Timothy Spall and Kenneth Cranham to star in Hatton Garden drama on ITV

ITV has announced it’s throwing its hat into the Hatton Garden ring with a four-part drama based on the notorious cash and jewellery burglary.

Masterminded by a gang of elderly criminals, dubbed the ‘grandpa gang’, the heist captured the public’s attention and sparked the imagination of a host of film and TV productions.

ITV is the third production tackling the robbery – the first was a film with Larry Lamb and Phil Daniels, while another, starring stalwarts of smash and grab movies Michael Caine and Ray Winstone, is currently in the works.

The new drama will be a four part series produced by ITV Studios, written by Jeff Pope and directed by Terry Winsor.

The duo are no strangers to working with this kind of subject matter, with Winsor building a career on directing crime movies and Pope earning praise for his moving script in Little Boy Blue, a drama based on Rhys Jones, the 11-year-old killed by a gang member in Liverpool.

Brian F. O’Byrne – who played Rhys’ father Steve Jones in the drama – will take on a leading role alongside Timothy Spall and Kenneth Cranham. David Hayman, Alex Norton, Ian Puleston-Davies, Geoff Bell and Nasser Memarzia will take on the gang members at the heart of the heist.

Speaking about the project, Pope said that the research “blew away many of the misconceptions” surrounding the robbery.

“This is one of the most high profile crimes of the last decade and we wanted to understand what had happened – and why it had happened,” he said.

“The research threw up some fascinating detail and blew away many of the misconceptions about this story.

“It was not about a bunch of 'loveable old blokes' […] the planning was clever and the characters involved unique.”

Polly Hill, head of drama at ITV, said she believes the audience will be “fascinated” by the story and described the dramatisation as “compelling”.

“Jeff is a master at bringing these true stories to screen,” she said. “I think the audience will be fascinated by this story and Jeff's compelling dramatisation.

Filming for Hatton Garden will begin in London in June.