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The Crown and Game of Thrones stars join BBC climate crisis conspiracy film

Photo credit: ITV
Photo credit: ITV

The BBC will tackle the global climate crisis in star-studded one-off film The Trick.

It has been confirmed today (June 9) that The Crown's Jason Watkins and Game of Thrones star Jerome Flynn have been cast in the BBC One single drama from the production team behind Keeping Faith.

Poet and playwright Owen Sheers has written a gripping thriller based on the real-life Climategate scandal of 2009, where University of East Anglia's lead climate researcher Professor Philip Jones was the target of cyberterrorism.

Watkins stars as the professor and Doctor Foster's Victoria Hamilton plays his wife, as they both endure a hate campaign because of the dangerous spread of misinformation about climate change from unseen enemies.

Photo credit: ITV
Photo credit: ITV

"It is rare that a drama marries the personal and the public in such a compelling way – the urgent need to tackle the effects of the earth's warming is not going away and the research into this project has been sobering," Watkins has said.

"It is a privilege to play the brilliant scientist, Phil Jones, whose own private world was so threatened from outside and whose research and efforts have been so vital globally in combating the effects of climate change. I'm delighted to be performing alongside Victoria, the whole exceptional cast and with Pip Broughton, whose singular and beautiful work I so admire."

The esteemed cast will also include Game of Thrones' Jerome Flynn, former EastEnders star Adrian Edmondson, Rhashan Stone (Keeping Faith), Blinded by the Light's Tara Divina, Waterloo Road vertan Pooky Quesnel, Pride actor George MacKay, The Pactor star Richard Elfyn, Justin Salinger (Hanna) and The Hatton Garden Job's David Calder.

Photo credit: HBO
Photo credit: HBO

"The Trick is both a story of a particular moment in time, and a story for our times," writer Owen Sheers has said. "The events that came to be known as Climategate were a powerful coalescence of forces that have since shaped much of our last decade.

"At its heart, however, this is also a story about the people caught at the eye of a new kind of storm, and how in the end despite attack from all sides, the integrity and truth of their important work won through.”

There are no transmission details yet for The Trick, but production has started in Cardiff, London and Norfolk.


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