Cameras will start to roll on November 8th of the five week Irish shoot of a second and third installment of Magma Production’s ‘Jack Taylor’ series. Both installments will shoot on RED on location in Galway, followed by a two week shoot in Germany. The production will see the return of Iain Glen (Resident Evil) as Private Investigator, Jack Taylor and Killian Scott (Love/Hate) as his enthusiastic sidekick, Cody.
The productions’ female leads are once again played by Tara Breathnach (The Tudors), and Nora-Jane Noone (The Magdalene Sisters). The two new installments of the feature-length TV drama series are based on the Ken Bruen novels ‘The Magdalene Martyrs’ and ‘The Dramatist’ which have been adapted by Marteinn Thorisson (Niko and the Way to the Stars).
In episode two audiences will see Jack returning to his beloved Galway clean and sober following a year’s absence. Uncovering a group of vigilantes calling themselves The Pikemen, after old Irish Freedom Fighters, Jack is pushed to the brink like never before and soon realises that the only way to see justice done is to do the very thing he has been trying to avoid: to become like the Pikemen. In episode three Jack is hired by the daughter of a former inmate of the infamous Magdalene Laundries to find the identity of a former nun, known only as Lucifer. Here, a seemingly simple case grows complicated when two murders are committed. Stuart Orme (Merlin) will direct both installments.
The ‘Jack Taylor’ pilot was screened on TV3 in August 2010. Both of the new 90-minute dramas have been co-financed by German broadcaster ZDF, Richard Price TV Associates, UK, and TV3/BAI, Ireland. The budget for the production is TBC. The producers of both episodes are Clodagh Freeman (Jack Taylor – The Guards) and Ralph Christians (Niko and the Way to the Stars), for Magma Productions. The director of photography for both upcoming projects is John Conroy (Speed Dating) whilst production design will be carried out by Derek Wallace (The Tailor of Panama, Triage) and the costume designer on board is Aisling Wallace Byrne (Na Cloigne).
Producer, Clodagh Freeman tells IFTN she is confident in the demand for the Jack Taylor stories: “I am delighted that Magma Productions have been given the support at home and internationally to kick off our Jack Taylor series,” she says. “ We have had a very positive response to the pilot from broadcasters and distributors worldwide who have been crying out for an Irish crime series of this calibre, and that is exactly what we are going to deliver.”
The projects’ offline edit will be done in-house in Magma Films and sound and picture post production will be carried out in Germany. It is then expected that part two and three of ‘Jack Taylor’ will receive transmission on TV3 in Summer/Autumn 2011. Magma films have bought the rights to all nine Jack Taylor novels with a view to bringing all of these to television audiences.
