“Game of Thrones” star Michelle Fairley and “Industry’s” Conor MacNeill have joined the cast of Channel 4’s upcoming Anthony Boyle drama “Close to Home.”
Fairley will play Dearbhla while MacNeill plays Marty.
They join “Masters of the Air” star Boyle as Sean alongside Jessica Reynolds (“A Woman of Substance”) as Mairéad, Seamus O’Hara (“House of Guinness”) as Anthony and Oisín Thompson (“Trespasses”) as Ryan.
Rounding out the cast are Gerard Headley (“Specky Clark”) as Finty, Kerri Quinn (“Say Nothing”) as Jackie, Hannah McClean (“Blue Lights”) as Bernice, Jeanne Nicole Ní Áinle (“How to Get to Heaven From Belfast”) as Julia and Lalor Roddy (“That They May Face the Rising Sun”) as Fra.
Produced by Fremantle’s award-winning Element Pictures (“Normal People,” “Bugonia”), “Close to Home” is based on Michael Magee’s debut novel, about a generation growing up in the wake of the Troubles, the long-running and violent conflict in Northern Ireland.
Magee is adapting his own work while Diarmuid Goggins (“Code of Silence”) directs.
The series will follow Sean as he returns to Belfast after university and quickly slips back into old habits. “Back on the mad all-nighters, the borrowed tenners and missing rent, the casual jobs that always fall through,” reads the synopsis. “Back with his brother, his ma and all the things they never talk about. Back where the promised prosperity of peacetime has yet to arrive and every street has a story to tell. One night, Sean assaults a stranger at a party and everything is tipped into chaos.”
Commissioned for Channel 4 by Gwawr Lloyd, interim head of drama and Gemma Boswell, commissioning editor for drama, it is exec produced by Christopher Aird, Ed Guiney, Andrew Lowe for Element Pictures, Michael Dawson, Michael Magee, Diarmuid Goggins and Anthony Boyle. Martin Mahon is serving as producer.
Fremantle is distributing the series, which was shot on location in Belfast. Filming wrapped last month.
The series was made with support from Northern Ireland Screen and Fís Éireann / Screen Ireland.
A broadcast date is still to be announced
