ITV orders surveillance thriller Viewpoint
David Farnor | On 01, Feb 2020
ITV has ordered surveillance thriller Viewpoint from screenwriter Ed Whitmore.
The five-part series, from the Emmy and Edgar award winning writer, is based on an idea by Fleabag director Harry Bradbeer, who has co-created the series. It follows a police surveillance investigation into a tight knit Manchester community and explores whether it is ever possible observe the lives of others with true objectivity and zero effect.
When beloved primary school teacher Gemma King vanishes into thin air, DC Martin Young decides to set up his observation post in the home of single mum Zoe Sturges. His reasoning is simple – Zoe’s flat commands a panoramic view of all the comings and goings in Westbury Square. More specifically, he can see straight into the flat that Gemma shares with boyfriend Greg Sullivan… the prime suspect in her disappearance.
But Martin is a man carrying his own burden of trauma and guilt and he starts to question if he can trust what he observes? Could he be projecting his own loneliness and remorse onto the ostracised Greg?
And are his developing feelings for the combative Zoe – with her own penchant for voyeurism – compromising his ability to do his job?
Mining the paranoid hinterland of Rear Window and The Lives Of Others, Viewpoint delivers a contemporary, character-driven murder mystery that’s as much about friendship, trust and community as it is about solving a crime.
Viewpoint has been commissioned for ITV by Head of Drama, Polly Hill.
“It’s hard to find a crime series that feels new and fresh, which is why I am delighted to commission Viewpoint,” she says. “Martin, the police surveillance officer watching a community to discover why a local teacher has gone missing, is in Zoe’s flat who secretly watches her neighbours because she’s lonely. The lines between the two and who can and can’t spy on us, is beautifully blurred. It creates a crime series that has a touch of Rear Window.”
Tiger Aspect’s Lucy Bedford will executive produce the drama with Ashley Way directing each of the five episodes. Juliet Charlesworth will produce the drama.
Filming begins in Manchester this spring.