Black Doves has arrived on Netflix to huge fanfare, and viewers will instantly want to know if it's based on genuine experiences - here's where the inspiration for the show came from.
Imagine John Wick meeting Love Actually - the potential spawn would be Black Doves. Pull Keira Knightley from Love Actually and its London backdrop and turn her into a professional spy, and you've got the slightly festive, action packed series of the year. Helen Webb (Keira Knightley) is a quick-witted, dedicated wife and mother she's also moonlighting as a professional spy. For a decade, Helen has been passing her politician husband’s secrets to the Black Doves, the organisation who sent her undercover.
An all-star cast join Knightley in the drama, with Sarah Lancashire portraying Helen's spymaster, Reed. When Helen's secret lover Jason (Andrew Koji) is assassinated, Reed calls in Helen’s old friend Sam (Ben Whishaw) to keep her safe. Helen and Sam undertake a mission to find out who killed Jason and why, finding themselves caught up in a murky conspiracy and looming geopolitical crisis. Like fellow Netflix thriller The Madness and BBC drama The Listeners, inspiration for the series has basis in real life - we take a look at where.
What is Black Doves based on?
Inspiration for the series came from creator, Joe Barton, reading about the real-life 'spy cops' scandal. Dating back to 1968, the scandal involves British police running a covert spy operation for more than four decades, to infiltrate political activist groups. Their undercover operations continued until distressing details were revealed about how far officers went to get information from those under surveillance, came to light in 2011.
Around 140 undercover officers spied on over 1,000 activist groups, compiling dossiers relating to their political activities. However, the officers didn't just infiltrate the groups, 20 of them also deceived those they were covertly watching into long-term sexual relationships and even fathered children while undercover - some were already married while this was happening. None of the women had any idea their partners and fathers of their children were actually spies.
According to the Spy Cops website, a site dedicated to providing resources to those affected by the scandal, the covert officers used identities of dead children in their official undercover documentation, in order to have credible disguises to offer the protesters they were infiltrating. Each officer would be deployed undercover for around four years, and would feed back vital information about political groups during this time.
When revelations of some of their sexual activities came to light, a public inquiry was commissioned. The police have paid compensation to some of the women deceived by undercover officers. Officially known as the Undercover Policing Inquiry, investigations into the conduct of officers involved remains ongoing.
After reading about the spy cops scandal, Joe Barton was hit with the idea for Black Doves. Speaking to Radio Times, he says, "I had been reading about those spy cops, those guys, and they infiltrated that environmental group and ended up having children with it,"
Barton adds, "I mean, a really horrific story. But I was like, OK, that idea, that duplicitousness of having a pretend marriage lasting years and years and years and then it's disappeared. That was really part of, I think, the inspiration for it as well."
The writer also discussed why he chose to set the show during Christmas time, which is also the time of year he wrote it. "I always wanted to set something at Christmas, I haven't managed to do it really before," Barton reveals, continuing, "It's so sugary and cheerful, but actually quite a dark time of year for many people, and literally a dark time of year.
It's all these contrasting ideas around it so it seemed like quite a natural time to set a thriller. Everyone was away, I had a few hours so I just started writing it. I ended up writing pretty solidly for a week and finishing it on New Year's Day."
Black Doves: Cast
- Keira Knightley as Helen Webb
- Ben Whishaw as Sam Young
- Sarah Lancashire as Reed
- Andrew Buchan as Wallace Webb
- Kathryn Hunter as Lenny Lines
- Ella Lily Hyland as Williams
- Gabrielle Creevy as Eleanor
- Omari Douglas as Michael
- Andrew Koji as Jason Davies
- Luther Ford as Hector
- Adeel Akhtar as Richard Eaves
- Paapa Essiedu as Elmore Fitch
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