New ITV drama The Thief, His Wife and the Canoe looks at the bizarre – yet true – story of Anne and John Darwin from Hartlepool.
The married couple, who share two sons together, were sentenced to more than six years in prison each for fraud, when John staged his own death to claim insurance money, with Anne going along with the lie.
Over the course of four episodes, Monica Dolan and Eddie Marsan portray the couple and tell the unbelievable true story of how they faked a death, almost got away with it, and subsequently got caught.
While the limited series packs in a lot of detail from the complex true story, there were of course parts that had to be left out.
RadioTimes.com recently attended a Q&A where writer Chris Lang explained what didn’t make it into the final four-parter.
“One of the elements that we didn’t have time to expand on was his relationship, John’s relationship, with his father. And his relationship with her brother after the discovery of what they’ve done.
“I could have written, you know, another two episodes about the relationships between all of the extended family.”
![""]("https://images.immediate.co.uk/production/volatile/sites/3/2022/04/thief-wife-canoe-panama-9d876be.jpg?quality=90&resize=620%2C425" "\"\"")
Lang continued: “We didn’t overshoot hugely, we probably lost a minute or two minutes of material per episode. “We were filming in difficult conditions. So we were really beady about what ended up in the shooting script.”
Read more: Eddie Marsan on what surprised him most about Anne and John Darwin’s story
If you’re looking for more to watch, check out our TV Guide. Visit our Drama hub for all the latest news.
The latest issue of Radio Times is on sale now – subscribe now to get each issue delivered to your door. For more from the biggest stars in TV, listen to the Radio Times podcast with Jane Garvey.