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Here's how the tabloids reported the news that PP had been axed
Death of Peak
Practice
Upset at Axing of popular show
The rural medical drama Peak Practice has been axed after 10 years despite
attracting a healthy 6.7 million viewers in the last series.
ITV will replace it with a new spin-off medical drama which is also about a
countryside surgery and, like its predecessor, will also be set in the Peak
District.
The show’s stars are said to be extremely disappointed as another series was
expected after the nail-biting cliff-hanger to the last one with Claire jumping
into a quarry, dragging popular doctor Alex with her. The scene left viewers
wondering who had survived and now they will never find out. A spokeswoman for
the production company, Carlton, said that after 12 series a joint decision had
been taken with ITV not to recommission it because the programme had become
tired.
She said: “We decided it was time to move on. It has been going for nearly 10
years and we felt we needed to take a fresh look at things. I am sure the cast
are disappointed but any actor knows that no series lasts for ever.”
Peak Practice was an instant hit when it was first screened in 1993, starring
Kevin Whately and Amanda Burton. Simon Shepherd, who was also in the original
series, left the show but returned in series 10 to join Maggie O’Neill and Gray
O’Brien as his fellow doctors.
The main characters of the new drama, Sweet Medicine, will be husband and wife
GP’s Nicholas and Deborah Sweet, who leave their London surgery to take over his
father’s practice in Derbyshire.
Daily Express
TV axe for Peak
docs
Medical drama Peak Practice has been axed by ITV1 after ten years.
The show’s stars are said to be ‘extremely upset’ after bosses decided to
replace it – with ANOTHER medical drama set in the Peak District of England.
The show, originally starring Kevin Whately and Amanda Burton, had 6.7 million
viewers when the last series ended in January. But the makers Carlton though it
looked tired.
Replacement series Sweet Medicine is set in a Derbyshire’s GP surgery.
The Sun
Peak Practice
is axed – for a medical drama
ITV1 has axed it’s long running medical drama Peak Practice.
Bosses decided the ten-year-old show about rural GP’s was showing it’s age after
12 series.
Do not adjust your set when it’s replacement reaches the screens, however. It
will be another medical drama, also about GPs – and set, once again, in the Peak
District.
At it’s height, Peak Practice pulled in around 12 million viewers. However,
ratings fell as the years passed and last August ITV issued an ultimatum to
producers, Carlton to come up with better storylines or face the chop. Peak
Practice introduced racier plots and characters – including former Coronation
Street star Eva Pope as a psychotic nurse – and the last series, which ended
earlier this year, averaged a respectable 7.1 million viewers. ITV drama
controller Nick Elliott has pulled the plug, however, saying the show has run
it’s course.
A spokesman for Carlton said a joint decision had been taken with ITV not to
recommission it. ‘Peak Practice gets good viewing figures but we decided it was
time to move on,’ she added
‘It has been going for nearly 10 years and we felt we needed to take a fresh
look at things. I am sure the cast are disappointed but any actor knows that no
series lasts forever.’
Peak Practice was first screened in 1993 and originally starred Kevin Whately,
Amanda Burton and Simon Shepherd.
All three moved on to other things but Shepherd, as dishy Dr Preston, returned
for the 10th series and was joined by Maggie O’Neill and Gray O’Brien as his
fellow doctors.
It’s replacement, Sweet Medicine, will be based around a family practice. The
main characters will be husband and wife GPs Nicholas and Deborah Sweet, who
leave their London surgery to take over his father’s practice in rural
Derbyshire after his death.
The series follows their attempts to transform the sleepy practice into a
cutting edge health centre, in the face of opposition from Nicholas’s formidable
mother Georgina.
The Carlton spokeswoman said” ‘We wanted a new series but obviously people do
like medical dramas and the Peak District is a great setting.’
Production will start next year and although casting has not yet begun, Carlton
said the producers hoped to enlist some ‘familiar TV names’
Daily Mail
ITV DUMPS
DOCS SOAP
Medical drama Peak Practice has been
dumped by ITV1 bosses after a decade of hit ratings.
The series about a rural doctors practice has run for 12 series and still pulls
in 6.7 million viewers.
But ITV said yesterday it decided to replace it with another country GP series
called Sweet Medicine – also set in the Peak District.
Disappointed star Simon Shepherd, who plays Dr Will Preston said: .ITV is in a
terrible state and we’re a casualty of it, no pun intended.’
ITV said ‘It’s going to have a relaunch but without the same actors.’
The Mirror
Peak
Practice is Struck off
It has enchanted millions of viewers for a decade but the GPs
in drama series Peak Practice have been told to put away their stethoscopes.
The sagas of gentle goings-on at a Derbyshire doctors surgery is to be replaced
by a series about......doctors in the Derbyshire countryside.
Peak Practice made stars out of Amanda Burton and Simon Shepherd, whose
character was written out and then returned for the final series, while former
Coronation Street actress Eva Pope played a mad nurse.
The last series, which ended in January, clocked up 6.7 million viewers. But ITV
director of drama Jonathan Powell said: 'We felt the time was right for a fresh
start in a new environment.'
The new series, Sweet Medicine, is about a family called Sweet who move from the
city to the country.
Metro
COUNTY'S
DOCTOR DRAMA IS DYING
Derbyshire medical drama Peak Practice has been axed after nine years - only to
be replaced with another series about GPs in the county.
Despite 6.7 million viewers tuning in to the last episode of Peak Practice,
which was aired in January, programme-makers say they were running out of ideas
for the series and need a "fresh start".
The series was based in the Peak District on the Derbyshire-Staffordshire
border, with scenes filmed across the county and in Derby.
It was the creation of Derby writer Lucy Gannon, a former social worker, who
developed the series in the early 1990s.
Hundreds of Derbyshire landmarks have appeared in the series over the years,
alongside a host of local talent.
Laura Kendrick-Harrison (20), of Ashbourne, starred as a choir girl who took an
overdose.
She said: "I appeared in the show when I was 15 and will always have very fond
memories of the Peak Practice crew.
"I lived a lifestyle I never thought I would - being chauffeur-driven in a
Mercedes car and being treated like a real star.
"It's a shame the series had to end. When it first started, everyone was excited
and we would watch it every week."
Her mother, Pat Kendrick-Harrison (50), said has always been a fan of the show,
which she believes showcased Derbyshire to the country. She said: "It made
people very proud Derbyshire was being featured in a national television series.
"I am sure many people will be sad to see the series go."
Entertainer Steve Beech, of Nottingham Road, Chaddesden, was an extra in the
show for four years, but suspected something was wrong when his agent was not
contacted by programme-makers Carlton.
Mr Beech said: "I'm surprised that this decision has been taken.
"When I was last working on set at the end of last year, there was certainly no
suggestion of the programme being axed.
"It's very sad, because Peak Practice was an opportunity for so many people from
across Derbyshire to appear on TV."
Actors from Peak Practice are said to be extremely disappointed by news of its
cancellation.
Carlton spokeswoman Fiona Johnston said: "Programme- makers felt they had done
everything they could with the characters. Sometimes script writers just run out
of stories and that seems to be what has happened here.
"Although Peak Practice was hugely successful, we needed a fresh start."
The show will be replaced by another medical drama, called Sweet Medicine, which
will follow the lives of doctors Nicholas and Deborah Sweet as they attempt to
set up a health centre in a Derbyshire village.
Carlton has yet to decide where it will be filmed, but production will begin
next year.
Derbyshire Evening Telegraph
More articles on Peak
Practice's axing, including a report on how the fans tried to save the drama
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