IT has already tasted TV stardom.
But now Oakwell Hall, at Birstall, is to again be at the centre of a major television production.
The Elizabethan manor house featured in the ITV production of Wuthering Heights, has been selected as a location for a star-studded period drama.
The BBC2 production – The Secret Diaries of Miss Anne Lister, a scandalous lesbian love story – is to be filmed at Oakwell in the next few weeks.
Maxine Peake, star of Shameless and Criminal Justice, takes the lead role. She is joined by Dean Lennox Lewis, who played her on-screen husband in Shameless.
Also appearing will be Spooks star Gemma Jones and Tina O’Brien, who plays Sarah Platt in Coronation Street.
The drama is based on the diaries of Anne Lister, who was born in 1791 and owned Shibden Hall in Halifax.
The diaries, containing up to around four million words, with a large section written in code, detail her life and love affairs with various women.
The 90-minute drama, being made by Oxford Film and Television, is expected to be broadcast in the spring.
It will be accompanied by a one-hour documentary, presented by the writer Sue Perkins, also a lesbian. The drama will tell the story of Anne Lister, the decoding of her diaries and the role of Halifax during the Industrial Revolution.
Filming is taking place at Shibden as well as at Oakwell. However, the size of Shibden’s rooms and building lay-out would make filming some of the internal scenes technically difficult.
The production team, some of whom were involved in Wuthering Heights, are therefore using Oakwell Hall for those scenes.
It means the hall will be closed to the public today and also from Sunday, November 29, to Friday, December 4.
The country park will remain open to visitors.
