Talking Pictures TV TV Guide: Listings, Schedule & What’s On Talking Pictures TV Tonight

Talking Pictures TV is the independent, family-run channel built almost entirely on one man’s private film collection. Noel Cronin spent decades buying up the rights to older British and Hollywood titles through his company Renown Pictures, and in May 2015 he and his daughter, Sarah Cronin-Stanley, turned that archive into a television channel. Eleven years on, nobody else on British free-to-air is attempting anything like it. Wednesday 19 August 2026 opens the evening with two archive staples, Michael Parkinson’s Give Us A Clue at 6:30pm and Jack Hargreaves’ Out of Town at 7pm, before the night settles into three films back to back: Kenneth More and Dinah Sheridan in 1953’s Genevieve at 7:35pm, Joan Crawford in 1957’s The Story of Esther Costello at 9:20pm, and Rupert Graves in 1994’s Open Fire closing things at 11:25pm. Full breakdown below.

Talking Pictures TV Schedule: Wednesday 19 August 2026 (Full Listings)

Here is the complete Talking Pictures TV schedule for Wednesday 19 August 2026, on Freeview 82.

Overnight

Breakfast

Morning

Afternoon

Early evening

Primetime

Late night

What’s on Talking Pictures TV today

Wednesday’s overnight run opens at 1:25am with Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis fumbling their way through basic training in 1950’s At War With The Army, before Tales of Frankenstein at 3:15am, a 1958 chiller with Anton Diffring’s Baron trying to coax a response out of an unresponsive creation. A short archive piece, Look At Life For the Record, looks at the record industry at 3:50am with singer Helen Shapiro among its subjects, then Target: The Corruptors takes 4am, Stephen McNally’s reporter chasing an industrial corruption case through its 32nd episode. The Man from U.N.C.L.E closes the overnight run at 5am, Robert Vaughn’s Napoleon Solo sent to a secret US air base to head off a hijacking.

Breakfast opens at 6am with Melody Club, a 1949 comedy in which Terry-Thomas poses as restaurant kitchen staff to unmask a crooked gang. Channel founder Noel Cronin gets his own 15-minute slot at 7:20am with What’s On TPTV With Noel, previewing the rest of the month’s line-up, ahead of Smart Alec at 7:35am, John Guillermin’s 1951 drama with Peter Reynolds as a chancer angling to become heir to a fortune he has no real claim to. Lunch Hour closes breakfast at 8:45am, Shirley Anne Field and Robert Stephens edging towards an affair at the firm where she works.

The Woman in Green takes 10am, Basil Rathbone’s Sherlock Holmes tracking a killer targeting women and taking a forefinger from each victim. Interrupted Journey follows at 11:20am, a 1949 thriller in which Richard Todd’s wife turns up shot, her body pulled from a car wreck he’s told never actually happened.

The afternoon opens with The Buccaneers at 1pm, Robert Shaw’s Dan Tempest blamed for a run of attacks his crew had nothing to do with, series one 23 episodes into its run. Ring of Spies follows at 1:35pm, Robert Tronson’s 1964 drama dramatising the real-life Portland spy case, with Bernard Lee and William Sylvester among the cast. Look At Life Kings of Speed gives British motor racing a quarter-hour at 3:20pm, before I Couldn’t Have Believed It! tours a 1930s chocolate factory floor at 3:35pm. Dial 999 takes 3:45pm, Robert Beatty investigating a kidnap plot built around collecting a ransom while technically breaking no law, its 31st episode. The afternoon closes with The End of the Affair at 4:20pm, Edward Dmytryk’s 1955 telling of the Graham Greene novel, Deborah Kerr’s wartime affair with Van Johnson coming under suspicion from her husband, played by John Mills.

Early evening belongs to Give Us A Clue at 6:30pm, Michael Parkinson hosting a 1985 edition of the charades game show, ahead of tonight’s evening schedule.

Talking Pictures TV tonight — primetime and the evening schedule

Here’s the Talking Pictures TV primetime line-up for tonight, Wednesday 19 August 2026.

Give Us A Clue — Talking Pictures TV, 6:30pm

This 1985 edition of the charades game show has Michael Parkinson in the chair, with Beryl Reid and Patrick Mower among the guest panel working out the answers through mime.

Out of Town — Talking Pictures TV, 7pm

Jack Hargreaves broadcasts from his Dorset home, looking back at lambing season on the chalk downs before turning to the short adult life of the mayfly.

