"All mediums are being considered"
The team behind Peaky Blinders have spoken again of the potential of a movie being made, as well as numerous spin-offs.
Last week, the TV release date of Peaky Blinders season five was revealed along with a selection of new photographs. With the show also branching out into a music festival and a ballet, they’re still very much considering making a film for the big screen. However, show writer Steven Knight told NME that it would most likely be set after the final season in two series time, when they plan to end everything at the start of World War Two.
“When we get to the end of the seven series, we’ll think about [the movie],” Knight told NME. “There’s still a lot of energy in it and places it can go. We’ve been thinking about spin-offs, and I’m also interested in doing something with the Second World War.
“The film is of interest, the ballet is of interest, the musical is of interest. I just like doing different things. I don’t want to hit the buffers and stop. I just know that there could be stuff that happens subsequently. It’s got such a following and loyalty now that it would just be great to keep it going.”
Cillian Murphy, who plays the lead role Tommy Shelby, told NME: “You’ll have to speak to Steven. That’s his baby. It would have to be a six hour movie. It would have to be a standalone thing.”
Cillian Murphy as Tommy Shelby in ‘Peaky Blinders’
Executive producer Jamie Glazebrook said that ” all mediums are being considered” when it comes to the future of the show, but that the nature of a longform TV currently suits Peaky Blinders more than a movie format.
“However, now we’re seeing more and more movies that are like serialized storytelling,” Glazebrook told NME. “When you start hour, you have no idea whether there are going to be a lot of scenes, or whether Adrien Brody is going to be running after you with a machine gun.
“Those hours are so unpredictable. When you go and see a movie, you sort of know how it’s going to play out because it’s such a structured beast. Between an episode for us, there might be a few months’ gap or a couple of minutes. For a viewer, it’s a really good feeling for the viewer to not know. You’re watching the characters rather than the plot. In these six hours, you feel like you’ve really lived it with them.”
Sophie Rundle, who plays Ada Thorn in the show, agreed that it currently works better as a TV series.
“There are so many rumors floating around, and I think they’re all created by Steve,” she told NME. “It could be anything. That’s the beauty of this world. I think that at the moment, TV works really well. In the time that we’ve embraced longform TV and binge-watching there’s also been a resurgence in people wanting to wait for their series to come out and watching it week by week. That model works for Peaky. While it still works, we’ll keep on doing that.”
Helen McRory, who plays Polly Gray, admitted that she was open to all ideas as long as Knight kept producing some great writing.
“I don’t think that Steve intends to stop writing so I don’t think I need to brace myself [for the end],” McRory told NME. “He always goes, ‘So when we finish that we’re going to do the film, and the ballet’. I don’t think anyone has informed him that it’s stopping. I’ll carry on as long as the scripts are there.”
Rumors of a Peaky Blinders movie have been circulating for years, with headlines last year reporting that Knight was progressing well with a script. A musical is also in the works, along with a video game.
Peaky Blinders series five will premiere on Sunday August 25 at 9pm on BBC One. Check out everything we know about the series here.
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