Holding

I was very clear I didn’t want to do the adaptation. I’d had my time with these characters, and it was time to hand them over.” Graham Norton is quick to explain why he was thrilled to let someone else bring to screen his 2016 bestselling crime novel, Holding. It is the story of a murder in a rural Irish community where everyone, it seems, has secrets that they have been holding on to. “I thought I’d feel weird, but I’ve loved watching the direction the characters have gone in, and the way the world has opened up and got larger. I’ve really enjoyed it.” 

Brenda Fricker, Siobhán McSweeney, Charlene McKenna, Helen Behan, Pauline McLynn and Conleth Hill have been cast in the four-part drama, directed by Kathy Burke.

Conleth Hill plays local police officer Sergeant PJ Collins, a soft and gentle man who shies away from people and fills his days with eating comfort food and half-hearted police work. 

He lives his life as a loveable outsider but is lonely and lacks motivation for his job. 

When the long-lost body of local legend Tommy Burke is found, Collins must stop hiding away and solve the biggest crime of his career. 

The series will be adapted by writers Dominic Treadwell-Collins and Karen Cogan and directed by Kathy Burke.

Conleth Hill (Game of Thrones) will lead as local police officer, Sergeant PJ Collins, of the remote Irish village of Duneen, West Cork.

A big friendly giant of a man, Sergeant Collins spends his days hiding, eating comfort food and avoiding real police work. But the discovery of local legend Tommy Burke’s body thrusts him into the limelight as he is tasked with solving a genuine case for the first time in his career.