ITV1 Commissions 1950’s code-breaking thriller ‘The Bletchley Circle’.

Set in 1951, ‘The Bletchley Circle,‘ a three x 60 minute murder mystery drama will star twice BAFTA award-winner, Anna Maxwell Martin (South Riding, Bleak House) as Susan, Rachael Stirling (Women in Love, Boy Meets Girl) as Millie, RADA graduate Sophie Rundle plays Lucy and Julie Graham (Lapland, Doc Martin) is Jean; as four fictional women whose brilliant work at top security HQ Bletchley Park during World War II helped break codes used by the German military.

“He’s making a pattern and he doesn’t realise he’s doing it. If we can crack it we’ll be able to see what his next move will be. Just like knowing where the German army will be in three day’s time. We can get ahead of him and stop him before he kills again.”

Susan, Millie, Lucy and Jean have returned to their normal lives modestly setting aside the part they played in producing crucial intelligence which helped the Allies to victory and shortened the war.
Behind Susan’s conventional exterior as a 1950’s housewife and mother, there’s a steely determination you under-estimate at your peril.
Seemingly unadventurous and conservative on the surface, our unlikely heroine is a force to be reckoned with. She just hasn’t done anything about it for the last 8 years!

Until now that is…..and the unresolved murders of Jane Hart and Patricia Oakes. With her handwritten charts of numbers, dates and times, and stretched lines of wool connecting pins to clips, Susan has spotted a pattern of behaviour no-one else has…..
Susan goes to the police only to be met with utter scepticism by the desk sergeant.

Unaware of her Bletchley background, the police refuse to take Susan’s theory seriously. With the help of her former friends she endeavours to crack the murders and bring the culprit to justice.

Bohemian Millie, speaker of fourteen languages and with a streetwise approach to life, Lucy whose youthful, naïve exterior masks a brilliant memory for data recall and Jean, the methodical no-nonsense organiser with valuable access to key records and documents.

Producer Jake Lushington says: “The Bletchley Circle is about what might have been,” said Jake. Despite the era they have come through, women like Susan and Millie have the capacity, the ideas and the ability to process evidence and crack a murder case. In many ways it is a form of police profiling which was way ahead of it’s time,” he added.

ITV Drama Commissioning team, Laura Mackie and Sally Haynes: “The Bletchley Circle combines a vivid portrait of post-war Britain with a taut and original thriller.” said Laura. “I’m delighted that we’ve attracted such a strong cast to bring it to life”

Bletchley Circle is produced by Jake Lushington (The Devil’s Whore), created and written by Guy Burt (The Borgias), Execitive Produced by Simon Heath (Hancock) and directed by Andy De Emmony (Cutting It).

The Bletchley Circle will be filmed on location in London from the end of April 2012.