Set in the moorland hills of 18th Century Yorkshire, England, is a country divided. As the aristocracy are building the first cotton mills and factories, the common people are starving. David Hartley (Michael Socha) has been away from his family’s remote moor-top dwelling for seven years. On his journey home to Cragg Vale, West Yorkshire, David gets lost in the moors. He’s dragging a mysterious looking bag of tools with him and on his last legs.
As he’s about to lay down and die, he is saved by six mythical Stag Men who let him know that his work on earth isn’t done yet. David’s mission is to assemble a gang of weavers and land-workers to embark upon a criminal enterprise to bring comfort and dignity back to his community. Hidden in the wilderness of the Yorkshire hills and dales, their business is ‘clipping’ – the forging of coins, a treasonous offence punishable by death.
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Key Cast
Michael Socha - David Hartley
Sophie Mcshera - Grace Hartley
Thomas Turgoose - William Hartley
Samuel Edward-Cook - Isaac Hartley
Soraya Jane Nabipour - Darya Hartley
Charlotte Ockelton - Gwen Hartley
Dave Perkins - Tom Hartley
Adam Fogerty - James Broadbent
Fine Time Fontayne - Joseph Broadbent
Yusra Warsama - Bethsheba
Anthony Welsh - Abe Oldfield
Olivia Pentelow - Hannah
Stevie Binns - Mand
Jennifer Reid - Barb
Creatives
Director/Writer - Shane Meadows
Author Of The Gallows Pole Book - Benjamin Myers
Producer - Nickie Sault
Director Of Photography - Danny Cohen BSC
Hair And Makeup Designer - Lisa Parkinson
Costume Designer - Emma Rees
Production Designer - Sarah Finlay
Editor - Lucas Roche
Music Supervisor - Lucy Bright
Casting Director - Shaheen Baig
Executive Producer For The BBC - Jo McClellan
Interviews
Shane Meadows
Shane Meadows, writer and director, on his vision: I really wanted to delve into the history of this story and the circumstances that lead to an entire West Yorkshire community risking their lives to put food in their children’s bellies.
It was during the workshopping process with the actors I realised there was also a story to tell leading up to Ben’s incredible book. A prequel that not only allowed us to understand ‘why’ the Cragg Vale Coiners did what they did, but maybe fall in love with them a smidge while they did it. It may have turned into one of the biggest crimes in British history, but it was pulled off by a bunch of destitute farmers and weavers doing what they had to to survive, and I think people will resonate with that.
You can tell a story in any century if you care about the characters, but there was something so attractive about this period in British history. Large mouthfuls of West Yorkshire were about to be inhaled by the Industrial Revolution and our country and its unspoilt sides set to change forever. So it was an honour to be able to go back and hold up a magnifying glass to some of dudes that were living through it.
Marry that with a cast that pitches some of the UK’s finest actors alongside an awesome array of brand spanking new Yorkshire talent and you have a series unlike anything else I’ve made before.
Ben Myers
Ben Myers, author of The Gallows Pole on when and how he came across the true story behind his book:
I moved to the area in 2009 and lived in Mytholmroyd and I heard a bit about this local mythology but there wasn’t that much information about it, and I didn’t look too deeply in to it. One day my wife, Adele, who’s also a writer, was visiting a place called The Bowes Museum in Barnard Castle in Durham, she walked in to the library and was looking along the shelves and there was one book that didn’t have a spine on it. She pulled it out, put it on the table and it fell open at the trial notes of the Cragg Vale coiners, so she was reading them from 1770 and she came home that day and said ‘You know the coiners story?’ and I said ‘yes I know a bit about it’ and she said ‘that would make a brilliant TV series, you should write it’ and I said ‘well I don’t know how to write telly, but I could have a go and write a novel and maybe Shane Meadows could film it one day with some of the actors from This Is England.’ That was in 2014, and it wasn’t even a plan, it was sort of a joking pipe dream really.
