Written, produced and led by Coel, First Day on Earth will follow Henri (Coel), a British novelist in a severe rut. When she is offered a job on a film in Ghana, West Africa sounds like the perfect escape from her dead-end relationship and lack of writing work. What’s more, her estranged father lives in the country, and she’s hoping that she can reconnect with him and her heritage.
She hopes the indie’s debut – hit BBC One drama Boiling Point – is the first of many TV and film successes.
Why did you set up an indie together?
Phil and I were introduced in 2019. It was a coincidence that we are both from Liverpool and have similar backgrounds. Neither of us knew anyone in the industry – we fought our way in and built these careers for ourselves, and we both have very similar goals. So we decided to work together.
Salmon (Chivalry) stars in the series as Kwabena, a recruiter with big dreams of being a filmmaker. Loosely inspired by Salmon’s life, Kwabena embarks on a series of opportunities trying to get his start in film, whilst also paying rent, dealing with love, and battling his own daydreams.
Shuggie Bain tells the tragic story of an impoverished childhood in 1980s Glasgow. Shuggie is an effeminate boy who struggles to fit in, and so looks to his mother Agnes as a guiding light.
Agnes is convinced of her own stardom and dreams big of a house with its own front door. But she finds herself increasingly drawn to drink and oblivion, draining away their benefits which is the only means they have to survive.
Shuggie cares for her as she battles her addiction while he strives to be the normal boy he longs to be.
Loosely inspired by true life events, Dreaming Whilst Black follows aspiring filmmaker Kwabena, a man stuck in a dead-end job who spends his time flitting between reality and a fantasy world of success. Kwabena is desperate to make it in “Babylon”, the only problem is he's broke, Black and born into a Jamaican family who wishes he was an accountant.
The pilot, adapted from the hugely popular web series co-written by Adjani Salmon and Ali Hughes, saw Salmon scoop the RTS Breakthrough award at this year's Programme Awards back in March.
Created by and starring comedian Ramy Youssef, the series follows the titular Ramy (Youssef) on a conflicting spiritual journey, caught between his Muslim faith and his millennial friends in modern America.
The son of Egyptian immigrants Maysa (Hiam Abbass, Succession) and Farouk (Amr Waked, Lucy), Ramy is forced to navigate the opposing lifestyles of his Muslim community, who see life as a moral test, and his friends, who think life has no consequence.
