Ben Whishaw and Alan Cumming to star in gay drama series for BBC

The series will be directed by Sherlock star Mark Gatiss
New role: Ben Whishaw will play a gay First World War veteran
Leon Neal/AFP/Getty

Ben Whishaw will play a gay First World War veteran in the opening short drama in a series directed by Sherlock star Mark Gatiss.

The eight 15-minute monologues, all set in the same London pub over the past 100 years, see stars including Alan Cumming, Russell Tovey and Rebecca Front play characters affected by the rise of gay rights.

The monologue by Whishaw, written by Gatiss, is called The Man On The Platform and is set in 1917.

His character has returned from the trenches and reflects on his attraction to another man.

The BBC Four series, called Queers, will take in a century of gay history. It will be broadcast as part of the BBC’s Gay Britannia season this summer and all eight monologues will be staged at the Old Vic before transmission.

The season also includes the drama Against The Law on BBC 2, about the journalist Peter Wildeblood whose jailing in 1954 helped spark the campaign to reform the law.

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