CILLIAN MURPHY, BACK ON FAMILIAR GROUND

Back in ‘Peaky Blinders’ gear? The glamour of an Oscar win for his eponymous role as atomic bomb maker Robert Oppenheimer and a flurry of tributes from his Irish hometown of Cork haven’t stopped Cillian Murphy from returning to the ordinary old streets of Birmingham.

Steven Knight, the creator of the popular BBC drama Peaky Blinders, has confirmed Murphy will reprise his role as the cut-throat Brummie gangster Tommy Shelby in his upcoming film rounding off the final series which aired in 2022.

Aside from his first Academy Award for Best Actor, the star was also recognised by the Golden Globes, the Baftas and the Screen Actors Guild for his work in Christopher Nolan’s movie Oppenheimer.

Roll the cameras…

Due to begin filming in the autumn, Knight’s new project, which comes after six series spanning nearly a decade, will continue to tell the story of the infamous and violent Shelby family’s gang warfare.

Speaking to Birmingham World, Knight said: “He [Murphy] is definitely returning for it. “We’re shooting it in September just down the road in Digbeth.”

Peaky Blinders kicked off following the Shelbys’ criminal career after the First World War, but the new film is understood to follow their story into the Second World War.

From Brum to Bond?

Knight is unsure exactly how Tommy Shelby’s chapter itself will end, telling Esquire: “How the story will unfold, I don’t know. What will happen after that, I want that to depend on the film.” As for Murphy, with an Oscar under his belt, the world is his oyster. Indeed, talk is circulating of how Murphy’s name is linked to the James Bond role.

Emilia Randall