Gentleman Jack is based on Lister’s collected diaries, which contain over four million words and are written mainly in secret code, recording lesbian relationships for a lifetime.
Fans of Sally Wainwright’s Gentleman Jack will be delighted to hear that the second series of shows has been recommissioned. According to the BBC, filming is currently underway.
The drama starring Suranne Jones as the remarkable Anne Lister, with 5.1 million viewers for episode one, was a good launch for the BBC in 2019, so it’s little wonder it’s coming back.
Excitingly, work on series two is underway, with shooting currently happening in Halifax. An image of Suranne Jones in costume and wearing a face mask was shared by the BBC.
Gentleman Jack season 2: Plot
The second season of Gentleman Jack, written by Sally Wainwright (Happy Valley, Last Tango in Halifax, To Walk Invisible), will once again use Halifax landowner Anne Lister’s real-life diaries, some of which were written in code, as its source, with each part of Lister’s story based on historical fact and the five million words she wrote in her journals.
Season two would discuss their life together as a couple after an up-and-down relationship in series one which ended with Anne and Ann (Sophie Rundle) agreeing to make a real go of things.
A synopsis read, “Yorkshire, 1834. All eyes are on Anne Lister and Ann Walker as they set up home together at Shibden Hall as wife and wife, determined to combine their estates and become a power couple. Anne Lister’s entrepreneurial spirit frightens the locals as much as her unconventional love life and, with Halifax on the brink of revolution, her refusal to keep a low profile becomes provocative and dangerous.”
“They move into Shibden together in series two and it’s about how they negotiate their married life, conspicuously in public, and how they deal with their detractors and the effect that has on their relationship as well,” Wainwright explained to Digital Spy.
It’s not yet been official when the eight-part series will come to screens but we can expect this somewhere in the future.
Plot
- Sophie Rundle as Ann Walker
- Gemma Whelan as Marian Lister
- Gemma Jones as Aunt Anne Lister
- Timothy West as Jeremy Lister
- Lydia Leonard as Mariana Lawton
- Katherine Kelly as Elizabeth Sutherland
- Jodhi May as Lady Vere Cameron
- Stephanie Cole as Aunt Ann Walker
- Derek Riddell as Captain George Sutherland
- Amelia Bullmore as Eliza Priestley
- Peter Davison as William Priestley
- Rosie Cavaliero as Elizabeth Cordingley
- Vincent Franklin as Christopher Rawson
- Shaun Dooley as Jeremiah Rawson
- Anthony Flanagan as Ben Sowden
- Joe Armstrong as Samuel Washington
- George Costigan as James Holt
