UKTV has partnered with Irish broadcaster RTÉ for a new scripted drama, Women on the Verge, which will air on UKTV’s premium entertainment channel, W in the UK, as well as RTÉ in Ireland.
Set in Dublin, Women on the Verge, which is based on the best-selling book Woman on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown by Lorna Martin, tells the darkly comic story of three successful thirty-something friends, who are all at various stages of their lives. Though all three are enterprising and hard-working, they're still concerned that their lives are not going entirely to plan.
The series stars Kerry Condon (Three Billboards, Rome, Better Call Saul), Nina Sosanya (Marcella, W1A, Last Tango in Halifax) and Eileen Walsh (Catastrophe, Patrick Melrose).
The project was initially picked up in 2011 by Catastrophe writer Sharon Horgan, co-founder of Merman Productions (who co-produce the series along with House), who has been working with writer Lorna Martin to bring the project to fruition.
Speaking about the screen adaptation, Martin said, “The show is a love letter to women who haven’t ticked all the boxes and whose lives are a bit messier and more complicated than they ever thought they’d be."
Kerry Condon will play Laura, an investigative journalist on the brink of ruining her career by sleeping with her boss. She is persuaded by her good friend Katie (Nina Sosanya) to seek professional help for her issues. She embarks on a course of intensive psychotherapy with the mysterious ‘Dr F’ (played by Sharon Horgan).
Katie herself is not without issue. Divorced and single, she has recently contemplated a course of IVF to ‘complete’ her family without the need for a man. Meanwhile, Alison, played by Eileen Walsh, completes the trio as a character who, after a series of disastrous one-night stands, finds herself back together with her ex Martin.
“Women on the Verge offers a highly original, no holds barred take on a subject matter that will be instinctively familiar to the W audience,” Adam Collings, channel director for W commented. He added, “Taking the gloss of Sex and the City, combined with the brutal honesty of Girls, this is a project unlike anything else on British TV.”
Women on the Verge is the latest addition to W’s growing slate of UKTV Originals which includes recently announced scripted series Flack starring Anna Paquin, Sophie Okonedo and Lydia Wilson.
