The Stage

Firth and Duff unite for gritty TV film

Published Wednesday 31 May 2006 at 16:45 by Liz Thomas

Colin Firth, Anne-Marie Duff, Robert Carlyle and David Oyelowo are to star in a hard-hitting new BBC drama titled London.

Written and directed by Bafta-winner Dominic Savage, whose credits include Love and Hate, Out of Control and Nice Girl, the piece is an update of Ken Loach’s seminal sixties production Cathy Come Home and addresses issues of social inequality in Britain today through the lives of several characters whose paths collide at a bed and breakfast temporarily housing the homeless.

He says: “This is a film about social inequalities, people in desperate circumstances and their intertwining different lives. It’s ultimately about people’s relationships and the difficulties, dilemmas and moral issues they face.”

It stars Firth as a wealthy City worker whose conscience about his luxurious lifestyle prompt him to aid the less fortunate, while Duff plays a pregnant mother escaping an abusive husband, played by Oyelow. Carlyle plays a newly-released convict.

Emilia Fox, Megan Dodds and Julia Davis also star in the one-off television film, which has just started filming.

The executive producers are John Willis and David M Thompson.