DRAMA

DRAMA PICK

PICNIC AT HANGING ROCK, BBC2, 9.05pm.

In this new six-part adaptation of Joan Lindsay’s novel, Natalie Dormer plays Hester Appleyard, a glamorous widow who arrives in Australia in 1900, dogged by a torrid past. After buying an isolated Victorian mansion in the bush outside Melbourne, she turns it into a school for young ladies which she operates as headmistress. It becomes a success, but six years later Hester is beginning to worry about the headstrong rebelliousness of her three star pupils, Irma, Marion and Miranda. Though they come from very different backgrounds, the three girls form an intense bond that unleashes a dangerous adolescent energy. Hester is horrified when Miranda repels the unwanted advances of a soldier by sticking a pitchfork in his foot, and forbids her from taking part in a picnic outing to Hanging Rock.