MUMBAI: Film director Michael Apted of Coal Miner's Daughter and The World Is Not Enough fame will direct the first three episodes of the new drama series Rome.
As reported earlier by Indiantelevision.com, Rome is a co-production between HBO and the BBC. It will begin shooting in Bulgaria next March. Production for the series will be based at Rome's Cinecitta Studios, with additional location work throughout Europe and North Africa. The first season of 12 episodes is scheduled to air on HBO and BBC Two in 2005.
Carolyn Strauss and Anne Thomopoulos will oversee the project for HBO. BBC Controller of Drama Commissioning Jane Tranter and Gareth Neame will oversee the project for the BBC. HBO and the BBC previously partnered on the world war II miniseries Band of Brothers, which won the 2002 Emmy Award for Miniseries.
Rome deals with two ordinary Roman soldiers and their families. An intimate drama of love and betrayal, masters and slaves, and husbands and wives, it chronicles the time that saw the fall of a republic and the creation of an empire. The series begins in 51 BC, when Gaius Julius Caesar has completed his masterful conquest of Gaul after eight years of war and is preparing to return to Rome.