White Heat (TV series)

White Heat is a 2012 TV series, written by Paula Milne. The series follows seven students who first meet in a London flat-share in 1965 and consists of 6 one-hour episodes, set in 1965, 1967, 1972, 1979,1982 and 1990. The series shares its title, (taken from a 1963 speech by Harold Wilson proclaiming the technological revolution), with Dominic Sandbrook's White Heat:A History of Britain in the Swinging Sixties.

The series was trailed in Radio Times with an article titled Our Friends in the South , an echo of Peter Flannery's 1996 TV series Our Friends in the North. Milne herself rejected a direct comparison however; "Our Friends in the North was absolutely seminal. But it didn't have a lot to do with women, and it didn't have a lot to do with race,and it didn't have a lot to do with sexual politics. " Milne, who had experience of both the Central School of Art and Design and the Royal College of Art in the mid-Sixties, said her experience most tallied with that of the character Lilly (MyAnna Buring).

"The mix of the personal and the political is framed by a flash-forward to the present day, in which the house is revisited by the former friends after one of their number dies and makes them the executors of his or her will." The identity of the dead character is withheld until the final episode.

Milne has said she thinks its theme is " the disappointment of the Left. [-] Edward, Jack's father, says to Jack during the 1979 episode ( when Margaret Thatcher is elected), that 'this is the end of consensus politics and it's you guys who opened the door and let her in. Just remember that'. Fucking right they did. Excuse my French."

Cast

• Lilly - MyAnna Buring
• Jack - Sam Claflin
• Lilly (present day) - Lindsay Duncan
• Charlotte - Claire Foy
• Beth - Tamsin Greig
• Orla - Jessica Gunning
• Victor - David Gyasi
• Alan - Lee Ingleby
• Miles - Richard Lintern
• Edward - Jeremy Northam
• Victor (present day) - Hugh Quarshie
• Jay - Reece Ritchie
• Orla (present day) - Sorcha Cusack
• Charlotte (present day) - Juliet Stevenson
• Derek Bowden - Julian Barratt
• Val - Karen Henthorn
• Frank - Geoff Leesley
• Jack (present day) - Paul Copley
• Alan (present day) - Michael Kitchen
• Jay (present day) - Ramon Tikaram