L to R: Connor Swindells, Jack O’Connell, Alfie Allen, Sofia Boutell, Dominic West
‘SAS: Rogue Heroes‘, a new series from ‘Peaky Blinders’ creator Steven Knight, has announced the cast for the World War Two drama about the formation of the Special Forces unit.
Based on Ben Macintyre’s best-selling book of the same name, the series begins in Cairo, 1941. David Stirling, played by Connor Swindells (‘Sex Education’, ‘Vigil’), is an eccentric young officer, hospitalised after a training exercise went wrong… and he is bored. Convinced that traditional commando units don’t work, he creates a radical plan that flies in the face of all accepted rules of modern warfare. He fights for permission to recruit the toughest, boldest and brightest soldiers for a small undercover unit that will create mayhem behind enemy lines. More rebels than soldiers, Stirling’s team are every bit as complicated, flawed and reckless as they are astonishingly brave and heroic.
Joining Swindells are Jack O’Connell (‘Skins’, ‘The North Water’) as Paddy Mayne, Alfie Allen (‘Jojo Rabbit’, ‘Game Of Thrones’) as Jock Lewes, and Sofia Boutella (‘Modern Love’, ‘Atomic Blonde’) as Eve. Dominic West (‘The Wire’, ‘Appropriate Adult’) will play Lieutenant Colonel Wrangel Clarke.
“I feel tremendously honoured to be joining this series with such a talented group of people,” commented Swindells. “Portraying such an interesting man is incredibly exciting and I feel very lucky to be able to do so. It’s going to be an amazing ride.”
The drama also stars Amir El Masry (‘Industry’, ‘The One’), Theo Barklem-Biggs (‘The First Team’, ‘Carnival Row’), Corin Silva (‘The Bay’, ‘Emmerdale’), Jacob Ifan (‘Bang’, ‘The Accident’), Dónal Finn (‘Cursed’, ‘The Witcher’), Jacob McCarthy (‘The Last Summer’, ‘A.P. Bio’), Michael Schaeffer (‘Chernobyl’, ‘The Salisbury Poisonings’) and Miles Jupp (‘The Great’, ‘The Durrells’).
“I’m really excited to be gathering together the very best of a new generation of British and International talent to tell this remarkable story,” adds Steven Knight. “The people who are depicted and who did such extraordinary things were young, in their 20s, and we have made a conscious decision to cast people of the same age. We enter this project with a spirit of adventure and believe our young and talented actors will do justice to this period of history.”
the six-episode series is created and written by Steven Knight (‘Peaky Blinders’, ‘Taboo’, ‘SEE’) and will be directed by Tom Shankland (‘The Serpent’, ‘The Missing’), with Stephen Smallwood (‘The Serpent’, ‘Patrick Melrose’) as producer. The series will be executive produced by Karen Wilson, Martin Haines and Emma Kingsman-Lloyd for Kudos, and Tommy Bulfin for the BBC. It was commissioned for the BBC by Piers Wenger, Director of BBC Drama, and Charlotte Moore, Chief Content Officer.
“Combining a fascinating, little-known story with all the intelligence and swagger that Steven Knight’s writing is known for, SAS: Rogue Heroes will be like nothing we’ve seen before,” said Piers Wenger, Director of BBC Drama. “It’s no surprise that a cast of such high calibre have signed up to bring these bold, brilliant and thoroughly entertaining characters to the screen.”
There is no broadcast date yet, but ‘SAS: Rogue Heroes‘ is currently filming.
