Harry Potter actor Timothy Spall to star in new sci-fi series on Channel 4

(Image credit: ABACA/PA Images)

Harry Potter and Secrets and Lies actor Timothy Spall will lead a star-studded cast in The Commuter, an adaptation of writer Philip K Dick's, Electric Dreams

Timothy Spall has signed up to star in a new Channel 4 series inspired by science fiction novelist Philip K Dick’s short stories.

The actor, who's starred in numerous  film and TV series including Mr Turner, The King's Speech and several Harry Potter movies, will play the lead in the first of ten standalone episodes.

Sixty-year-old Spall, father of successful actor Rafe Spall, will play Ed Jacobson, an unassuming employee at a train station who is alarmed to discover that a number of daily commuters are taking the train to a town that shouldn't exist in the episode called The Commuter.

Timothy Spall (Yui Mok/PA)

When a curious Ed investigates for himself, he comes face-to-face with an alternate reality that forces him to confront his own struggles around his relationship with his wife and his troubled son.

Last Tango in Halifax actor, Anne Reid, will also star  in The Commuter along with BAFTA Award nominee Hayley Squires (I, Daniel Blake), Tuppence Middleton (War & Peace) and Rudi Dharmalingham (Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them).

Last Tango in Halifax's Anne Reid (Celia)

Last Tango in Halifax's Anne Reid (Celia)

Hayley Squires attending the EE British Academy Film Awards held at the Royal Albert Hall, Photographer: Ian West/PA Wire

Hayley Squires attending the EE British Academy Film Awards held at the Royal Albert Hall, Photographer: Ian West/PA Wire (Image credit: PA Wire/PA Images)

Harry Potter And The Cursed Child actor Anthony Boyle (pictured below) will star as Spall's son and Jacobson’s wife is played by This Is England star Rebecca Manley.

Anthony Boyle (Ian West/PA)

The Commuter is penned by Harry Potter And The Cursed Child writer Jack Thorne and directed by Tom Harper, whose credits include War And Peace and Peaky Blinders.

The series will air on Channel 4 later this year in the UK and was also commissioned by Amazon for the US.

 

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Tess Lamacraft
Senior Writer for What's On TV, TV Times, TV & Satellite week, Whattowatch.com

Tess is a senior writer for What’s On TV, TV Times, TV & Satellite and WhattoWatch.com She's been writing about TV for over 25 years and worked on some of the UK’s biggest and best-selling publications including the Daily Mirror where she was assistant editor on the weekend TV magazine, The Look, and Closer magazine where she was TV editor. She has freelanced for a whole range of websites and publications including We Love TV, The Sun’s TV Mag, Woman, Woman’s Own, Fabulous, Good Living, Prima and Woman and Home.