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

Published: 13 September 2026

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. Monday 14 September 2026 opens in the small hours with The Heritage Chart Show with Mike Read and the drama Let’s Get Lost, then The Adventures of Robin Hood and The Buccaneers carry the schedule towards breakfast. Daytime works through The Dark Eyes of London, The Pickwick Papers and the detective series Z-Cars, then the archive feature Celia and Richard the Lionheart either side of the wartime drama School For Secrets and the comedy That’s My Boy. The evening opens with A Day Begins in Manchester (1960s) at 6:35pm, before The Footage Detectives takes the 7pm slot, Maigret the 8pm hour, and a five-part Francis Durbridge serial closes the night from 9:55pm. Full breakdown below.

Talking Pictures TV Schedule: Monday 14 September 2026 (Full Listings)

Here is the complete Talking Pictures TV schedule for Monday 14 September 2026, on Freeview 82.

Overnight

Breakfast

Morning

Afternoon

Early evening

Primetime

Late night

What’s on Talking Pictures TV today

Monday’s overnight run opens with The Heritage Chart Show with Mike Read just after midnight, then the drama Let’s Get Lost, Gold Is Where You Find It and The Forbidden Frontier carry the small hours before The Adventures of Robin Hood, The Buccaneers and Supercar lead into breakfast.

The morning proper opens with the archive drama The Vise at 6am, then What’s On TPTV With Noel, The Dark Eyes of London and the hour-plus adaptation The Pickwick Papers carry the schedule towards mid-morning. The Look At Life short The Big Blow and the detective series Z-Cars fill the late morning, before the feature Celia takes up the run into lunchtime. Richard the Lionheart, School For Secrets, Brats and That’s My Boy carry the afternoon towards early evening, with Seven Thunders closing out the afternoon proper.

Talking Pictures TV tonight — primetime and the evening schedule

Here’s the Talking Pictures TV primetime line-up for tonight, Monday 14 September 2026.

A Day Begins in Manchester (1960s) — Talking Pictures TV, 6:35pm

A Day Begins in Manchester (1960s) opens the evening at 6:35pm, one of the channel’s short archive pieces built from newsreel-style footage of the city going about its ordinary business decades ago.

The Footage Detectives — Talking Pictures TV, 7pm

The Footage Detectives airs at 7pm, the channel’s own strand digging through its archive to trace the story behind a piece of vintage film (series 1, episode 241).

Maigret — Talking Pictures TV, 8pm

Maigret settles into the 8pm hour, the Rupert Davies-fronted adaptation of Georges Simenon’s Parisian detective novels (series 4, episode 6).

Francis Durbridge’s Bat Out of Hell — Talking Pictures TV, 9:55pm-11:55pm

Francis Durbridge’s Bat Out of Hell closes the night as a five-part thriller serial, running back to back from 9:55pm through to 11:55pm. Durbridge built his name on twist-heavy suspense serials for radio and television, and this one strings its mystery out episode by episode rather than resolving inside a single hour, an old-fashioned way of holding an audience that the channel’s latest slot still leans on.

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?

A Day Begins in Manchester (1960s) opens the evening at 6:35pm, ahead of the channel’s own archive strand The Footage Detectives at 7pm. Maigret takes the 8pm slot, before a five-part Francis Durbridge’s Bat Out of Hell serial closes the night from 9:55pm to 11:55pm. Check the schedule table above for the full day’s listings.

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.

Tonight’s evening leans on archive drama rather than a headline film: The Footage Detectives at 7pm and Maigret at 8pm carry primetime, before a five-part Francis Durbridge serial, Bat Out of Hell, closes out the night from 9:55pm to 11:55pm.

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