SoHo Spector Drama Charts American Pop Idol’s Trial

SoHo will screen two days after its HBO premiere an HD dramatisation of Phil Spector’s trial for murder starring Al Pacino and Helen Mirren.

The David Mamet-written and directed telemovie is one of SoHo’s March highlights.

Others include the miniseries Labyrinth and Empire Falls, the documentary, In Vogue: The Editor’s Eye, and the NZ premiere of season three of ex-TV3 property United States of Tara.

But Phil Spector, which airs on March 26, is the premiere to most anticipate.

It dramatises the legendary record producer’s relationship with his defense attorney, Linda Kenny Baden, while on trial in 2003 for killing actress Lana Clarkson in his home.

Jeffrey Tambor (The Larry Sanders Show, Arrested Development), Banshee’s Matthew Raunch and Mamet’s daughter, Clara, who soon will be seen in TV2’s sitcom, The Neighbours, co-star.

In Vogue: The Editor’s Eye explores how the magazine’s pictorial spreads have shaped and been shaped by the times, through the artistic vision of its fashion editors.

But don’t expect another The September Issue.

The Hollywood Reporter thought it “less an illuminating portrait of what it takes to be a fashion editor than a nostalgic and self-congratulatory look back at the history of a storied magazine” while Newsday’s bottom line was: “In Vogue doesn’t get quite as far ‘in’ as one might hope, but the mag and its polished crew never fail to intrigue.”

Labyrinth was one of the last projects filmmaker Tony Scott completed before his death.

He produced the three-hour drama with his brother, Ridley, after their success with The Pillars of the Earth and World Without End.

It follows two women – a modern-day archaeologist and her medieval counterpoint – in their quest to find the Holy Grail.

The cast includes Jessica Brown Findlay (Downton Abbey), Vanessa Kirby (The Hour), John Hurt (Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy) and Claudia Gerini (Under The Tuscan Sun).

Whereas Labyrinth has only just screened in a handful of European territories, Canada and Australia, Empire Falls already has aired on free-to-air TV here (albeit in SD) and made its HBO debut in 2005.

SoHo will screen the two-part Richard Russo adaptation, about a small, worn-out town in Maine, 8.30 Sundays from March 3.

It won Paul Newman, at age 80, his first Emmy Award. Newman, who starred in Russo’s Nobody’s Fool, also was the project’s architect.

Having optioned the rights, he took them to HBO, which, not surprisingly, agreed Empire Falls could be as long as was necessary to be true to the book.

At nearly three-and-a-half hours, it does capture the leisurely flow of the novel but isn’t as nuanced.

Moreover, what was joyous to read is plodding to watch, particularly the exposition-heavy first half, and while the cast is crammed with the cream of American screen talent, the actors’ standing overshadows their characters’ anonymous lives.

Newman’s co-stars include Ed Harris, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Helen Hunt and Joanne Woodward.

The third and final season of the Toni Collette drama about a woman with multiple personalities, United States Of Tara, will screen 8.30 Thursdays from March 28, two years to the day that it went to air in the US.

It will be preceded by a Saturday box set marathon of the first two seasons on March 23.

Other box set attractions for March include: season four of True Blood (March 2, ahead of another run of season five from March 7); season one of Hunted (March 9); season five of Six Feet Under (March 16); and season two of Game of Thrones (March 30).

SoHo also will run double-eps of Strike Back on Friday nights from March 22.