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Red Cap History Red Cap is
created by Emmy and Golden Globe nominee Patrick
Harbinson, whose credits include ER and Soldier
Soldier. An intelligent and original contemporary
series which pushes the boundaries of the crime
drama genre, Red Cap focuses on Jo McDonagh, a
tough-talking, uncompromising member of the
Army’s elite Special Investigation Branch
(SIB). The SIB is
charged with one of the most sensitive and
demanding of all military jobs: the investigation
of serious crimes committed by or against members
of the British Army. The SIB is a
man’s world. Douglas Hodge co-stars as
Jo’s tough and cynical boss, Sergeant Major
Burns; James Thornton plays Staff Sergeant Roper,
whose frostiness for Jo is beginning to melt away,
albeit slowly; and Gordon Kennedy is the
understanding team player, Sergeant Hornsby. In the
face of such colleagues, Jo’s desire to
impress and succeed is even more acute. Having
proven her detective skills, if not her diplomacy,
in the pilot episode, she was summarily demoted for
her maverick approach to serious crime
solving. In the new
series, her grudging boss Sergeant Major Burns has
to reinstate Jo to the rank of Sergeant as a full
member of his SIB team. Jo has to watch her back,
however - the SIB doesn’t give second chances
any more than it accepts mistakes and the cases to
which she is assigned aren’t getting any
easier. Jo and the SIB
team find themselves involved in the murky
underworlds of drug and gun-related crime, murder
and human trafficking, espionage and political
cover-up, and terrorism. Running alongside the
crimes and the investigations, of course, are the
continued tensions and power struggles within the
SIB itself. In preparation
for the role Tamzin spent a week at the Army’s
Reserve Training and Mobilisation Centre in
Chilwell, Nottingham. Tamzin’s period of
training familiarised her with Army life and
equipped her for the challenges of playing Jo
McDonagh, a far cry from her role of Melanie in
EastEnders, and as Shelley, a single mother whose
son is sent to a young offenders institution in the
award-winning Out Of Control. Her training with
the Army, where she was ‘shadowed’ by a
real life female SIB Sergeant, Morven Sayer,
included unarmed combat, 9mm pistol training,
driving, drill, and understanding the army’s
labyrinthine hierarchical structure. Red Cap’s
creator and writer, Patrick Harbinson, was in the
army himself and wrote 15 episodes of the hugely
popular ITV series Soldier Soldier. With such
experience Patrick has infused Red Cap with a
tangible sense of realism. Patrick’s
other credits include Sharpe, Hornblower,
Frenchman’s Creek, The Unknown Soldier, and
The Whistle-Blower for BBC One. He is also the Emmy
and Golden Globe nominated writer/producer of the
universally successful ER and Dark Angel and is
currently writer and co-executive producer on the
hugely popular Law And Order:Special Victims
Unit.
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