The BBC has greenlit screenwriter Dennis Kelly's (Matilda: The Musical) adaptation of Andy West's bestselling book The Life Inside: A Memoir of Prison, Family and Philosophy. Deadline reported that Josh Finan (The Responder) leads the cast as Dan, "a philosopher who begins teaching a class of men in prison. The character is based on West and the show currently has the working title Waiting for the Out."
The cast also includes Gerard Kearns, Samantha Spiro, Phil Daniels, Stephen Wight, Ronkẹ Adékoluẹjo, Neal Barry, Alex Ferns, Francis Lovehall, Steven Meo, Ric Renton, Tom Moutchi, Nima Taleghani, Sule Rimi, Charlie Rix, and Jude Mack. The project is backed by BBC Studios, which will handle global sales.
"It's not at all unusual for the men in Andy West's family to end up in prison--but Andy is the only one that chose to be there," said writer and executive producer Kelly. "His book is funny, insightful, beautiful, genuinely heartbreaking and nothing like what you'd expect it to be--we've tried to take that into the series."
West, who is also exec producing, added: "I'm so thankful to the writers, directors, producers and everyone involved in adapting The Life Inside. They have brought extraordinary creative and moral imagination to the stories in the book. We all hope to make a series that goes beyond the cliches about prisons and the families inside them and that touches people either side of the wall."