A costume drama or period drama is a period piece in which elaborate costumes, sets and properties are featured in order to capture the ambience of a particular era.

The term is usually used in the context of film and television. It is an informal, crossover term that can apply to several genres but is most often heard in the context of historical dramas and romances, adventure films and swashbucklers. The implication is that the audience is attracted as much by the lavish costumes as by the content.

The most common type of costume drama is the historical costume drama, both on stage and in movies. This category includes Barry Lyndon, Braveheart, From Hell, and Robin Hood. Films that are set in the 1930s and 1940s, such as Last Man Standing, may also be placed in this category. Other examples include Marie Antoinette, Middlemarch, and Pride and Prejudice.

There have been highly successful television series that have been known as costume dramas/period pieces. Notable examples include Upstairs Downstairs, The Tudors, Mad Men, Boardwalk Empire, Downton Abbey, Deadwood, Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman, Little House on the Prairie, and Freaks and Geeks. There also exists shows that use the effects of a costume drama/period piece because they are set in a particular era of time, although their true focus is based around a different genre. Examples of these are Xena: Warrior Princess, Legend of the Seeker, and That '70s Show.

Amma Asante (born 1969) is a British writer and film director.

As a child, Asante attended the Barbara Speake stage school in Acton, London, where she trained as a student in dance and drama. She began her film and television career as a child actress, appearing as a regular in the British school drama Grange Hill. She fronted the "Just Say No" campaign of the 1980s and was one of nine Grange Hill children to take it to the Reagan White House. She went on to gain credits in other British television series including Desmond's (Channel 4) and Birds Of A Feather (BBC1), and was a Children's Channel presenter for a year.

In her late teens, Asante left the world of acting behind and eventually made the move to screenwriting with a development deal from Chrysalis. Two series of the urban drama Brothers and Sisters followed, which Amma wrote and produced for her production company and BBC2.

Asante's 2004 feature film, A Way of Life, was her directorial debut.

In November 2004 The London Film Festival awarded Asante the inaugural Alfred Dunhill UK Film Talent Award, created to recognise the achievements of a new or emerging British writer/director who has shown great skill and imagination in bringing originality and verve to film-making. February 2005 saw Amma collect the award for The Times Breakthrough Artist of the Year at The South Bank Show Awards and nominations for Best Newcomer at both the Evening Standard and London Film Critics Awards.

Jennifer Ehle ( /ˈiːliː/; born December 29, 1969) is an American actress of stage and screen. She is known for her BAFTA winning role as Elizabeth Bennet in the 1995 mini-series Pride and Prejudice.

Born in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, to English actress Rosemary Harris and American author John Ehle, Ehle made her stage debut as a toddler in a 1973 Broadway revival of A Streetcar Named Desire, in which her mother played Blanche Dubois.^{[citation needed]} She spent her childhood between the UK and US, attending 18 different schools including the Interlochen Arts Academy. She was raised largely in Asheville, North Carolina, which was close by her hometown. Her drama training was split between the North Carolina School of the Arts and the Central School of Speech and Drama in London.^{[citation needed]}

In 1992, Peter Hall cast her as Calypso in a television adaptation of Mary Wesley's novel The Camomile Lawn, in which she and her mother played the same character at different ages. This story, produced by UK's Channel 4, was a five part miniseries about the lives and loves of a family of cousins from 1939 to the present. The two would later reprise this different age portrayal of a character as Valerie in István Szabó's 1999 movie Sunshine.

Jeremy Philip Northam (born 1 December 1961) is an English actor. He is best known for his roles as Ivor Novello in the 2001 film Gosford Park, as Dean Martin in the 2002 television movie Martin and Lewis, and as Thomas More on the Showtime series The Tudors. Most recently, he starred in the now-canceled CBS drama Miami Medical.

Northam was born in Cambridge, as the youngest of four siblings. His mother, Rachel (née Howard), was a potter and professor of economics, and his father, John Northam, was a professor of literature and theatre, as well as being an Ibsen specialist and teacher (first at Clare College, Cambridge and later at Bristol). Northam was educated at Bristol Grammar School and Bedford College, University of London, and trained at the Bristol Old Vic Theatre School. He married Canadian film/television make-up artist Liz Moro in April 2005, though they later divorced.

Northam performed at the Royal National Theatre – he replaced Daniel Day-Lewis in the role of Hamlet (1989), and won the Olivier Award in 1990 for "most promising newcomer" for his performance in The Voysey Inheritance.

John Hardy Goetz (October 24, 1937 – October 27, 2008) was an American professional baseball player. A right-handed pitcher, he appeared in four games for the 1960 Chicago Cubs of Major League Baseball, but had an 11-year career in minor league baseball. The native of Goetzville, Michigan, stood 6 feet (1.8 m) tall, weighed 185 pounds (84 kg) and attended Western Michigan University.

Goetz' Major League trial came at the outset of the 1960 Cubs' season. He made the team's 28-man early-season roster out of spring training and appeared as a relief pitcher in four contests. In his MLB debut, against the San Francisco Giants, he was effective, hurling 2⅔ innings of scoreless relief. But he was treated roughly in outings against the Giants the following week and against the St. Louis Cardinals in his last appearance, and was returned to the minors, where he spent the rest of his career. He retired from professional baseball after the 1965 season and 333 games played in the minors.

In 6⅓ Major League innings, Goetz allowed nine earned runs, ten hits and four bases on balls. He struck out six.