Anyway, that’s what I did. I spent most of that year 2014 and 2015 researching it and writing, I’d already walked a lot of the moors and woodlands around here and during my research I discovered that James Broadbent worked in a cottage called ‘The Stub’ as a weaver and that was the house I’d just moved out of. I thought this is too good to be true, I know the locations, and Bell House - some friends of mine are architects and they’d worked on the refurb of that house - I was basically in the middle of what felt like a film set. I’d walked all the old routes and all the old tracks, and I thought well ok I’ve done the research in terms of I know the area, now I have to find out the historical facts, which was a more laborious process. So I read through lots of dry and dusty accounts of the Cragg Vale coiners in this highfalutin legal language from the 18th Century and I wrote the book. But there were a few things that fed in to it as I was writing it, for example one of my neighbours in Mytholmroyd, her nickname’s Pauline Dragon, was telling me that she grew up on the edge of the moor above Cragg Vale and she said ‘You know there’s funny things going on up there, when I was a kid, one night I woke up and there were these stag-headed men in my bedroom and they were dancing round my bed and I could see this steam pluming off them, it happened twice, and I swear I wasn’t asleep, it was real, and I told my parents and they were like ‘shut up, don’t tell anyone that, they’ll think you’re nuts.’ So there were a few things told to me during the writing of the book like that, and I thought well I’ve got to include that detail and perhaps it could be David Hartley who sees the stag-headed men. Once that fell into place, I thought only a certain type of person would probably admit to that, so I decided to make him this visionary guy, prone to delusions and hallucinations and that kind of set the tone for the rest of the book. I didn’t want to write an historic account because they already exist, I wanted to write something that was a bit psychedelic and over the top and kind of reflected the intensity of this landscape, because at any time of year, but particularly in autumn and winter when you walk around these moors by yourself, you can feel a sense of history that’s there in the soil and it’s a magical feeling but it’s a bit malevolent as well. So I wanted to take a true story and crank it up in to something that’s pushing the boundaries of what historical fiction is really.
The book was sent out to 10 publishers and they all turned it down, so I published it through a small publisher called Blue Moose Books based in Hebden Bridge, who I’d already done two books with, and they understand the area, they understand the story, and we built the whole thing up from the ground. Myself and Kevin Duffy who runs that publisher, we launched it in, what is now (on screen in the series), Barb’s pub in Heptonstall, which is otherwise known as Heptonstall Museum, in the Spring of 2017 when the book came out, and built it up as a word of mouth thing. We printed 2000 copies and it got some good reviews in national press and then booksellers started getting in touch, it had a very eye-catching cover designed by a friend of mine and it just gradually built and built and built and then it was optioned for film and then in Autumn 2019, I got a call from Element Pictures saying ‘a director’s read it and he wants to make it and we’ve got a name for you’. This was on the phone and I was in a remote cottage in Scotland writing another book, and I said ‘who’s the name?’ and they said ‘It’s Shane Meadows’ and I put my hand over the phone and went ‘F***ing hell!’ to my wife, and then said back in to the phone ‘Oh great, that’s interesting’, so it had come full circle.
Michael Socha and Sophie McShera
Michael Socha on preparing for the role
I worked on a farm for a week and learnt how to shear sheep, I did lots of walking around the area, I went to York castle to see where David was locked up, I learnt to clip coins, which I enjoyed doing, it was very satisfying. In This is England, I wasn’t in it half as much as I am in this and there’s also a bit more of a character attached to this role. I’m playing somebody who existed, so I’ve also got a back story that was half made for me. Whereas the character I played in This is England was, I suppose, a version of me, I think there are definitely elements of myself here, but in terms of back story, it’s already written.
Sophie McShera on her preparation for the role
In terms of preparation for the role, we had a really extensive audition rehearsal process, so I got to do loads of prep through that. I think we first met each other a year or so before we started filming. We did a lot of improvising and we spent time together figuring out our back stories, and everyone spent time bonding within their characters as families and as pairs. We all did walks together and walked the places our characters would have walked.
