‘Happy Valley’: The 3rd & Final Season Gets January Premiere Date On BBC One
It has been a long wait, but ‘Happy Valley‘ returns for its 3rd and final season in January 2023 on BBC One and iPlayer the UK broadcaster has announced.
When Sergeant Catherine Cawood (Sarah Lancashire) discovers the remains of a gangland murder victim in a drained reservoir it sparks a chain of events that unwittingly leads her straight back to Tommy Lee Royce (James Norton). Her grandson Ryan (Rhys Connah) is now sixteen and has ideas of his own about the kind of relationship he wants to have with the man Catherine refuses to acknowledge as his father, leaving Catherine’s sister Clare (Siobhan Finneran) caught in the middle. In another part of the valley, a local pharmacist gets in over his head when a neighbour is arrested.
The returning cast also includes Con O’Neill as Clare’s recovering alcoholic boyfriend Neil Ackroyd, George Costigan as Nevison Gallagher, with Charlie Murphy as his daughter and Catherine’s police colleague Ann. They will be joined by other returning favourites including Derek Riddell as Richard Cawood, Karl Davies as Daniel Cawood, Susan Lynch as Alison Garrs, Rick Warden as Mike Taylor, and Vincent Franklin as Andy Shepherd.
New cast for this season includes Amit Shah (‘The Other One’, ‘The Long Call’), Mark Stanley (‘The Girl Before’, ‘White House Farm’) and Mollie Winnard (‘All Creatures Great And Small’, ‘Four Lives’) who will play pivotal roles in the final chapter.
It’s been a while since ‘Happy Valley’ has been on our screens having last aired in 2016, but for once, the delay was not due to the pandemic, but was a creative decision. For the last part of the story, screenwriter Sally Wainwright knew that she needed the character of Ryan Cawood (played by Rhys Connah) to be a teenager, rather than a young boy. Whilst they could have recast, she wanted to keep Ryan in the role and wait for him to age up. Plus she had plenty to keep her busy in the intervening time, such as a second season of ‘Gentleman Jack‘, and the upcoming swashbuckling adventure series ‘The Ballad of Renegade Nell’ for Disney+.
‘Happy Valley’ series three was commissioned by Piers Wenger, Director of BBC Drama, and is a Lookout Point production for the BBC, co-produced with AMC. Happy Valley is written and created by Sally Wainwright. Series three is directed by Patrick Harkins and Fergus O’Brien, with Chris Clough as series producer, and Jessica Taylor as producer. Executive producers are Sally Wainwright and Sarah Lancashire, with Faith Penhale and Will Johnston for Lookout Point, and Ben Irving for the BBC.
‘Happy Valley‘ Season 3 premieres New Year’s Day (1st January 2023) on BBC One & iPlayer in the UK.
