How Doctor Who Books Formed a Path to Writing the TV Show

Between 1990 and 2005, when Doctor Who wasn’t on TV, the show mostly existed as original novels. When Russell T. Davies, Julie Gardner and Jane Tranter brought it back in 2005, several of the show’s new screenwriters were chosen from the writers of those spin-off books, including Davies and future showrunner Steven Moffat. While they […]

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Dope Girls is not your grandma’s historical drama (unless of course, your grandma has lived a life, has good taste in TV, and frankly, could do with a bit more respect and a bit less condescension from people assuming that she won’t be able to watch anything that isn’t presented by Alan Titchmarsh).

To try again then, Dope Girls is no Downton Abbey. It might be set in the same time period, but this tale of Soho women dancing with danger, death and well, other dancers in the nightclubs where they work is a world away from the genteel intrigues of the Earl of Grantham.

With a cast including actors from the US, Australia and the UK, here’s who’s playing who in BBC One’s new Saturday night series.

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Eliza Scanlen as Violet Davies

Violet is a new recruit to the Metropolitan police service hoping to be chosen for “The Female Experiment” in which women were first made officers in the UK. She’s tough, alone and has nothing to lose, which makes her a dangerous prospect.

She’s played by Australian actor Eliza Scanlen, whose breakout roles came in HBO’s 2018 adaptation of Gillian Flynn’s Sharp Objects, and in Greta Gerwig’s 2019 feature film Little Women, in which Scanlen played second-to-youngest March sister Beth. She’s recently appeared opposite Doctor Who’s Ncuti Gatwa in this year’s National Theatre production of The Importance of Being Earnest.

Julianne Nicholson as Kate Galloway

A brunette woman in a black coat in BBC One's Dope Girls

Kate is cruelly forced to find her own way after she loses her job, and has to go to extreme lengths to provide a living for her and her teenage daughter Evie, a clever girl with the potential to be among the first women in the UK to go to university.

She’s played by US actor Julianne Nicholson, who’s currently appearing as the wealthy Sinatra in Disney/Hulu political thriller Paradise (which has just been renewed for a second season). She’s known for Law & Order, The Outsider, having played Esther in Boardwalk Empire, Lillian in Masters of Sex and Lorri in the first season of Kate Winslet-starring crime drama Mare of Easttown.

Umi Myers as Billie Cassidy

Umi Meyers wearing a dress and fur coat in BBC One's Dope Girls

Billie is a Soho nightclub dancer who lives a bohemian, drink and drug-fuelled lifestyle with her singer friend Eddie Cobb. She’s played by Umi Myers, a recent graduate of the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, with previous stage parts and an appearance in Bob Marley: One Love. Dope Girls is Myers’ first television lead role.

Geraldine James as Isabella Salucci

Geraldine James in a blue dress in BBC One's Dope Girls

The matriarch of the fearsome Salucci crime family, Isabella is a ruthless survivor who’s held her clan together through the War and much more. She’s played by Geraldine James, a familiar face on screen and stage who’s had a long and healthy career going back to the late 1970s. To some TV viewers, she’ll always be indivisible from the part of Sarah in The Jewel in the Crown, to others, she’ll be best recognised as Rose from Band of Gold, Milner in Channel 4’s Utopia, Mrs Hudson in the Guy Ritchie Sherlock Holmes films, and Marissa in Anne With an E, to name just a few.

Dustin Demri-Burns as Damaso Salucci

Dustin Demri-Burns wearing a dark suit in BBC One's Dope Girls

A Salucci son, Damaso is a member of a powerful Soho crime family, and has a terrifying brutal side. He’s played by Dustin Demri-Burns, who’s well known for comedy roles in Cardinal Burns, Stath Lets Flats, GameFace and Am I Being Unreasonable?, but has an equally healthy career in dramas with a comedic edge from The Great to Slow Horses, Britannia, Sweetpea and The Decameron.

Ian Bonar as Sgt Frank Turner

Sgt Turner is helping to run The Female Experiment, which saw the UK’s first female police officers. He’s a complicated man who doesn’t wield his power well, and makes an early enemy of Violet. He’s played by Ian Bonar, who recently appeared opposite Peter Capaldi in Apple TV+’s Criminal Record, as well as roles across various TV genres, from I May Destroy You to New Blood, Vera and many more.

Fiona Button as Sophie Asquith-Gore

Fiona Button wearing a white and green dress in BBC One's Dope Girls

The wife of a wealthy and important government minister, and the mother to Evie’s friend Alice, Sophie is grieving the brother she lost in the war, and thinks that she can still speak to him via a medium. She’s played by actor-director Fiona Button, who’s known for the role of Rose Defoe in Abi Morgan’s legal drama The Split, and was recently seen as Denise in series three of Industry, as well as in Grantchester, Out of Her Mind, and plenty of theatre productions.

Nabhaan Rizwan as Silas Huxley

Medium and occultist Silus Huxley takes money from the wealthy to help them contact their dead. He’s played by Nabhaan Rizwan, who recently played Dionysus in Netflix’s KAOS, as well as appearing opposite his brother Mawaan Rizwan in his sitcom Juice, and in the US playing Frank in Station Eleven, after his breakout role in 2018’s BBC crime drama Informer.

Will Keen as Frederick Asquith-Gore

A powerful government minister who’s set on rooting out the rot in London’s seedy nightclubs, Frederick Asquith-Gore is played by screen and stage actor Will Keen (incidentally, the father of Logan and His Dark Materials’ Dafne Keen), who recently appeared in BBC drama Wolf Hall as Thomas Cranmer, as well as playing Lord Belzagar in the second season of Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power, Norfolk in My Lady Jane, the Queen’s private secretary in The Crown, and David in Ridley Road, as well as appearing in feature film Operation Mincemeat and more.

ALSO APPEARING

A man holding two fans in BBC One's Dope Girls

– Musical stage and screen actor Michael Duke as nightclub singer Eddie Cobb.
– The Outrun and The Power‘s Eilidh Fisher as Kate’s daughter Evie Galloway.
– The Bay, The Reckoning, True Detective and Strike‘s Eloise Thomas as Evie’s schoolfriend Alice Asquith-Gore.
– The Sixth Commandment‘s, Ghosts‘ and Lead Balloon‘s Anna Crilly as butcher Anne Sanders.
– Bridgerton and The Bastard Son and the Devil Himself‘s Priya Kansara as nightclub dancer Lily Lee.
– Heartstopper‘s Ben Hope, aka Sebastian Croft as nightclub owner Silvio Salucci.
– The Newsreader and The Inheritance‘s Rory Fleck Byrne as returned soldier Luca Salucci.