“I hope Boris is flattered”: Michael Winterbottom on casting Kenneth Branagh as UK premier in Covid Sky drama “This England”

When it was announced that Michael Winterbottom would direct the series on the first bloc of the pandemic in the spring of 2022, many speculated, or perhaps hoped, that the politically loyal director would hold the British government responsible. However, speaking with Deadline at the 38th Sarajevo Film Festival, 25 years after his famous war drama. Welcome to Sarajevo Screened there, Winterbottom revealed that, like many of his fictional but real films, the six-part Sky series This is England which debuts on September 21, will be part of a set that offers a bird’s eye view of the British government’s initial response to Covid.

“Boris is just a thread running through it,” he said, “because it’s really a mosaic of many different stories. The funniest part was the research, really, because we started it after the first wave in June 2020. We talked to a lot of scientists, people who work at SAGE. [The Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies]So many doctors, nurses, nursing home workers and people have obviously had Covid. So this is a collage of all their intertwined stories… almost in a diary. It is really the diary or the chronicle or the calendar of the first wave, so it ends at the end of May 2020 “.

Although much news has emerged from the pandemic, most notably the infamous “Partygate” scandal involving illegal blocking meetings at Johnson’s home at 10 Downing Street, Winterbottom insists the focus is on the big picture. “We’re just trying to document what happened,” he told her, “and I think it’s true, everyone was trying to do the best they could. Nobody wanted to make mistakes. The virus was spreading incredibly fast. I mean, if you think back to what was happening in early March 2020, eight days later it was a completely different situation, so the idea of ​​the pace of the show is trying to keep that pace. . . When you watch the series, you will remember everything you remember experiencing. One minute it felt like something was happening in China, the next in Italy, then it was with us in the UK, but not too bad, and then suddenly it was everywhere. And that feeling of trying to catch up is something we hope to capture in the series. “

Winterbottom made it clear that he was not committed to the series, which Fremantle offered him in June 2020. “It was vague like, ‘Do you want to do something for Boris Johnson and the covid?'” He recalled. “So it took two years. The writing process was pretty quick and then we mostly shot last year. The change was rather slow. But the shooting was pretty difficult because we were trying to get into nursing homes, we were trying to get into hospitals. And when we started pre-production, the third block was just getting started, so we were blocked again. “

However, Branagh was Winterbottom’s final choice for the role and the actor was cast right after reading the first draft of the script, written with Kieron Quirk. “Ken said yes,” Winterbottom said. “But I only had eight weeks, in March and April. So I said, “Well, it’s almost possible.”

But why Brana?

“Well, it’s a tough choice,” he laughed. “Who else will be playing Boris Johnson?” And I hope Boris likes that we cast Kenneth Branagh to play him. Ken did a great job. But to be honest, he’s not part of the character. Boris / Ken is just the central character of the story. Along with everyone else, we are really seeing how they fare with this pandemic. You don’t see anyone’s backstory, you don’t see who they are, their families, you just see what they are doing with the pandemic. So, in a way, it’s the pandemic narrative that drives the entire series. “

However, some events on the show are sure to shake the bones, most notably the controversial visit by government adviser Dominic Cummings while he was locked up at Barnard Castle. “We remain true to what happened,” said Winterbottom. “We show what happened and don’t comment. We only show how the story came out because we also show how scientists studied the virus. It was an incredible job what they did, they got the genome so fast, they got the vaccine so fast and we’ll show it. “

with This is England With only a few weeks left to air, it should come as no surprise that the prolific director has another feature in the starting blocks. “We are in Italy to start shooting Promised Land‘, She said. [Jewish activist] Abraham Stern, who tried to blow them up. “

Why has he followed her for so long? “I don’t even remember why, but we started looking into this story about 15 years ago,” said Winterbottom. “It’s actually a very small story: it’s about two British policemen, a Jewish woman one of them has a crush on, and Stern. So it’s a very chilling story, but I think it shows how violence or extremism can separate people, how people who would normally work together are gradually being separated by the use of violence. “