''Anne'', subtitled ''One Mother's Story'', is a British historical four-part television drama developed by

World Productions World Productions Limited is a British television production company, founded on 20 March 1990 by producer Tony Garnett, and owned by ITV plc following a takeover in 2017. History The company's first major series was the police drama '' Betwe ...

. Starring

Maxine Peake Maxine Peake (born 14 July 1974) is an English actress and narrator. She is known for her roles as Twinkle in ''Dinnerladies (TV series), dinnerladies'', a sitcom on BBC One (1998–2000), as List of Shameless (British TV series) characters#Vero ...

as the titular campaigner Anne Williams, the four-part drama revolves around the

Hillsborough disaster The Hillsborough disaster was a fatal crowd crush at a football match at Hillsborough Stadium in Sheffield, South Yorkshire, England, on 15 April 1989. It occurred during an FA Cup semi-final between Liverpool and Nottingham Forest in the tw ...

of 1989 and its aftermath. The series premiered on ITV on 2 January 2022 and aired for four consecutive nights.

Cast

as Anne Williams *

Stephen Walters Stephen Walters (born 22 May 1975) is an English actor. A regular in British television and film, he has played a wide range and variety of character roles in both drama and comedy. Walters is most commonly associated with unpredictable, comp ...

as Steve Williams * Campbell Wallace as Kevin Williams * Bobby Schofield as Michael Williams * Lily Shepherd and Ellie May Davies as Sara Williams *

Clare Calbraith Clare Michelle Calbraith (born 1 January 1974) is an English actress, born in Winsford, Cheshire, and raised in Liverpool and Cheshire, whose appearances include roles in ''Vera'', the ITV period drama series '' Home Fires'' and ''Downton Abbe ...

as Sheila Coleman *

Rob Jarvis Robert S Jarvis (born 1965) is an English television and film actor. He is best known for his roles as Eddie in ''Hustle'' the long-running BBC series, Graham Shand in ''Luther'' and as Russell Posner in ''Emmerdale''. He currently plays the part ...

as John Glover *

Matthew McNulty Michael Anthony McNulty (born 14 December 1982), known professionally as Matthew McNulty, is a German-born British actor. His credits include '' See No Evil: The Moors Murders'' (2006), ''Looking for Eric'' (2009), '' The Musketeers'' (2016), '' ...

Andy Burnham Andrew Murray Burnham (born 7 January 1970) is a British politician who has served as Mayor of Greater Manchester since 2017 Greater Manchester mayoral election, 2017. He served in Gordon Brown's Brown ministry, Cabinet as Chief Secretary to th ...

* Polly Kemp as Ann Adlington *

Raymond Waring Raymond Waring, known as Ray, (born 21 July 1977) is an English actor. He was born in Liverpool and grew up in Runcorn, Cheshire, where he attended St. Chad's Secondary School. In 1994, he was accepted into the National Youth Theatre of Great ...

as Steve Hart * Ian Puleston-Davies as Phil Scraton * Gracie Kelly as Debra Martin

Production

Development

The series was in development as of 2018. After some deliberation, the dramatisation of Anne Williams' life and work by

for ITV received approval from her real life daughter Sara, who was nine when the disaster occurred. She would help with the script, written by Kevin Sampson, author of ''Hillsborough Voices''. Bruce Goodison would direct and Simon Heath of World Productions would executive produce the drama.

Casting

It was announced in September 2018 that

would star as Anne Williams.

would co-star as Williams' husband Steve.

Filming

Principal photography was scheduled to begin on location in

Liverpool Liverpool is a port City status in the United Kingdom, city and metropolitan borough in Merseyside, England. It is situated on the eastern side of the River Mersey, Mersey Estuary, near the Irish Sea, north-west of London. With a population ...

in summer 2018. Cast and crew were reported in

Formby Formby is a town and Civil parishes in England, civil parish in the Metropolitan Borough of Sefton, Merseyside, England. Historic counties of England, Historically in Lancashire, three manors are recorded in the Domesday Book of 1086 under ...

, at St George's Hall, and at

Anfield Anfield is a Association football, football stadium in the area of Anfield (suburb), Anfield, Liverpool, England, which has been the home of Liverpool F.C. since its formation in 1892. The stadium has a seating capacity of 61,276, making it the ...

that October. Steve Kelly, who lost his brother Michael in the Hillsborough disaster and was consulted for the series, stated he did a "double take" watching Peake on set.

Reception

Rotten Tomatoes Rotten Tomatoes is an American review aggregator, review-aggregation website for film and television. The company was launched in August 1998 by three undergraduate students at the University of California, Berkeley: Senh Duong, Patrick Y. Lee ...

reported an approval rating of 100% based on 7 reviews, with an average rating of 8.4/10.

Awards

References

External links