Michelle Keegan Returns For A New Drama From The Team Behind Fool Me Once

Best known for everything from Coronation Street to Our Girl to Ten Pound Poms, Michelle Keegan is a standout star on British telly. Her highest profile role has to be Fool Me Once, which took the world by storm on 1 January 2024, and remains one of Netflix’s most successful original dramas of all time (coming in at ninth on its ranking of English language shows, trailing behind global hits like Bridgerton, The Queen’s Gambit, Adolescence, Wednesday and Stranger Things). With Keegan leading the gripping thriller as widowed veteran Maya, the twisty Harlan Coben adaptation also starred Richard Armitage, Joanna Lumley, Emmett J. Scanlan and plenty more. But other than a new series of Ten Pound Poms, Keegan has been absent from our TV screens ever since. Until now.

Once again teaming up with Quay Street Productions – the production company behind Fool Me Once – Keegan is set to star in a new six-part drama opposite Douglas Booth. Titled The Blame, here’s everything we know so far.

The Blame: Plot, Cast, Release Date & More

This just in: ITV has commissioned a new drama from Quay Street Productions titled The Blame. Made up of six episodes, the series has been written, developed for television and executive produced by Megan Gallagher who has previously worked on gripping, buzzy series like All Her Fault and Wolf.

On behalf of Quay Street, executive producers Nicola Shindler and Richard Fee say they are ‘so delighted to be working with Megan again’, calling her ‘an exceptional writer who has written a compelling series taking viewers on a twisty journey’.

‘We are also thrilled at the brilliant cast led by Michelle and Douglas, who will keep viewers on the edge of their seats, wondering who to trust at a time when the themes explored in The Blame are more relevant than ever,’ they add.

In the leading role is Keegan, who will be donning a uniform to portray DI Emma Crane. She will be joined by Booth as DI Tom Radley and Ian Hart as DCI Kenneth Walker. We’re told to expect ‘complex characters, unexpected twists and a mystery at [the series’] core’.

What Will Happen?

The Blame opens when the body of sixteen-year-old figure skater Sophie Madsen is discovered, sending shockwaves through the small town of Wakestead. It’s undoubtedly tragic – but as DI Emma Crane (Keegan) and DI Tom Radley (Booth) dig deeper into the case, they find a web of lies, institutional coverups and moral compromise.

Based on Charlotte Langley’s 2023 novel of the same name, Crane and Radley are united by mutual trust – as well as a shared contempt for the head of the anti-corruption team DCI Kenneth Walker (Hart). And corruption will play a large part in the series… With the clock ticking, Crane is tasked with an impossible challenge: navigating a murder investigation while treacherous politics within her own team threaten to derail it. 

According to Shindler and Fee, we can expect to see a ‘contemporary police station brimming with secrets, corruption, and betrayal’.

‘The Blame is such an important and urgent story to tell,’ creator and writer Gallagher adds. ‘I’m so grateful to have had the opportunity to bring Charlotte Langley’s world and characters to life on screen.’

The Cast

Joining Keegan, Booth and Hart is a stellar cast mixing familiar faces with rising stars.

The full cast list is as follows:

• Michelle Keegan as DI Emma Crane
• Douglas Booth as DI Tom Radley
• Ian Hart as DCI Kenneth Walker
• Nathan Mensah as DC Lewis
• Nigel Boyle as Brett Shergill, a digital forensic technician 
• Joe Armstrong as Kyle Frasier, an ice-skating coach
• Matilda Freeman as Sophie Madsen
• Gavin Spokes as DC Joel Stevens
• Josh Bolt as DC Douglas James
• Ceallach Spellman as PC Callum Drummond

Release Date

Filming for The Blame is set to get underway this summer in and around London. No release date just yet, but The Blame will premiere on ITV and ITVX.