The man who previously brought the haunting stories of Shannon Matthews and Rhys Jones to screen is turning his attention to something equally true but altogether less tragic, with his next project - the bonkers tale of the Hatton Garden heist.
Jeff Pope, who previously penned TV biographical dramas ‘Little Boy Blue’ and ‘Cilla’ as well as ‘Philomena’ for the big screen will dramatise what has been tagged “the most spectacular British crime of the decade”.
‘Hatton Garden’ will depict the audacious jewellery and cash burglary at the heart of London’s diamond district executed by an elderly gang of career criminals across the Easter Bank Holiday weekend in April 2015.
Leading the cast is Timothy Spall, along with Kenneth Cranham and Brian F. O’Byrne (who recently starred as Rhys Jones’ bereaved father in ‘Little Boy Blue’.). Other cast members include David Hayman, Alex Norton, Ian Puleston-Davies, Geoff Bell and Nasser Memarzia.
The 4 x 60 minute drama tells the inside story of how the men pulled off the heist which was considered in a class of its own in terms of scale and ambition, and the extraordinary level of planning, preparation and organisation required to penetrate the vault of the Hatton Garden Safety Deposit Company.
The drama will explore on just how much planning went into the raid, as well as tensions within the group, the effect on the victims of the robbery and the police operation that captured the gang.
Jeff Pope says of his latest project:
“This is one of the most high profile crimes of the last decade and we wanted to understand what had happened - and why it had happened. The research threw up some fascinating detail and blew away many of the misconceptions about this story. It was not about a bunch of ‘loveable old blokes’, many box holders lost everything in the raid and we will reflect this. But the planning was clever and the characters involved unique.”
Filming will commence in June in the inner London area.
This isn’t the first treatment of the crime that shocked and tickled in equal measure. Larry Lamb and Phil Daniels recently starred in a big screen version of the tale, and another film is already in the works.