Kit Harington continues his revolutionary streak with A Tale Of Two Cities miniseries

After lighting the fuse in 2017’s Gunpowder, Kit Harington is hustling back to the BBC for A Tale Of Two Cities. In the upcoming four-part miniseries based on Charles Dickens’ French Revolution classic, Harington will play Sydney Carton, the brilliant but cynical barrister, who does a far, far better thing than he has ever done before. Developed by Daniel West, who co-created Gunpowder with Harington, A Tale Of Two Cities is a co-production between BBC and MGM+, giving the American cable channel and streamer the rights for the show’s stateside premiere. 

For those of you who slept during 11th-grade English, the book follows the tensions between England and France in the run-up to the French Revolution. When young Lucie Manette (Mirren Mack) receives a letter from her long-thought-dead father, the police arrest the messenger, Charles Darney (François Civil), for treason. With her father imprisoned in the Bastille, she hires Sydney Carton to defend Charles, whom she believes can lead her to her father. So begins a complex love triangle in the best and worst of times. 

Between Gunpowder, which dramatized the Gunpowder Plot of 1605, which took place on some date that we can’t remember, and A Tale Of Two Cities, Harington and West are carving out a nice little niche for themselves at the BBC. On Gunpowder, Harington played Robert Catesby, the leader of the failed Catholic plot to blow up the House of Lords in London. We won’t spoil anything about Dickens’ 167-year-old novel, but let’s just say Carton gets a very, very nice rest in it. 

There’s no release date for the four-part series yet, but don’t wallow in the winter of despair too long. Both the BBC and MGM+ offer a spring of hope in the form of four first-look photos of the show.