The current landscape is making it “increasingly hard” to fund British stories such as the Post Office drama that is currently dominating the news agenda, according to ITV‘s drama boss.
Polly Hill, who commissioned the four-parter that is on the front page of every national newspaper this morning, raised concerns that shows unique to British culture such as Mr Bates vs The Post Office are “important” but “increasingly hard to make.”
“It’s now become harder to fund these British stories,” said Hill, who was likely referencing super-inflation in the drama market and the need to attract co-production funding, which can dilute editorial. “We must be able to keep making them, because Mr Bates vs The Post Office shows that drama can help make a difference, and importantly that the audience wants to hear them.”
The success of the drama, which starred Toby Jones, Monica Dolan and The Crown’s Alex Jennings, was made more stark when compared with the show it came up against last week, the second season of BBC One’s Jamie Dornan-starrer The Tourist, which is co-produced for Australia’s Stan and Germany’s ZDF, and airs on Netflix in the U.S. ITV’s series nearly doubled The Tourist’s linear rating each night and has attracted millions more to ITVX.
Hill told Deadline the story “demanded to be told.” She was keen prior to even reading a script after being approached by UK producer Patrick Spence, who had already met Bates and a group of former sub-postmasters willing to tell their shocking story. The scandal saw hundreds of these sub-postmasters wrongly accused and many prosecuted for theft, false accounting and fraud due to discrepancies that showed up in their accounts, which it has since been proved was the fault of a computer system called Horizon introduced around two decades ago.
“None of us could possibly have imagined that it would become the national conversation, but how wonderful that it has,” added Hill. “The sub-postmasters and mistresses deserve to be heard and we hope this ITV drama helps bring about real change.”