His career these days tends to favour the big screen over the small, but Idris Elba still finds time for telly when needed. He's now on board Guerrilla, a miniseries created by 12 Years A Slave writer John Ridley.
The six-part series will star Elba as one half of a couple who liberate a political prisoner and become swept up in radical politics in 1970s London. Forming an underground activist cell, they target the Black Power Desk, a counter-intelligence unit that was actually set up within the Special Branch at the time to investigate and destroy black activism. And the pressure will not just come from without, as the couple struggles with their choices and the effect on their relationship...
With Ridley writing most of the episodes and setting the miniseries' template by directing the first two, Guerrilla will be carried by Showtime in the US and Sky Atlantic over here, which will hopefully mean it'll be broadcast at the same time. The cameras should start rolling later in the summer.
Elba is on screens now (his voice, at least) in Disney's new take on The Jungle Book. On Friday he has action thriller Bastille Day out in cinemas and is the main antagonist in Star Trek Beyond, which arrives on July 22.