Charlotte Ockelton
On her thoughts reading the scriptments and working with Shane
When I first read the beginning of the scriptments, I felt very blessed and very grateful, to go from doing nothing like this before to this, it’s a big step. And the story is so important to now. Everyone has gone through really difficult times in their life and not had much at one point, especially with Covid as well, which is out of everybody’s control, and the financial impact that has happened through that, this story is important to now and what people will do to survive. If you have to feed your kids, you’ll do anything to keep them alive, more than yourself, and that desperation bit of the story, how desperate the community are, it’s very relevant to now. I think audiences will find familiarities in the story and some comfort in that. It shows the teamwork, the bond and the love that everybody has for each other really pushes them to do what they need to do. It’s not out of a bad place, it’s not like they want to do it just to be greedy, they need to do it to survive, so I think there’s definitely some common ground for every person to relate to that.
Working with Shane, I’ve come to really learn that he’s probably one of the most humble people I’ve ever met in my life. Even though when you watch his work, you’re like wow this is Shane Meadows, but when you meet him and work with him, he’s so humble in terms of he’s like a friend, the way he speaks to you, he’s welcomed me as a non-professional who’s come from the open casting, and he’s treated me exactly the same as everybody else on the job.
Thomas Turgoose
On his preparation for the role and working with Shane on this project
The preparation for the role was an absolute treat, we spent about 3 months together in Nottingham and we really bonded. The gang quickly became ‘The Gang’ and we all felt so comfortable and it was like we’d known each other all our lives. That’s what Shane creates in the workshops, not to keep going back to This is England, but it feels very much like that, the gang that we’ve got is very similar in the sense of the friendships and the group chats we’ve got going on, the gossip etc, and it feels real, which will show on camera. That’s what Shane does in his casting process and, to be able to find the characters in our own way, because of course there’s very little research that we could have done on the characters, so we were given that freedom to dig deep and put parts of our own lives in there, work together and find our back stories and create.
Working with Shane as an adult now, I think it’s totally different in the sense that you can’t get away with the things that you got away with as a kid, it just doesn’t work like that. When I told my Dad that I was doing this, one of the first things he said to me was ‘make sure you go and make Shane know you’re not just that little kid anymore, that you’ve grown in to a respectable man (ish) – I’m a new parent, I’m married now – and I’d like to think that I take the craft quite seriously now, so I just wanted to show Shane and people who are watching the show as well, that I’m willing to put work in to things and hopefully Shane seems happy with everything I’m doing. So yeah it has been different working with Shane as a man as opposed to being a kid.
Stevie Binns
On how she came on board the series and what she connected to in the story
I came through an open casting. I saw the advert online, did my one-minute video, sent it off, I must have re-done it 50 times before I sent it and then hoped that I’d hear something back and I did! I was invited to do some workshops and walked in to a room full of people I’d seen on TV, with me screaming inside, trying to act dead cool! And then a few months down the line, here I am doing this.
I think I connected to the story itself. So when we found out what the project was and where it was based (I live 20 mins from here), the passion and determination of this group of people hasn’t left Yorkshire in my family and other people’s families who are from here, and many moons have passed since the time of the coiners, but that’s not changed and that is very much what Yorkshire people are. Bending the law slightly, not so much anymore, but the determination to do the best they can with what they’ve got, is absolutely what drew me to it.
Dave Perkins
On how he came on board the series and what he connected to in the story
I was the same as Stevie, we both came through the open casting. I saw an advert on the internet for a Shane Meadows’ BBC project and they were looking for non-actors from Yorkshire, I almost didn’t send the video in, but then I thought what have I got to lose, you’ve got more to gain than you have to lose, so I sent the video off and hoped for the best and like Stevie said, got invited to a workshop and you walk in and there’s all these people you’ve seen on TV before and you’re a bit star-struck and then Shane comes and says ‘Hi how are you, I’ve googled you’ and it just built from there, it was natural and it built and grew. The actors we’re working with now, we got put in a room with them and asked to improvise and we must have done something right because here we are.
Similar to what Stevie says about connecting to the story, it’s the community having to really pull together and do something to get themselves out of a situation. It’s just a great story, and the bending the law bit, I’ve always been a bit on the edge of the rule book, so for me, I like the slightly rogue side of it as well.
