A host of TV stars are to descend on Huddersfield for a new BBC drama.
They are filming scenes for Happy Valley, which is being shot at the North Light Film Studios in Armitage Bridge and on location around the town and Calderdale.
The work, by the RED Production Company, will see many well-known faces star in the shocking and compelling crime thriller from award-winning writer Sally Wainwright, who wrote Last Tango in Halifax.
Heading the cast is former Coronation Street and The Paradise star Sarah Lancashire, who is no stranger to Huddersfield, having filmed Where The Heart Is in the town.
She will be joined by the likes of Steve Pemberton (Whitechapel, Benidorm), Siobhan Finneran (The Syndicate, Downton Abbey), George Costigan (Unforgiven, Calendar Girls), Joe Armstrong (The Village, Robin Hood), James Norton (Rush, Death Comes to Pemberley), Adam Long (Spike Island, Waterloo Road), Karl Davies (Emmerdale, Game of Thrones), Ramon Tikaram (Casualty, Eastenders) and Charlie Murphy (Love/Hate, The Village).
Lancashire plays Catherine, a no-nonsense police sergeant who heads up a team of dedicated police officers in a rural valley in Yorkshire.
When a staged kidnapping quickly spirals out of control and turns into a much more brutal and vicious series of crimes, she finds herself involved in something significantly bigger than her rank, but unknowingly close to home.
Lancashire said: “Happy Valley is a dark, funny, multi-layered thriller revolving around the personal and professional life of Catherine, a dedicated, experienced, hard-working copper.
“She is also a bereaved mother who looks after her orphaned grandchild. It’s an emotional, complex, challenging role. I’m terrified, exhausted and freezing cold but I wouldn’t want to be anywhere else.”
Sally Wainwright, executive producer and writer, said: “I’m pleased that we’re filming Happy Valley right in the heart of West Yorkshire. It’s going to be hard work, but on screen it will look stunning.”
The six hour-long episodes will be screened later this year.
Ben Sweet, of North Light studios, said: “Happy Valley is the first of many TV projects set for The North Light Film Studios in 2014.
“Mark Brooke and myself have been actively pursuing projects from across the UK and further afield and it’s now starting to pay off.
“We simply show them our great versatile and expansive facilities and leave the vast rolling dramatic hills of Huddersfield and Holmfirth to do the rest. It’s not really a hard sell is it?
“Having these productions filming here puts us firmly on the film location map, it helps with the local economy and it continues our proud history of filmmaking which dates back to the Bamforth era in Holmfirth.”
Monty Python star Michael Palin is returning to his native Yorkshire to take on his first leading role in a TV drama for more than 20 years.
And he’ll be doing much of the work in Huddersfield.
The Sheffield-born actor and writer will play the elderly Tom Parfitt, who witnesses a murder on the day he moves into a nursing home, in Remember Me.
The new show, which also stars Mark Addy as a policeman, is being filmed in Huddersfield and Scarborough and will be shown later this year.
It is written by Gwyneth Hughes who is best known for her work on crime drama Five Days and The Girl which examined Alfred Hitchcock’s obsessive relationship with actress Tippi Hedren.
Palin, who recently had a small part in World War One drama The Wipers Times, has previously appeared in Alan Bleasdale’s critically-acclaimed GBH on Channel 4 in 1991.
Palin, 70, said: “This is my first lead role in a TV drama series since GBH. It’s also a return to Yorkshire, where I was born, brought up and learned my acting in amateur dramatics.
“I was attracted to Remember Me not only by the northern setting, but also by a good, strong challenging role, something I could really get what remains of my teeth into.
“I’ve always loved ghost stories, so playing the lead in one is a very exciting prospect.”
BBC One controller Charlotte Moore said: “It’s a real coup for us that Michael Palin has chosen to make his return to a leading role for the first time in over 20 years on BBC One, and a testament to Gwyneth Hughes’ hauntingly brilliant script.”
A lot of the filming will be done at North Light Film Studios in Armitage Bridge and is the third BBC show to be based there in six months. Studios spokesman Ben Sweet - a former Huddersfield Town player - said: “It’s brilliant that someone of the calibre of Michael Palin is coming here to Huddersfield.
“A lot of the studio work will be done here at Armitage Bridge and there will be location filming in Marsden, Slaithwaite and the Holme Valley.
“This is the third BBC commission we have got in the past few months, and that is excellent news for the local economy.
“It puts Huddersfield on the map and brings a boost to local shops and businesses with the film crews in town.’’
