River City moves to multi-series format

It’s all change for BBC Scotland’s River City as the acclaimed drama moves to a new multi-series format after the summer on BBC iPlayer, BBC Scotland and BBC One Scotland.

Gavin Smith, Commissioning Executive, BBC Scotland:

“This new format allows the production team the chance to delve deeper in to storylines and create more ‘must-see’ moments, which River City has become renowned for. When the series returns in October, Montego Street will have had a mini makeover and we’ll be introducing the first of three new characters so there will be lots for the River City fans to look forward to when it returns in the Autumn.”

From Monday 23 October, River City will air as three distinct series a year with breaks of six weeks in between. Each series will run for eleven weeks, twice-weekly with new episodes premiering every Monday on BBC iPlayer.

The current run will come to an end on Wednesday, 9th of August which will see the life of one character hang in the balance after a dramatic showdown goes horribly wrong. River City – which recently won ‘Best Drama’ at the RTS Scotland 2023 Awards – will then take a ten week ‘on screen’ break over August and September, returning in its new multi-series drama format from October.

River City last year celebrated twenty years of airing on BBC One Scotland, the series has seen a number of changes to its format over those two decades including going from two half-hour episodes a week into once-a-week hour-long drama and more recently back to its twice-weekly output.

A BBC Studios production for BBC Scotland, filming resumes on Monday, 28th August at the BBC Dumbarton Studios for the first of the new multi-series episodes which will air from October 2023 through to January 2024.

Louise Thornton, Head of Commissioning, BBC Scotland:

“BBC Scotland is very proud of River City and we know it has an incredibly loyal audience who tune in to follow the drama in Shieldinch every week. That drama will continue but we are changing the broadcast pattern to allow us to keep delivering value to all licence fee payers whilst at the same time bringing more dramatic storylines to Montego Street.”