This Easter join Sky1 for a magical journey… David Almond’s SKELLIG in stunning high-definition

“Them that can walk, should walk. Them that can fly…” This Easter Sky1 takes you on a journey of hope and discovery with a sumptuous adaptation of David Almond’s Whitbread Children’s Award winning novel, SKELLIG.

SKELLIG features an all-star cast including Academy Award® nominee and BAFTA® winner Tim Roth (The Incredible Hulk, Reservoir Dogs, Funny Games) in the title role, Academy Award® nominee Kelly MacDonald (No Country For Old Men, Trainspotting), Bill Milner (Son Of Rambow, Is There Anybody There?) and BAFTA® nominee John Simm (Life On Mars, State Of Play). Navin Chowdry (Ny-Lon, Teachers), Alexander Armstrong (Mutual Friends, The Armstrong and Miller Show) and Edna Dore (Nil By Mouth, EastEnders) also star.

Dave (Simm) and Louise (Macdonald) are a young couple with a teenage son, Michael (Milner). Louise is heavily pregnant. They needed a bigger place, and they’ve found somewhere out of town, but it’s a real wreck. There’s a rickety old shed at the bottom of the garden. Dave reckons that’ll have to go.

Michael’s baby sister is born prematurely, and while she lies in an incubator with her parents at her side, Michael is left at home, lonely and uncertain, looking to explore. He befriends his neighbour Mina (Skye Bennett), a young girl with an enquiring mind and a love of nature. And then, he finds something in the shed. But SKELLIG is far more than he at first appears, and his presence will change Michael’s life, and the lives of his family, forever.

Author David Almond commented: “In any adaptation what happens is somebody takes your story and if they’re good, they show it back to you and you say, ‘Oh yes, that’s what I was writing about.’ They tell you something about your own work. It begins as your creation but then it’s recreated, it’s transfigured. When I heard Tim Roth was going to be playing SKELLIG it gave me a little frisson. I thought yes, perfect, perfect piece of casting…I just thought he looked fantastic, so great. He was talking about how it’s a very grubby, dirty reality that all this takes place in. And he looked perfect and he talked about being a tramp, but a tramp with wings -he grasped that duality right from the start.”

Screenwriter Irena Brignull added: “The book is very economical in its writing; it’s quite minimalist and very lyrical. I didn’t want to lose that. There is a danger when you play things out for real in a film; things that have lived in a reader’s imagination: they can become more ordinary. The book is extra-ordinary, so it was quite a delicate balance not to overplay this story.”

Tim Roth said: “The script was a very, very adult children’s film in a way. It didn’t patronise, it was dead on. It was really, really well written…It sort of reminded me a little of David Lean’s 1946 Great Expectations. It’s about something that scares you, but you end up loving.”