Brenda Blethyn’s Two-Front TV Moment: Comforting Kate & Koji Bingeability Meets a Big-Scale Period Remake
For viewers who follow brenda blethyn’s work, the near-term lineup offers an unusual split: an easygoing seaside sitcom you can stream immediately and a heavyweight period drama landing as a tightly scheduled event. The contrast matters because it gives long-time fans both instant comfort television and a prestige project that has already attracted international buyers and a plan for a brisk premiere run.
Brenda Blethyn: what this mix means for longtime viewers
Here’s the part that matters: fans who know Blethyn from her crime drama days now have two distinct viewing promises. Kate & Koji delivers familiar warmth and character-driven comedy across two series, while A Woman of Substance positions Blethyn in a starring period role spanning generations. The immediate payoff is comforting rewatchability; the longer arc is an international rollout that could reintroduce Blethyn to U. S. and global audiences in a different register.
Event details and the release window for the period remake
An eight-part remake of a classic adaptation will premiere with its first two episodes on Wednesday 11 and Thursday 12 March at 9pm. The series presents two actors as the same lead character across time: Brenda Blethyn as the older Emma Harte and Jessica Reynolds as the younger Emma. After the first transmission, the full eight-part run will be available as a boxset for viewers to catch up.
How Kate & Koji lands now — creators, tone and episode structure
Kate & Koji is a seaside-set series created by Andy Hamilton and Guy Jenkin, the creative team behind another well-known sitcom. The show debuted in 2020 and was praised for its humour, its take on British societal issues, and Blethyn’s performance. The first series, six episodes long, introduced Kate — a prejudiced British working-class woman who runs a café in an Essex seaside town — and Koji, an African doctor seeking asylum in the UK. While waiting for his papers, Koji seeks refuge from his temporary accommodation at Kate’s café; Kate initially thinks he’s a “scrounger” until she learns he cannot legally work while his claim is processed. She offers him free food in return for unofficial medical consultations, and over six episodes Koji runs an underground clinic treating members of the local community while forming a friendship with Kate.
The second series, broadcast in 2022, returns to that dynamic across another six episodes. Brenda Blethyn returned as Kate, while the original actor for Koji stepped away to take a U. S. role and was replaced by Okorie Chukwu. Series two continues the unofficial surgery storyline, with Koji navigating a romantic relationship and Kate dealing with the reappearance of a former rival. The first series originally averaged just under five million viewers when it aired.
Distribution, international sales and production background
The period remake is an adaptation of Barbara Taylor Bradford’s novel and was produced by the company behind The Buccaneers. The writing team includes Katherine Jakeways with co-writer Roanne Bardsley. U. S. streaming rights have been secured by a North American service, negotiated by a senior sales executive named Matt Creasey. The show has also been sold in multiple other territories, and the commercial campaign for the series was an active element at this week’s industry screenings, where dozens of sales houses are presenting catalogues. The new adaptation follows a 1980s miniseries that starred Jenny Seagrove and Deborah Kerr and that remains one of the earlier adaptation’s biggest successes; that original run’s final episode still ranks as the highest-rated program in that original broadcaster’s history.
Cast, scope and the story’s spine
The remake charts Emma Harte’s life from 1911, when she is an impoverished but ambitious maid in Yorkshire, through a rags-to-riches trajectory that culminates with her looking down from a New York penthouse. Brenda Blethyn plays the older Emma, Jessica Reynolds the younger. The ensemble also includes Leanne Best, Ewan Horrocks, Harry Cadby, Niall Wright, Robert Wilfort, Toby Regbo, Hiftu Quasem, Sophie Bould, Georgina Sadler and Jo Joyner. The production credits identify the adaptation as an eight-part period drama that promises sweeping chronology and a focus on social ambition across the 20th century.
News of the new adaptation emerged shortly after the author’s death in late 2024. The series’ international sales strategy has already placed it in multiple markets, and a U. S. streamer's acquisition signals a coordinated push outside the UK.
What’s easy to miss is how deliberately different the two projects are: one trades on small-scale local ingredients and comic friction, the other on epic ambition and cross-border commercial planning. That tonal split will be the clearest signal of Blethyn’s range in the coming months.
If you’re wondering where to start: both series of Kate & Koji are available to binge now on a major streaming service, while the second series is also accessible the broadcaster’s own streaming platform; the period remake arrives in March with a concentrated double-episode launch followed by full boxset availability.
Writer’s aside: the pairing of a comforting sitcom and a grand period remake is a savvy positioning move for any performer — it preserves an existing audience while opening doors abroad, and in this case it gives viewers immediate material alongside a high-profile event.
