EXCLUSIVE: The Faroe Islands’ GRÓ Studios and the UK’s Three River Fiction are bringing a crime thriller, Reyna, to Series Mania next week.
Based on an original idea from UK writer Chris Ould, the series will follow a British detective, Jan Reyna, whose family ties to the Faroe Islands draw him back to the country. It’s being billed as “a Nordic noir crime thriller through a fresh and unconventional British-Faroese lens.”
Plot details are scarce, but it will involve themes of identity, genealogy, biotech and generational trauma, alongside thriller tropes and the rugged beauty and haunting atmosphere of the Faroe Islands. Casting will be unveiled at a later date.
London-based Three River Fiction is known for BBC and Virgin Media Television drama series Dead and Buried, which starred Annabel Scholey and Colin Morgan, while the Faroe Islands’ GRÓ Studios is a joint venture between creator, writer and executive producer Torfinnur Jákupsson and producer Jón Hammer.
The partners plan to pitch the project at Series Mania and secure further financing, production partners and international distribution. There will be multiple Nordic projects on show at the event in Lille, France, including the first Finnish-Swedish showcase, as we reported yesterday.
The news comes after we revealed earlier this week that Jákupsson had launched UK production outfit Red Herring Story, which will act as an international co-production player in the North Atlantic region.
Jákupsson is the creator of Trom, a Faroese crime procedural that was picked up by networks across Europe, including the BBC in the UK. He has previously detailed to us his bid to put the Faroe Islands on the global film and TV map.
Today, he said: “With Reyna, we’re deepening our exploration of what Nordic noir can be, bringing a uniquely British-Faroese story to a global audience. This partnership with the UK represents an exciting next step for Faroese drama and for international co-production in the region, both in terms of industry growth and in how we tell stories that are both intimate and far-reaching, rooted in our heritage but resonating far beyond it.
“It also marks an important step for GRÓ Studios as we branch out internationally with our new UK affiliate Red Herring Story. Reyna is exactly the kind of layered, investigative storytelling we want to bring to the international market.”
Benjamin McGrath, Reyna co-creator and executive producer at Three River Fiction, added: “Trom showed us the rugged beauty of the Faroes and their natural capacity for great storytelling, and Reyna will continue this success as the first ever UK-Faroese drama co-production. Reyna is a complex exploration of genealogy and lineage and is as much a story of our main character’s self-discovery as it is a knotty crime thriller. It’s exciting to be partnering with Torfinnur to push the genre into fresh, uncharted territory.”