Mark Gatiss has confirmed that his crime drama Bookish will return for a third season and a Christmas special. Speaking at a season two screening and Q&A hosted by Richard Osman, the actor told Express and other press: "We have just shot the Christmas special. That's just finished, and series three starts shooting in November."
Renewed before debut
The show, which follows bookshop owner and sleuth Gabriel Book, had its first two seasons commissioned before it even aired. "It's an incredible vote of confidence to have it recommissioned before it went out, and it made such a difference to everyone that they felt it had gone down so well," Mark said.
"Nobody knows anything. You put your heart and soul into something and hope it's gonna work, and luckily, people really responded to it."
Ambition and inspiration
The actor reflected on the show's future ambitions. "Obviously, with that confidence, you want to be more ambitious with the second series, as much as you can within budgetary constraints," he continued. "But it was really lovely to think ahead like that and plan very quickly for what comes next."
As the show's creator, Mark also discussed his writing process. Asked why the late 1940s appealed to him, the Sherlock star noted, "It's one of my favourite periods, so that's why I wanted it to be set there originally."
"I've read an awful lot about it over the years; there are mass observations, diaries, and lots of records. The research is such a huge part of the joy of it because you always discover something. There's a wonderful book by Angus Calder called The People's Law, which I read 20 years ago. And obviously, that's about the war itself, but there are nuggets in it."
"World War II was an extraordinarily weird thing. It smashed everyone's lives."
Characters and plots
Mark explained the richness of the era and its characters. "There's an amazing story about the Royal Family being booed when they visited bomb sites and all this stuff that was suppressed. But, yes, it really comes from that, and you get that kind of richness; there are so many animals.
"It's not just that Book is a gay man, but [his wife] Trotty is a woman who's been in the Spanish Civil War and liberated by the possibilities of the war. For the newcomers, Jack has come out of prison and then gets this found family."
On finding inspiration for each murder mystery plot, Mark mused, "Famously, Graham Greene wrote a letter to Agatha Christie, which is in her estate, begging to buy plots. He couldn't think of a thing. She had so many, but it's difficult, isn't it?
"I think increasingly that what you want is an episode, it's 'the one with' or 'the one where,' and if you set it in a particular thing, a tailor's shop, or seances, or a castle in Germany, then it immediately suggests something. I think that's a really useful way of thinking about it, rather than trying to think of the murder first and working backward."
Season 2 of Bookish premieres tonight airing on U&Alibi at 8pm.
