Hot Picks: Kill Jackie

This multinational revenge thriller starring Catherine Zeta-Jones is based on the acclaimed novel The Price You Pay by Nick Harkaway (writing as Aidan Truhen) and comes from a creative team that counts Killing Eve and Gangs Of London among their credits.

Straddling comedy and drama, the series follows Zeta-Jones’ character Jackie Price, who has been living a wealthy existence for the past 20 years in a bid to stay anonymous after escaping a dangerous past as an international cocaine dealer.

Just as life starts to feel boring, she discovers that The Seven Demons – a squad of terrifying hitmen - have been hired to kill her, leaving Price to revert to her old instincts and take down the assassins before they get to her first.

Tom Butterworth, co-creator, writer, showrunner and executive producer, joined the show after being passed the novel by Peter Lawson of Steel Springs Pictures, and says a pilot script and the attachment of ZetaJones made the project feel “creatively compelling”.

Butterworth adds: “I loved the idea of your past coming back to haunt you in the form of seven psychopathic assassins. We changed the main character ‘Jack Price’ into ‘Jackie’, introduced a secret from her past, and chose Bilbao, San Sebastián, London and Swansea as the setting.”

“The tone and energy and dark fun gets under the audience’s skin and carries them to the end of the ride”
Tom Butterworth

Butterworth, famed for work on Gangs Of London among numerous others, worked with lead director Damon Thomas (Killing Eve) on the show and describes it as a “very free adaptation” of the novel but one that preserves “the crazed Gonzo dark comedy of the book”.

The show was shot in the UK and Spain, with around 13 days to film each episode, including a four-day stint spent in a desert towards the end of the production. Zeta-Jones is joined by Daniel Ings (I Hate Suzie, Lovesick) in the main cast, with supporting actors including Ron Perlman (Sons Of Anarchy), Sidse Babett Knudsen (Borgen), Hattie Hook (Ten Pound Poms) and Darci Shaw (A Thousand Blows).

And that combination of cast and script has delivered a unique series, says co-creator Lawson, aided by a plot turn that remains under wraps.

“There are many thrillers out there where the hero’s dangerous past comes back to haunt them. Our audience will be drawn into that, but we give them a big twist. I hope the tone and energy and dark fun gets under the audience’s skin and carries them to the end of the ride,” he says.

Butterworth adds that it is still rare to have a female lead in a show with action and peril, “without them just aping a male action hero”. Jackie Price does not do that, he continues, “but she’s brilliant at thinking several moves ahead. She’s also a hot mess, haunted by loss, past mistakes and easily distracted – and that is why adversaries underestimate her.  You never quite know if she’s in control or out of her depth, which is why I hope you’ll root for her.”

He adds that having Zeta-Jones attached “was a big reason” why he got involved, describing her as a “full-on star, but somehow her characters always feel effortlessly grounded, like someone you’ve met”. Plus, he adds, you’ll hear her real Swansea accent for the first time on screen.

For Rebecca Dundon, senior vice-president of scripted at distributor Fremantle, the series is “the epitome of original storytelling, led by a fearless unexpected hero you’ve never seen before and instantly become obsessed with”.