UK Thriller Murder on the Home Front Comes to the US

A new crime drama is headed to the US, one in which murder is mingled with other menaces in war-torn London. And it is coming to PBS next month.

The year is 1940. World War II is raging and London is being blitzed by the German Luftwaffe. Amidst the air raids, chaos and devastation, murder is happening under the cover of the nightly blackouts.

When a young woman is found dead in her room at a boarding house, Home Office Pathologist Dr. Lennox Collins (Patrick Kennedy, Parade’s End, Bleak House) is called on the scene to his first-ever murder case. Also there is Molly Cooper (Tamzin Merchant, The Tudors, The Mystery of Edwin Drood), a reporter and wanna-be crime writer who is trying to get a scoop about the killing. Instead of a story, she lands a new job as Collins’ assistant.

Investigating the murder are DI Freddie Wilkins (David Sturzaker, Da Vinci’s Demons, Doctors) and DS Brady (Iain McKee, Mrs. Biggs, The Promise). They have a few suspects, and then more murders when the bodies of more women are found, women killed in the same manner as the first. As if the bombings weren’t bad enough, now there is a serial killer on the loose.

According to Collins, “There are three ways in an investigation. The first is the study of the clues, the second is the study of the crime, and the third way is to study the psyche.” By using groundbreaking forensic techniques, his open mind and keen observations, and Molly’s help, Collins pieces together shreds of evidence to find the killer.

But there is more to these murders than meets the eye. And Collins is running out of time. The suspect the police have in custody is about to be hanged, and he may or may not be responsible for the murders. If it isn’t him, then who?

Costarring in Murder on the Home Front are Emerald Fennell (The Lady Vanishes, Any Human Heart) as Issy Quennell, the crime scene photographer; James Fleet (The Vicar of Dibley, Little Dorrit) as Professor Stevens, Collin’s boss; and Ryan Gage as club owner Danny Hastings.

Based on the memoir Murder on the Home Front by Molly Lefebure, this made-for-TV movie is a fictionalized account of her first days working as the assistant to renowned forensic pathologist Dr. Keith Simpson at the British government’s Department of Forensic Medicine.

Murder on the Home Front makes its US broadcast premiere on Sunday, 16 February, at 10 PM ET on PBS (check your local listings), and its online debut the next day on the PBS Video Portal.

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