This year Ashton town centre has been host to camera crews filming the latest drama for BBC 1 in the town centre. Adapted from the novel by Jo Bloom RIDLEY ROAD is a new drama written and adapted for television by award-winning writer Sarah Solemani (Barry, Aphrodite Fry) and has been commissioned for BBC One. The 4×60-minute drama is produced by Red Production Company (a StudioCanal company) and Bafta Award-winning executive producer Nicola Shindler (Years And Years, Happy Valley, Trust Me, Safe).

Ridley Road is a thriller set against the backdrop of a swinging sixties London we haven’t seen: An East End world where far right fascism is on the rise. When Vivien Epstein follows her lover into danger and he is caught between life and death, Vivien finds herself going undercover with the fascists, not only for him but for the sake of her country.

Filming took place on Stamford Street with an interior set created in the former Sorrento’s Coffee Shop (Prior to that The Koffee Pot) and many exterior premises signage amended for the show. One of the oldest shops on Stamford Street established in 1948, Wm Walton And Sons Ltd, was the focus of much of the filming with the window redressed as a tailor’s shop. The production stars Aggi O’Casey, James Bond actor Rory Kinnear, former EastEnders stars Danny Hatchard, Tamzin Outhwaite and Tracy-Ann Oberman and Doctor Zhivago and A Taste of Honey star Rita Tushingham.  The show is expected to be screened in 2021 on BBC 1.

Images by Howard Murphy