'They felt pleased they’d been listened to, honoured and represented in the way that they would have liked'
Some families of Peter Sutcliffe’s victims have been involved in a new ITV drama looking back at the shockwaves caused by his atrocious actions.
George Kay wrote The Long Shadow which took four years of research and involvement of some of the victims’ families. ITV has stressed they didn’t want to glamourise any of Sutcliffe’s atrocious acts. Willow Grylls, executive producer for the series, has further echoed the desire not to glamourise Sutcliffe’s crimes. Willow said: “This awful tragedy is one of the biggest crime stories of the last 100 years. It is definitely part of our social history. Yet it generally retold in two ways. One focuses on Peter Sutcliffe and who he is.
“We visited the Hill family who had never spoken to the press, or any part of the media, before. We built up that trust,” explained The Long Shadow’s writer George Kay. “We spoke to the Hill family. Doreen is 90-years-old and her daughter, Jacqueline's sister, spoke for that family. We visited them, and spoke many times, it was very clear her daughter was speaking on her behalf.”
“Matt, the producer, set it up. It suddenly hit me meeting in this hotel ‘f**king hell what am I actually going to say?’. He was so incredibly generous and gratuitous with his time. It became so palpable to me what we are trying to do on screen. I have such respect for him for that hour he spent with me.”