Genevieve — Talking Pictures TV, 7:35pm

Genevieve (1953, dir. Henry Cornelius) gets a proper primetime billing rather than a graveyard slot. Kenneth More and Dinah Sheridan lead a foursome whose friendly London-to-Brighton veteran car rally turns into a genuine grudge match by the final reel. It’s the kind of gentle, well-worn comedy Talking Pictures TV built its reputation on, and one of the few titles here most viewers will already know by name.

The Story of Esther Costello — Talking Pictures TV, 9:20pm

The Story of Esther Costello (1957, dir. David Miller) takes the back half of primetime. Joan Crawford plays a wealthy woman adrift after the collapse of her marriage, who finds purpose taking in a young girl left both deaf and blind, with Rossano Brazzi and Heather Sears completing the central trio. It’s a heavier, more melodramatic evening than the film before it.

Open Fire — Talking Pictures TV, 11:25pm

Paul Greengrass, decades before the Bourne films, directed this 1994 drama tracing the life of David Martin, one of Britain’s most wanted men through the 1980s. Rupert Graves takes the lead, with Kate Hardie and Jim Carter in support.

What kind of films and shows are on Talking Pictures TV

Vintage British and Hollywood films

The backbone of the schedule is the Renown Pictures library: British films from the 1930s to the 1970s, plus war pictures, adventure films and the odd Hollywood title bought in to fill a gap. Quality swings wildly from one afternoon to the next, which is part of the deal.

Archive TV drama and detective series

Early evenings lean on serialised drama from the 1950s through the 1980s: Z Cars, Public Eye, Hannay and others of that stripe. Much of it isn’t shown anywhere else on British television, and some of it hadn’t been shown anywhere at all for thirty-odd years before this channel dug it out. If you want to know why people are fond of Talking Pictures TV rather than merely tolerant of it, this is the part of the schedule to point at.

Cult strands, B-movies and magazine shows

Late nights get stranger: horror and cult titles through Caroline Munro’s Cellar Club, oddities like Supernatural, imported curios.

How to watch Talking Pictures TV

Channel numbers

Here’s where to find Talking Pictures TV across the main UK television platforms:

Talking Pictures TV is free on all of the above platforms, with no subscription required. It doesn’t run a +1 timeshift channel, so these are the only live feeds available.

TPTV Encore catch-up

TPTV Encore is the channel’s own free streaming service, launched in December 2021 and run through a browser at tptvencore.co.uk, with an app on Android. Register an email address and recent broadcasts are usually there for about a week.

The better reason to bother with it is what sits behind the catch-up: a deep archive that includes Southern Television material never given a regular slot on the main channel. Those older titles stay free after the catch-up window shuts, but they carry adverts.

Frequently asked questions

What’s on Talking Pictures TV tonight?

Archive slots lead into the films tonight: Give Us A Clue at 6:30pm and Out of Town at 7pm, followed by Genevieve at 7:35pm with Kenneth More and Dinah Sheridan, The Story of Esther Costello at 9:20pm with Joan Crawford, and Open Fire at 11:25pm with Rupert Graves.

What channel is Talking Pictures TV on?

Freeview 82, Sky 324, Virgin Media 445 and Freesat 306. It’s also on Freely at channel 36. All are free to watch.

Does Talking Pictures TV have a +1 channel?

No. TPTV Encore stands in for a +1 service, with recent broadcasts available to catch up on demand instead.

Is Talking Pictures TV free to watch?

Yes, entirely. It’s advertising-funded rather than subscription-funded, on the live channel and on TPTV Encore alike.

Verdict

I rate Talking Pictures TV highly for exactly what it is: a small independent operation that still does something none of the bigger channels bother with. Old films and archive television get a proper home here instead of the odd graveyard slot. It won’t be for everyone, and some evenings the schedule reads like a lucky dip. That’s also the appeal.

Genevieve is the one to catch tonight, at 7:35pm. Kenneth More and Dinah Sheridan’s veteran-car rivalry has been a fixture of British comfort viewing for over seventy years, and it earns a slot most channels would waste on something newer and worse. The Story of Esther Costello, straight after at 9:20pm, is the tougher watch of the two: Joan Crawford in full melodrama mode, but David Miller keeps a firm enough hand on it that the sentiment mostly stays earned rather than sticky.

Related: Film4 TV Guide | Freeview Channel Guide | Films on TV This Week