Interview with Sue Breen, Producer
Interview with Sue Breen, Producer of Requiem.
Published: 22 January 2018
I hope people are surprised by it. The story is completely un-guessable - and that’s not easy to achieve
What immediately stood out for you about Requiem?
What instantly appealed was the fact that it was so different from anything else on TV. It’s a very unusual combination of a cracking mystery page-turner, but also a gripping psychological thriller, which poses the question: is this actually happening or is it all in Matilda’s head? It was a tremendous opportunity to make something really different, and that doesn’t happen very often.
What are Kris’s strengths as a writer?
Kris is fantastic. He’s been inspired by 70s horror films like Rosemary’s Baby and Don’t Look Now. Those are timeless classics, and this was a great opportunity to do something on TV in that vein. He has an encyclopaedic knowledge of those films and had all the references in his head. There’s recently been a great resurgence in the popularity of horror, but what is unusual about Kris’s script is that although it has slight horror elements, we made sure from day one that they felt real-world and grounded. Even when it goes to extreme places, the drama has to remain believable.
What are Kris’s other qualities?
He’s an incredible generator of plot. He is amazingly hard-working and generates stories at an unbelievable speed. No request is ever too much. He is also a brilliant writer of character. Matilda is a very distinctive character. It’s great to have such a strong female lead, and her relationship with Hal is key to the show. A writer who is so good at combining plot and character is very hard to come back. We are very lucky to have Kris.
Tell us about Mahalia as a director
Her great quality is vision. That’s something rarer in directors than people realise. What you want from a director is for them to come on board a project that’s already brilliant and take it to a level that you didn’t see coming. That’s what Mahalia did, and that’s what makes her special. It felt like we were watching a genius at work, and that was incredibly exciting.
What drew you to Lydia as the lead?
She’s an amazing actress. She is a pleasure to work with - she’s the least grand actor I’ve met. She’s very real and connects with audiences. You never feel like she’s acting. She has an ability to tap into real emotions and not give you what you might be expecting. She’s also a real Londoner, and we wanted that sense of fish out of water in Wales. Lydia really conveys that sense of a woman whose world has been turned upside down and who has been sent to a place very far removed from her normal life. Everything she thought she knew about her life may well be wrong.
What effect do you hope will Requiem have on its viewers?
More than anything else, I hope people are surprised by it. The story is completely un-guessable - and that’s not easy to achieve. I would like people to be shocked because they didn’t see where the story was going. I think we have made something very distinctive and original. Mahalia has a unique way of combining the dark nature of the story with great beauty. Even the scary stuff contains a lot of beauty. Finally, I’d like people to go away saying, “I’ve never seen anything like that before”.
