The creator of Netflix’s newest hit show, Black Doves, has revealed what inspired the plot of the series.
The show stars Keira Knightley and Ben Whishaw as a spy and an assassin both on the run.
Knightley plays the lead, Helen, who goes on the run after her cover is blown. Whishaw, meanwhile, plays Sam, an assassin sent to protect her.
It’s been a massive hit since its released, shooting to the top of Netflix’s charts in a busy period, beating out The Madness, The Pembrokeshire Murders, and A Nonsense Christmas with Sabrina Carpenter.
Already renewed for a second season before the show even came out, more Black Doves is on the way, but what inspired the show?
In an interview with The Hollywood Reporter, the show’s creator Joe Barton revealed a bizarre real-life discovery which he says inspired part of the plot.
Keira Knightley in Black Doves (Netflix)
According to Barton, he was inspired to write Black Doves after reading a newspaper advice column in which a widow discovered that her husband had had another wife, and their relationship was an affair.
He went on to say: “She was struggling with the fact that this man she loved had passed away, but she couldn’t tell anyone or share her grief.
“She felt she had to grieve in private, which is a fascinating and human emotional problem.”
Anyone who’s watched the show will immediately see what that inspired, but if you didn’t and for some reason are still watching, here is a massive spoiler warning.
If you read beyond this point and think to yell at me for spoiling it for you, don’t .
The first episode reveals that, as well as engaging in a semi-fake marriage with a Government Minister to trade insider secrets, Knightleys’s Helen was also engaging in an affair.
Her affair with Andrew Koji’s Jason is abruptly ended when he is murdered a mere three and a half minutes into the first episode.
Barton also said of the Christmas-set spy thriller’s inspiration in an interview with Variety: “I just love stuff set at Christmas.
“I’m a big Christmas film fan, also big [on] Christmas telly. I love when shows have their one Christmas episode.
Ben Whishaw in Black Doves (Netflix)
“ER always had a good one. The West Wing always had a good one. So I’ve always wanted to do it, but it was actually tricky.
“The first script I wrote in that week between — I started on Boxing Day, finished it on New Year’s Day — so I was, like, properly engrossed in Christmas.
“Then obviously time goes on, and I remember sitting with Chris Fry, one of the producers, in like April or something…and both of us just being like, ‘What do you do at Christmas?’ It goes so quickly from your head, you completely forget.”
