BBC, Stan take off with Lord of the Flies

FIRST LOOK: Here’s the first images from Lord of the Flies, Jack Thorne’s four-part adaptation of William Golding’s classic novel that is coming soon to the BBC in the UK and Stan in Australia.

The first adaptation of Golding’s book for television, it is the story of a group of young schoolchildren who find themselves stranded on a tropical island with no adults, following a deadly plane crash.

In an attempt to remain civil, the boys organise themselves, led by Ralph and supported by the group’s intellectual, Piggy. But Jack, who is in charge of signal fire duty, is more interested in hunting and vying for leadership and soon begins to draw other boys away from the order of the group and, ultimately, from hope to tragedy.

The young cast, including many making their professional acting debuts, include Winston Sawyers as Ralph, Lox Pratt as Jack, David McKenna as Piggy and Ike Talbut as Simon. Thomas Connor appears as Roger, Noah and Cassius Flemming as twins Sam and Eric, Cornelius Brandreth as Maurice and Tom Page-Turner as Bill – alongside an ensemble of more than 30 boys playing the desert island camp’s “biguns” and “littluns.”

Filmed on location in Malaysia, the series is written by Thorne (Adolescence, His Dark Materials) and directed by Marc Munden (National Treasure, Help). Truthful to the original novel – set in the early 1950s on an unnamed Pacific island – Thorne’s adaptation delves further into the book’s emotive themes: human nature, the loss of innocence and boyhood masculinity. Each of the four episodes is titled after a character at the core of the story – Ralph, Piggy, Simon, and Jack – offering a subtly different perspective on the boys’ collective plight and manner in which they cope with their predicament. The series has been made with the support of Lord of the Flies author William Golding’s family.

It is produced by Eleven (Ten Pound Poms, Sex Education) and One Shoe Films for BBC iPlayer and BBC One, the series is a coproduction with Stan, who will air the drama in Australia. Sony Pictures Television will distribute the series internationally.

The producer is Callum Devrell-Cameron (Sex Education, Hanna). The executive producers are Joel Wilson and Jamie Campbell for Eleven, Jack Thorne for One Shoe Films, Marc Munden, Nawfal Faizullah for the BBC, and Cailah Scobie for Stan.

tagged in: BBC iPlayer, BBC One, Eleven, Jack Thorne, Lord of the Flies, Marc Munden, One Shoe Films, Sony Pictures Television, Stan