Joe Barton talks about the real inspirations of his thriller series with Keira Knightley, now at number one in the Netflix Top Ten\
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| Image Credit: Netflix |
The six episodes of the spy story Black Doves officially debuted on December 5 on Netflix, quickly jumping to number one at the top of the most-viewed series on the platform. There are many proposals from the Big N regarding old and new Christmas-themed films and series, notoriously one of the great workhorses among the sections in the catalog. But it is equally true that the irresistible charm of London lit up for the holidays, during the weeks of Christmas Time, does not often also represent the setting for a spy-themed thriller.
And if the mystery since the times of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Agatha Christie, and Ian Fleming still represents the popular genre par excellence in Great Britain, the protagonist of Black Doves Keira Knightley scores with the interpretation of a truly intriguing and unusual spy, Helen Webb. Apparently, she was the perfect wife of the Minister of Defense, a man she was supposed to marry only for cover and of course never loved, in reality, a secret agent, particularly skilled with a switchblade, as well as a passionate lover of a controversial character, murdered in mysterious circumstances. Now, the English creator and showrunner Joe Barton reveals the mystery: Is it a true story?
«I found myself reading a series of stories about police officers who had infiltrated an environmentalist group and ended up marrying and having children with some of them. A terrifying story in reality, with much darker tones than ours – explains the creator of Black Doves -. But I said to myself: “Okay, this idea, the duplicity, the ambiguity that a person must have to have a cover marriage that lasts years and years and then simply disappear into thin air”. I think it was an important inspiration for me».
In fact, the scandal of these undercover police officers therefore linked to intimate and sentimental relationships with women they had deceived for years, had been a very hot topic for British public opinion, after some of these women, all belonging to protest groups for civil rights and environmental protection, had filed a lawsuit against their former false spouses between 2010 and 2011, which became public and was thus much discussed in newspapers and tabloids in the United Kingdom.
The character played by the protagonist of Black Doves Keira Knightley, on the other hand, translates this real inspiration into a fictional and entertainment context, still operating an interesting reversal of perspective, since the infiltrator and deceiver is indeed a strong female protagonist, capable of manipulating and managing a seasoned politician who, at the beginning of the series, is not only already the Minister of Defense, but even the possible next Prime Minister who will take office in Downing Street.
Source: Radio Times
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