The Responder is a distinctive new take on crime drama from the makers of The Salisbury Poisonings, Dancing Ledge Productions. Written by ex-police officer Tony Schumacher, his first original series for television, The Responder holds a mirror up to the emotional extremes of life on the front line of British policing – sometimes darkly funny, sometimes painfully tragic, always challenging.
Milk Publicity was given 2 months to create and complete a full publicity, picture publicity + EPK strategy to launch new writer Tony Schumacher’s first show for television The Responder. The campaign resulted in the show becoming the most talked about show on television and receiving major critical acclaim with five-star reviews across the board. The distinctive 5×60 series set in Liverpool starring; Martin Freeman, Ian Hart, Adelayo Adedayo, MyAnna Buring, Kerrie Hayes, Warren Brown, David Bradley and Rita Tushingham, alongside newcomers Josh Finan and Emily Fairn was carefully positioned to ensure audiences were aware of it’s authenticity and originality.
When it launched on BBC ONE and BBCiPlayer the series reached 9.7m viewers across 30-days, making it the second biggest new drama of 2022. With Fremantle handling global distribution, the series sold widely: Disney+ (Italy), CANAL+ (France, Poland South Africa), Magenta TV (Germany), Movistar (Spain), RTL (Hungary), Pickbox (Croatia, Bulgaria, Slovenia, Bosnia & Herzegovina, Serbia, Macedonia, Montenegro), Cosmote TV (Greece), Viasat (Russia & CIS), Rozhlas A Telvize, (Slovakia), BritBox (North America). The series is fast becoming one of Europe’s biggest dramas.
THE RESPONDER received Best Drama Award at Edinburgh TV Awards, 2022
Tony Schumacher walked away with the award for Best Script Writer at the Royal Television Society North Awards, 2022
A Series 2 commission has been announced by BBC ONE and will go into pre-production later this year.
“Carrying my first television project out of the delivery suite and into a waiting room of crazed reviewers and reporters is about as far from my idea of pleasure as you could get. Victoria and the team at Milk cradled and cherished my baby, and held my hand throughout the process in such a way as to make it almost fun. Their attention to detail, enthusiasm and love helped make Responder what it is today, and as well as being colleagues, they are now my trustworthy and wise friends.” Tony Schumacher – Writer
