Michael Winterbottom’s This England, starring Kenneth Branagh as UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson, has closed sales across 88 territories through distributor Fremantle.
Commissioning broadcaster Sky will launch the series this Autumn across its territories in the United Kingdom, Ireland, Germany, Austria, Switzerland, and Italy.
This England has sold to Movistar+ in Spain, Viaplay for the Nordics and Baltics, Poland and the Netherlands, Cosmote (Greece), OSN TV and OSN+ (MENA), M-Net (South Africa) and BBC First (Australia) and TVNZ (New Zealand). Further deals are due to be announced in the coming weeks.
Produced by Richard Brown’s Passenger and Revolution Films, the six-part series is based on Boris Johnson’s tumultuous first months as Prime Minister, tracing the impact on the country of the first wave of the pandemic.
Winterbottom sat down with Screen earlier this week to discuss the project in detail.
“It’s certainly not trying to be a hatchet job,” Winterbottom told Screen. “I’ve no idea what people will think when they see it; very few people have seen it. It’s hard to judge whether people will see it as being an attack on Boris Johnson or an attack on the government – it’s not intended as that.
“Or whether they’ll see it as too sympathetic – possibly too sympathetic, that’s more likely I think. But it’s more supposed to be ‘this is what happened’. Our assumption is that everyone was trying to do their best; everyone was trying to respond to something that hadn’t really happened before, and was moving very quickly.”
The events in government are interwoven with stories from around the country, from scientists working on the vaccine to the doctors, nurses and care-home workers and ordinary people caught up in the pandemic.”
Winterbottom has directed many acclaimed films based on factual events, including Welcome to Sarajevo, A Mighty Heart, 24 Hour Party People and The Road to Guantanamo.
Jens Richter, CEO International at Fremantle said: “This dramatic behind the scenes dramatization of how the government, the scientists, the medical community and ordinary people around England faced these extraordinary events will fascinate and compel viewers.”
This England was commissioned by Gabriel Silver, director of drama commissioning at Sky Studios for Zai Bennett, Sky UK’s managing director of content.
In the UK, This England will launch on 21 September 21.
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