The tenth season of hit detective drama Grantchester returns to ITV on Wednesday
Grantchester‘s Geordie Keating is set to make a shocking discovery that “fractures the family”. The fan-favourite crime drama is set to return to ITV on Wednesday (January 7) with eight brand-new episodes.
Robson Green and Rishi Nair star as DI Geordie Keating and Reverend Alphy Kottaram, respectively. The pair first met and developed a partnership last series after Reverend Will Davenport (Tom Brittney) bid farewell.
Robson and Rishi will be joined by several returning cast members for season ten, including Al Weaver as Leonard Finch, Tessa Peake-Jones as Mrs C, Kacey Ainsworth as Cathy Keating, Oliver Dimsdale as Daniel Marlowe, Nick Brimble as Jack Chapman, Bradley Hall as DC Larry Peters and Melissa Jones as Miss Scott.
Speaking to the press ahead of the penultimate season’s premiere, writer and executive producer Daisy Coulam teased at some trouble for Geordie and Alphy, saying: “I suppose this is Geordie and Alphy’s first sort of big series together, and it’s sort of about that friendship, which is basically the centre of every series, really.
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“It’s about Geordie and Alphy, and Geordie discovering about Alphy that maybe he isn’t quite the glass half full guy that he seems to be, that there might be something more going on under the surface. For everyone, it’s about identity and parents and children.
“Everyone’s sort of struggling, I suppose it always comes back to family in the stories as well. It’s like everyone’s struggling with their own family issues, like Kathy and Geordie have got issues… There’s a kind of situation in [Leonard’s] family, and it’s about how this disparate group of people kind of save each other, really.”
Geordie actor Robson went on to share details of how his character’s relationship with Alphy will be affected in upcoming episodes, after the detective makes a shocking discovery about his partner.
“What you have to do with all this community of characters, as Daisy does brilliantly, at the start, it’s always this kind of metaphorical Garden of Eden. Everybody’s in a good place, and what you have to do, whether it’s the crime or a situation or a circumstance, you have to fracture those relationships,” Robson explained.
“You want the audience to go, ‘Oh no, they’re falling apart. Oh, we want them back together again.’ And that’s the journey I go on with Alphy.”
He continued: “His character is tested because the final episode, when Alphy first turns up in Grantchester, [Geordie] was sat in the pub and I say, ‘What’s your secret, Alphy?’ And he went, ‘I don’t have one. I’m a straight-laced guy.’ But all the way through, Geordie knows there’s something, there’s a secret and a lie that is haemorrhaging within Alphy.
“And that comes to the surface in series ten, which has a profound effect on their relationship and really fractures the family of Grantchester, as do the crimes.”
The first episode of season ten will see Alphy prepare for a programme of Easter celebrations that he has organised, with most of the village embracing them.
However, a local man named Reg sits outside the church protesting with his homemade placard that Christianity is getting too commercialised. A gunshot is soon heard, with Reg being found dead, seemingly having taken his own life. Will Geordie and Alphy be able to uncover the truth?
Grantchester season 10 premieres on ITV1 and ITVX at 9pm on Wednesday, January 7
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