Anthony Welsh
On his preparation for the role
A lot of our prep was developing our back story for this relationship (with Bethsheba, Yusra Warsama’s character) because when you step on to set with Shane, he can lead you in so many different ways, and they’re all as exciting as the other, but you can only do that when you have a really firm foundation knowing your relationships, with us two in particular, but with everyone in our community and then you have a base to spring off. Early on in the process we wanted to do a lot of research into the black community who were in England in the 18th Century and we were really keen on finding real-life examples that we could build our back story from, and there’s such a plethora of black people who were across all crafts. I came across a man called George Africanus who was an entrepreneur in Nottingham in the 18th Century and I found out about him and where he was buried. He was buried in a place where we were staying to do the workshops and I could see his grave from the hotel window where I was staying, and there was something that was very spiritual about learning that. This won’t come out in the show necessarily, but it was part of my character’s prep and back story and we wanted to base it on some real-life people. It’s very easy to put stereotypical representations, and basically see black people only as slaves in the 18th Century, and that becomes the only story, and it’s untrue. We also spoke to a doctor and he gave us a lot of insight about the black lives that were present throughout the whole of the UK, we wanted to be aware of the fact we were representing that. Shane has been so supportive of that endeavour, and I’m excited for people to see what we’ve done.
Yusra Warsama
On filming on location in Yorkshire and the highlights of filming
I really liked Bell House because behind it there’s a vista where we would all chill, and just being there was peaceful and beautiful.
Every day was a highlight. Working on this job was a bit of a religious experience, you have to give yourself to it and the flow of it, and I’ve liked that. You didn’t know what was going to happen each day, in terms of how we made it, because it was improv, so for me there were always little magic moments that you couldn’t predict or foresee in the scriptments, and you just go that’s magic, that’s the alchemy that is beautiful. So I enjoyed seeing those things pop up. Someone might do something or it might be a feeling, or it might be coming in to a space where the art department had just smashed it. I really enjoyed observing every day, the bits of magic the crew the team, the actors created.
Olivia Pentelow
On working with Shane on this project and working with the other cast
What an experience, I don’t even know how to describe it to be honest, Shane’s just a really incredible thinker. It’s quite magical to see the way that he thinks and how he really makes an idea come to life. The way that he works is so unusual, I like the fact that he works through improvisation. Before I came on to this project, I was studying at Uni and I worked a lot with improvisation so it was really interesting to leave Uni and come on to this project and be surrounded by such a talented thinker. It’s just breath-taking.
I was starstruck working with the other cast. Obviously I’m not going to tell the people that I’ve seen on television, that I’ve seen them on television, because that’s embarrassing, but it was so inspiring to meet some of these people that I’ve grown up watching, getting to work alongside them and getting tips and advice and be able to watch them and learn new tricks and ways to work. I’ve got nothing but admiration for the people I’m working with to be honest.
Jennifer Reid
On the historic story of the coiners and what audiences can expect from the series
I knew the story and I’ve done all the tourist stuff including Heptonstall Museum. There’s never usually more than 20p on David Hartley’s grave, but when I visited during filming I knew people from London had been up, because there was about £4.50 on there!
I think audiences will enjoy seeing proper rural Yorkshire, I think they’re in for a treat in the fact that there’s not a large female presence in the book but I think the women do really take quite a lot of control in the scenes and I really enjoy that. The fact that they’ve included sex workers and these minorities or groups that might not get a lot of platforms in life, I think that’s really cool.
Samuel Edward-Cook
On reading the scriptments and working with Shane
The first time I read Shane’s scriptments, the colours, the characters, the world, Shane’s humour that a lot of us have seen throughout his work prior to this, was all there and that just jumped out straight away. Obviously there’s a lot of serious themes and the content at times is quite heavy but Shane’s very unique but familiar humour I was really drawn to first and foremost. Behind that is obviously this really rich history of the family itself, the Hartleys, but also the area, the Calder Valley and this particular part of West Yorkshire. It’s a real love letter to the area as well.
