It’s The End for Dame Harriet Walter and Frances O’Connor with Sky Atlantic

Dame Harriet Walter and Frances O’Connor are set to star in The End, a co-production from Sky and Australia’s Foxtel.

“So often we shy away from death and try to sanitise it, pretend it’s never going to happen. This series aims to do the opposite. As our characters figure out how to die, they’re really grappling with how they’ve lived and what they’re going to do with the time they have left. The series is also fairly mad with things like giant vaginas and lots of bad sex. No one’s perfect in this family but they love each other for their flaws and hopefully audiences will too.” – Creator and writer Samantha Strauss

Airing on Sky Atlantic next year, The End is about three generations of a family with separate but intersecting obsessions – trying to figure out how to die with dignity, live with none and make it count.

O’Connor plays Dr Kate Brennan, an Australian-based specialist in palliative care. Euthanasia is a hot-button topic in Kate’s field of work and she is passionate in her opposition. On the other side of the world, Kate’s mother Edie Henley (Walter) feels just as strongly about her right to die.

Kate has little choice but to ship Edie out from England and deposit her in a nearby retirement village in the Gold Coast – Edie’s worst nightmare. While Kate struggles with her own problems, her children are trying to work out who they are, and who they want to be.

What follows is a story about parents and children, ethics and emotion, and mostly how it’s never too late to start again.

The End, being filmed in Queensland this year, will run for ten episodes and will air on Sky Atlantic and streaming service NOW TV in the UK and Ireland during 2019. 

“Thought-provoking, darkly comic and full of heart, the show dives into provocative topics with unflinching honesty. The End’s wonderfully complex characters will make you laugh, cry and question how you want to live… and die.” – Liz Lewin, Executive Producer for Sky