Category: TV Drama; BBC ONE
Date: 21.07.2006
Printable version
Liverpool, 1920. Three girls on the edge of womanhood,
a world on the brink of change
Lilies by acclaimed screenwriter Heidi Thomas (I Capture The Castle, Madam
Bovary) is an eight-part drama series for BBC ONE by World Productions for BBC
Northern Ireland.
Tough, sexy, funny and heartbreaking, it details the lives of
Iris, May and Ruby Moss - Catholic sisters coming of age in a dockland terraced
house.
Familial love sustains them, and their fortunes are bound to those of
their brother and their father.
Jane Tranter, BBC Controller of Drama Commissioning, says: "Heidi Thomas is a
unique and original writing talent, combining in Lilies a meticulous eye for
period detail and resonance, and a wonderfully modern wit, emotional intelligence
and warmth.
"Her eight-part take on the 1920s is fresh, bold and entertaining,
offering a drama to BBC ONE full of energy, empathy and optimism."
Set in the years immediately following the First World War, Lilies pulls no
punches in its storytelling.
It depicts a sensual, vivid and sometimes savage
universe - where life is lived on a knife-edge of poverty, fuelled by various
kinds of love.
All three girls must make their own way in the world.
Iris (Catherine Tyldesley)
makes chocolates, Ruby (Kerrie Hayes) sells (and sometimes models) corsets, and
May (Leanne Rowe) - seduced by the trappings of a world beyond her grasp - earns
her living as a parlour maid.
In the course of the series each of the sisters
tastes passion for the first time, and their lives, newly launched, are changed
forever.
Series author Heidi Thomas says: "Lilies features three wonderful emerging young
talents who beat off fierce competition to win their first lead roles.
"We needed
girls who mirrored our characters: they had to be spirited, passionate, strong
and pure.
"We were also looking for luminous, old-fashioned beauty. Catherine,
Kerrie and Leanne have these qualities in spades."
Key cast includes the acclaimed actor Brian McCardie (star of Rob Roy, Kidnapped
and Murphy's Law) as Dadda, the family's charismatic and mercurial father.
Having
married very young, Dadda is now widowed, and his struggle to nurture his unruly
children proves both moving and comic.
Daniel Rigby, another sensational
newcomer, will star as the family's troubled brother Billy.
Scot Williams is
Father Melia, Ian McKee is Frank Gadney and Georgia Taylor (Blackpool, Coronation
Street) plays Phyllis Cook, Ruby's friend.
A World/BBC NI production for BBC ONE, Lilies is currently filming in
Liverpool for transmission in 2007.
The producer is Chrissy Skinns and executive
producers are Heidi Thomas and Tony Garnett (World Productions).
AF