Instantly Shane’s sense of humour draws you to him as a person, and instantly puts you all at ease. From there you’ve got this amazing level playing field that you’re all on, Shane’s very much on the level of the actors and he’s part of this with you and he’s really driving you forward. Obviously he’s an incredible visionary and he’ll see something very small in a scene and he’ll come in and make the smallest suggestion which will then grow and grow and you go off and play with it. It’s an amazing experience for an actor to have that creative playing field and it’s quite rare.
Soraya Jane Nabipour
On reading the scriptments, preparing for the role and working with Shane
When I first read the scriptments, it was so exciting. As Sam said, there’s a very strong sense of Shane’s voice and his humour coming through, but I was also really attracted to the story of these people, their resourcefulness, their shrewdness, their tenacity to survive. And to me the story seems so relevant to now, to today. Coming out of this pandemic, the story of structures that are oppressive and exploitative and people finding a way to survive living within those and the gap between the haves and the have-nots. The first time I read the scriptments they felt so current and important, it didn’t feel like an old story to me, it felt like a story of today.
The most valuable thing in the preparation for the role was the conversations I had with people with individuals as a group. I think the beautiful thing about the way Shane works is his drawing together of all these different people. We’ve all come from so many different backgrounds, we’ve had such varied life experiences and that makes something really special happen when we’re in a space together. Everyone’s bringing their own personal histories, their social, political, cultural histories, when you get that mix in a room and then you have these conversations, these explorations that are truly genuinely open, we really don’t know what is going to happen in a scene and this so rare and so special and so exciting, and terrifying! But it makes you feel alive, you learn about yourself in the process of going on that journey and you learn about other people. I’ve had really amazing chats both off the set and on the set, that I’ll value forever.
Working with Shane is like swimming in the ocean, in the sense that it’s limitless. It’s so open and terrifying, because you’re given so much room to explore, to take a risk. That’s very rare and also Shane puts a lot of trust in you, he invites you to decide what your personal investment is and to decide what matters to your character and where do you want to go and that very generous invitation, it gives you a lot as a performer, and not just as a performer, but also as a person, so you ask yourself what matters to me and what am I wanting to explore here and what am I bringing to this and what is this other person bringing and what are we making together. I think that’s just a gift really.
Adam Fogerty
On working with Shane and the other actors
One thing I do love about what Shane does, and what he’s done with this, is bring a lot of people in who aren’t actors, who have a dream to be actors. And it’s amazing because you watch them and you think, this person hasn’t been to acting school and is just perfect, because that camaraderie that we’ve made and friendships, you forget about the cameras being there, because you’re just with a load of mates doing it. It’s amazing and I think that’s a great thing when you look at Shane’s background, he’s given a lot of people their starts.
Fine Time Fontayne
On working with the cast
When we all met for rehearsals, which was when I met most of the people I’m working with, there’s people like me, I’ve been a working actor for 40 odd years, but there are other people who have been around 20 years and some younger actors who have got good reputations, they know what they’re doing on a set, and then there are people who Shane’s chosen who have never been involved in this kind of work at all. Everybody’s always scared because you don’t want to fail, so there we all are, some with some information, some without any information, we do our rehearsals, we talk about who we are, who the characters are and on the final day of that period, Shane did a thing that drama teachers will know called ‘hot-seating’, where you take a character you put them on a chair and everybody else fires questions and you’ve got to answer and some of these questions you will never have thought of but you improvise the answer. What happens in that is you as the person in the hot seat you learn more and more about who you think you are and we as a group learn more and more about who you are and what the alliances are. You would have thought with a group of people, in terms of experience so disparate, some with a lot of experience and some with none at all, that it would show, that it would crack open, and the people could do it or not, but you wouldn’t know. That sense of egalitarianism, that sense of we’re making this together, we’re solving this problem together, the camera crew, the wardrobe, the actors, the director, everybody who’s involved is working towards the same end, which is part of why we’re all smiling.