ITV commissioned series The Long Shadow, is now in the final stages of post production.
Produced by New Pictures in association with all3media international, the drama will depict one of the most notorious and shocking serial killer cases in the world, the hunt for Peter Sutcliffe, dubbed the Yorkshire Ripper. Between October 1975 and January 1981, police undertook the biggest manhunt in British criminal history, changing the way the British police worked forever.
Written by acclaimed screenwriter George Kay (Criminal, Litvinenko), The Long Shadow is a true crime drama which will follow the desperate, cat and mouse hunt for Sutcliffe focusing upon the police investigation and the lives of the victims who fatally crossed his path.
New Pictures co-founder and Chief Executive Officer, Willow Grylls (Des, White House Farm, The Missing) will executive produce the drama alongside Lewis Arnold (Sherwood, Time, Des) who is also directing.
Commented Executive Producer Willow Grylls: “George Kay’s beautifully nuanced scripts shine a light on a case that defined the second half of the twentieth century and continues to cast a long shadow.”
Meticulously researched and drawing upon the most extensive archive of the investigation, comprising of hundreds of case files, interview transcripts and police reports, The Long Shadow will is based upon Michael Bilton’s highly praised book, Wicked Beyond Belief: The Hunt for the Yorkshire Ripper, George Kay’s scripts will focus on the lives of the Sutcliffe’s victims, the loved ones they left behind, and the everlasting toll the investigation took on the detectives who led the investigation.
What began as a series of murders on sex workers in Leeds, soon spread across the whole of the North of England, to women of all backgrounds, living in all different neighbourhoods. In all, Sutcliffe killed thirteen, and attempted to kill seven others. By the late 1970s, Sutcliffe had terrorised Britain creating a national obsession of finding out the killer’s true identity. He was finally caught in 1981 and was sentenced to 20 concurrent sentences of life imprisonment.
One murder has the power to cast a long shadow with the case plunging a whole society into darkness. For every victim, there are friends and loved ones. For every police officer, there is the burden of failure – of near misses and guilt – the knowledge that as they fail to find their man, more women continue to suffer. The impact on the lives of those who live on after the deaths of their loved ones. Those would cannot escape what happened, who let it affect them into adulthood or the decades after facing their own life sentences. The focus is on those lives and losses of many more.
The show is due to air on ITV in 2023/24.
