Monumental Pictures co-founder Alison Owen is fond of saying that feminist period drama Harlots is authentically told from the “whore’s eye view”.

Harlots

HARLOTS

Distributor ITV Studios Global Entertainment
Producer Monumental Pictures
Length 8 x 60 minutes
Broadcasters ITV Encore (UK); Hulu (US)

Based on Harris’s List Of Covent Garden Ladies, an 18th-century guidebook to local sex workers, the drama – created by Moira Buffini and Alison Newman – follows a brothel owner raising her daughters in Georgian London.

Owen, an executive producer, says: “London was literally being built on the backs of these women and we wanted to give them a voice.”

The Elizabeth producer – who launched Monumental with Debra Hayward in 2014 – says a roster of all-female writers and directors helped to “set the tone and sensibility” of the drama, though the set-up may change in future series.

“It was a smooth transition from the writing through to the director, the actress and to the audience – it was uninterrupted and made it feel really truthful.”

Harlots is also distinctive for the rock music that punctuates the period scenes.

Executive producer Alison Carpenter says: “None of us wanted swooping strings. It veers from guitar rock to big drums and sometimes a hip hop feel.”

Owen adds: “People have been freed up in terms of historical drama. There’s been a gradual acceptance by the audience for things to be looser, and not very chocolate-box.”

Harlots was first developed at Channel 4, with Hulu coming in as a partner, but when the “economic dynamics” didn’t work out, the project went to ITV, with Hulu still on board. ITVS GE director of global content Julie Meldal-Johnsen calls

Harlots a “fascinating new take on the world’s oldest profession”. “It’s edgy… there’s a rawness to it that’s really appealing. It’s exciting that it’s an all-female-produced show,” she says.

So why place it on ITV Encore? “Creatively, it allowed the co-pro between Hulu and ITV Encore to buy into the same vision – not into a more controlled and edited version.”