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Channel 5 announces all-star cast for new police drama Suspects.

Fay Ripley

Channel 5’s has announced Fay Ripley, Damien Molony and Clare-Hope Ashitey will lead the cast for new improvised crime drama, Suspects (formerly titled Evidence).

The ten-episode series co-created and Executive-Produced by Paul Marquess (Footballers’ Wives, Hollyoaks), and Newman Street Productions (part of FremantleMedia UK), will see the dialogue being improvised by the actors – and the use of filming techniques and a directorial approach usually associated with factual programming and fly-on-the-wall documentaries.

The series focuses on a team of three detectives and their distinctive approaches to the job of policing.  Each of the ten episodes tells a discrete, self-contained crime story.  The episodes start with a news report, then follow the detectives as they investigate the circumstances of the crime, collate and analyse the evidence, and interview their suspects – until they finally identify and charge the perpetrator. The cases themselves are hard-hitting and contemporary – ranging from the disappearance of a soldier with PTSD to the hunt for a serial rapist.  The team also investigates the shooting of a popular clergyman and a gang of sex traffickers who prey on teenage girls.

Fay Ripley (Cold Feet, Reginald Perrin) will play D.I. Martha Bellamy. Witty and warm, Martha fiercely protects her team – and she’s exactly the kind of cop you want knocking on your door when your world has been turned upside down.

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Damien Molony (Being Human, Ripper Street) will play D.S. Jack Weston, whose easy charm belies his killer gut instinct.  Jack is a man of action – coupled with acute emotional intelligence.

Finally, Clare-Hope Ashitey (Children Of Men, Top Boy) will be D.C. Charlotte ‘Charlie’ Steele, who has a keen eye for detail and whip-smart instincts which help her cut to the heart of any investigation.  Passionate yet level headed, Charlie believes the police can make a real difference…

Fay Ripley comments on starring in Suspects and working without a script: “I have shied away from playing cops for years, but I have always wanted to work on the right cop show. The whole method of filming [Suspects] brings to it a sense of reality, so I am playing myself as a cop, rather than playing someone else’s telly version of me.  We all feel like we’re in this new and exciting thing together, we are all allowed to pitch in – which you rarely are as an actor – so it definitely is handing us something that we are not normally handed.  It’s all up for grabs.”

Paul Marquess, Managing Director, Newman Street says: “Working without a script means that you need actors who are confident, intelligent and articulate.  Fay, Clare and Damien have wholeheartedly embraced this very new process; the results have a spontaneity about them that is fresh, engaging and hugely watchable. “

Suspects will air on the channel in early 2014.