Stars to refight England's civil war in new TV drama
A passionate revolutionary saga will sweep across British television screens this autumn. The lavish four-part drama, The Devil's Whore, from the pen of Peter Flannery, creator of the hit serial Our Friends in the North, stars Dominic West, of The Wire, as Oliver Cromwell. Andrea Riseborough, fresh from her role as Margaret Thatcher in BBC4's The Long Walk to Finchley, will play alongside him as a young gentlewoman of the court, drawn into the English Civil War.
And right at the centre of this story of Roundhead versus Cavalier is a family legacy that has become increasingly personal to Martine Brant, co-writer of the £7m Channel 4 epic. Researching the screenplay for more than a decade, she discovered that her beautiful Oxfordshire home, Wytham Abbey, played a key part in the conflict that ripped England apart during the 17th century.
'Cromwell actually stayed here as he planned the siege of Oxford,' said Brant this weekend. 'It was originally a manor that belonged to Abingdon Abbey and provided fruit and veg for the monks. It then became the seat of the Earls of Abingdon, before being sequestrated during the Civil War.'
The Devil's Whore chronicles the life of the fictitious Angelica Fanshawe, who was born into the Royalist camp. The name is taken from that of the diarist Anne, Lady Fanshawe, a direct ancestor of Brant's three daughters through their paternal grandmother...
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And right at the centre of this story of Roundhead versus Cavalier is a family legacy that has become increasingly personal to Martine Brant, co-writer of the £7m Channel 4 epic. Researching the screenplay for more than a decade, she discovered that her beautiful Oxfordshire home, Wytham Abbey, played a key part in the conflict that ripped England apart during the 17th century.
'Cromwell actually stayed here as he planned the siege of Oxford,' said Brant this weekend. 'It was originally a manor that belonged to Abingdon Abbey and provided fruit and veg for the monks. It then became the seat of the Earls of Abingdon, before being sequestrated during the Civil War.'
The Devil's Whore chronicles the life of the fictitious Angelica Fanshawe, who was born into the Royalist camp. The name is taken from that of the diarist Anne, Lady Fanshawe, a direct ancestor of Brant's three daughters through their paternal grandmother...