for each other 60 years after they first met.

Series one, which aired between 20th November and 19th December 2012, was the BBC's highest-rating new mid-week drama of 2012, regularly attracting more than seven million viewers.

Also starring in it are Sarah Lancashire as Celia's daughter Caroline Elliot and Nicola Walker as Alan's daughter Gillian Greenwood, plus Nina Sosanya as Caroline's lover Kate and Tony Gardner and Ronnie Ancona as, respectively, Caroline's husband John and John's lover Judith.

The first episode of the new series is currently unplaced in the BBC One schedule for Saturday 16th to Friday 22nd November.
Directed by Euros Lyn, filming took place over the summer across the north of England, and Wainwright said: Nicola Shindler, the executive producer and founder of Red Production Company, commented; The first series won the Best Drama Series award at this year's TV BAFTAs, and Wainwright was named Best Drama Writer at the 2013 British Academy Television Craft Awards.


UPDATE - 11th NOVEMBER: The new series will start on Tuesday 19th November at 9pm, the BBC has confirmed.

The BFI Southbank will be looking closely at the emergence of Cool Gothic And The New Vampire next week with a host of special guests plus illustrative clips from TV series such as Being Human, In The Flesh, Buffy The Vampire Slayer, The Fades, and True Blood.

Taking place on Monday 4th November at 6.30pm, it will feature a panel discussion hosted by film critic Danny Leigh, who will be joined by actors Anthony Head (Buffy), Damien Molony (Being Human) and Lily Loveless (The Fades), creators/writers Toby Whithouse (Being Human) and Dominic Mitchell (In The Flesh), and director Farren Blackburn (The Fades).
Tickets can be bought via this link.

The event is part of the BFI's blockbuster project Gothic: The Dark Heart of Film.

UPDATE: THURSDAY 28th NOVEMBER: A clip of Buffy and Angel creator Joss Whedon talking about vampires - taken from the BFI's Joss Whedon In Conversation event of 12th June 2013 - was uploaded to the BFI's YouTube channel two days ago:


The full conversation can be seen here.

The BBC's new fantasy drama Atlantis has been recommissioned for a second series, it was announced today - after just four episodes of the first run.

Created by Howard Overman, Johnny Capps, and Julian Murphy - part of the team behind Merlin, whose gap it is filling - the first episode, which aired on BBC One on Saturday 28th September, drew an audience of 8.4 million viewers (including catch-up over seven days), making it the biggest new Saturday-night drama series launch in the UK since Robin Hood in 2006, and also up on the launch of Merlin in 2008. Across the first three episodes, the show - made by Urban Myth Films - has averaged a consolidated audience of 6.7 million, and is averaging 7.4 million viewers in Live+7.

BBC One controller Charlotte Moore said: Ben Stephenson, the controller of BBC Commissioning, commented: In a joint statement, Capps, Murphy, and Overman said: The 13-part series follows the adventures of Jason (Jack Donnelly), Hercules (Mark Addy), and Pythagoras (Robert Emms), who battle against some of the most famous names of Greek legend, often in unexpected guises. The show also stars Jemima Rooper (Medusa), Aiysha Hart (Ariadne), Sarah Parish (Pasiphae), and Juliet Stevenson (The Oracle). All of these characters will return in series two. The number of episodes of the second series is yet to be confirmed, though.

Previously unannounced guests still to come include Robert Lindsay and John Hannah, who have forthcoming roles in the current series, which continues on BBC One until late December.

Tonight's episode - White Lies - airs at 8.15pm.