BBC orders Grenfell Tower fire drama from ‘Wolf Hall’s Peter Kosminsky

The Grenfell Tower fire in 2017

UK pubcaster the BBC has commissioned Grenfell, a drama about the 2017 fire at Grenfell Tower in West London which killed 72 people.

Told from multiple perspectives, the three-part series will shine a light on the human stories of those caught up in the tragedy, exploring the profound impact of Grenfell on survivors, the families and loved ones of those whose lives were lost, the firefighters on duty that night, and the wider community.

Wolf Hall and The Slate’s Peter Kosminsky is writing and directing the drama, which will draw on more than five years of research conducted by him and associate producer Ahmed Peerbux, to give a comprehensive account of the events leading up to, during, and after the fire.

Grenfell (3 x 60-minutes) will be made by The Forge for BBC One and iPlayer, with Kosminsky also executive producing alongside Mark Pybus for The Forge, and Lucy Richer for the BBC.

“Occasionally, events occur in our national story which touch us all. The fire at Grenfell Tower is such an event. We remember what we were doing when we heard about it, remember the pictures, the saturation coverage. And yet, despite this, despite the many newspaper pages and TV hours devoted to the story, we may be left with a less than clear sense of exactly what happened, what went wrong,” said Kosminsky.

“In our drama, we attempt to pick our way through hours of public testimony, as well as original interviews conducted by our team, to reach the heart of this catastrophe: how such a thing can have happened; how we can avoid it ever happening again.”