Sky & Peacock Behind Miniseries About Notorious Lockerbie Disaster; Oscar-Nominated Jim And Kirsten Sheridan To Write

Sky and Peacock are behind a drama based on the notorious 1988 Lockerbie disaster from Academy Award-nominated writers Jim Sheridan and Kirsten Sheridan, Deadline can reveal.

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Airing next year, Lockerbie will be based on the search for justice by Dr Jim Swire and his wife Jane who lost their daughter Flora in the air disaster, which killed all 259 passengers and crew on board when it exploded over Lockerbie, Scotland, 38 minutes after take off. A further 11 residents lost their lives when the plane came down.

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Swire led a campaign for truth and justice and went on a journey that included meeting Libya’s Colonel Gaddafi and successive British Prime Ministers before Libyan national Abdelbaset al-Megrahi was convicted 13 years later. He was released on compassionate grounds in 2009. The series is based on Swire and Peter Biddulph’s book about thee disaster.

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The five-parter comes from UCP, Sky Studios and Universal International Studios’ Carnival Films, and represents a big-budget bet for Sky and Comcast-owned NBC streamer Peacock. Sky has tended to co-produce limited series such as Chernobyl with HBO and this show will air on Peacock solely in the U.S., with NBCUniversal Global Distribution handling international sales.

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“The Pan Am Flight 103 disaster was one of the world’s deadliest terror attacks that continues to have widespread implications for the meaning of justice in the U.S., Scotland and Libya,” said Jim Sheridan and Kirsten Sheridan. “Over 30 years on, this series takes an intimate and very personal look at the aftermath.”

The Sheridans were both Academy Award-nominated for 2002 Paddy Considine-starring feature In America and Jim Sheridan has also picked up nods for Daniel Day Lewis double In The Name of the Father and My Left Foot.

The pair are writing all episodes of Lockerbie, with Naomi Sheridan guest-writing one. Nigel Marchant and Gareth Neame are Executive Producers for Carnival, with Samantha Hoyle Executive Producing for Sky Studios. Oskar Slingerland also serves as Executive Producer. The series was commissioned by Gabriel Silver, Director of Commissioning for Drama at Sky Studios and Zai Bennett, Managing Director of Content at Sky UK.

Murder at the Cottage

Two days before Christmas in 1996, Sophie Toscan du Plantier was brutally murdered at her holiday cottage in Schull, West Cork. The murder rocked the quiet Irish town and 24 years later, the case remains a mystery. This series sees six-time Oscar-nominated filmmaker, Jim Sheridan, piece together original evidence, never-before-seen footage, and interviews with those closest to the case to try to make sense of what really happened.

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All episodes streaming now on 

Now streaming in North America on

Mike Hale, The New York Times

“But guilt is not the central question in “Murder at the Cottage,” which fills the requirements of the true-crime documentary without being captive to the format. It is, in the descriptive sense, a work of art, written and directed by the gifted Irish filmmaker Jim Sheridan.”

John Anderson, The Wall Street Journal

“Mr. Sheridan displays not just a thirst for abstract truth, and a journalistic doggedness. He expresses a profound regret that someone who was a guest in his country should have been so brutally slain.

Also, like the detective in the classic noir “Laura,” he might be slightly in love with the victim, whom he knows only through her picture.”

Rachel Cooke, The New Statesman

“Sky’s Murder at the Cottage is an extraordinary piece of true crime”

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“it’s quite extraordinary: if he gives us both mystery and tragedy, this is also televisual psycho-geography”

“Having seen the whole thing, it’s hard to believe Sheridan’s series could be bettered.”

MEDIA