The entire season is based on just one of Val McDermid\u2019s novels in the Pirie series, The Distant Echo<\/a>, with the story being told across three two-hour episodes \u2013 a departure from the norm for ITV, which usually has serialised one-hour episodes or stand-alone two-hours.<\/p>\n However, speaking exclusively with RadioTimes.com<\/a>, the show\u2019s writer Emer Kenny, who also stars as River Wilde in the series, revealed that was not always going to be the case.<\/p>\n She explained: \u201cOriginally ITV said to me, \u2018Do you want to do one book per two hours?\u2019 \u2013 but the original book was 600 pages long or something. And I was just, like, \u2018If I do that, it will just be plot, there will be no character, there will be no texture, there\u2019ll be no humour\u2026\u2019 and humour is so important to me.\u201d<\/p>\n Kenny continued: \u201cI\u2019ve been a comedy actress for a long time and I find it really difficult to write anything that doesn\u2019t have some element of gags and jokes in it. So I said, \u2018I just don\u2019t think it\u2019s going to fit, I don\u2019t think it\u2019s going to work\u2019, and so I ended up pitching the way that I did it, and they were happy with it.<\/p>\n \u201cI am so glad that we got that extra time. Obviously it\u2019s unusual to have a two-hour but I think it allowed all of those things that I\u2019ve mentioned in each episode to expand a little bit from the usual 60 minutes.\u201d<\/p>\n Meanwhile, at an event attended by RadioTimes.com<\/a> and other press, executive producer Simon Heath explained that at one point the series was going to be made up of one-hour episodes, but this was changed after the first script was written.<\/p>\n He said: \u201cAs you often approach these things, you go with the standard format and Emer\u2019s initial pilot was for an hour, and it worked and it was greenlit. And then I got a call during the first lockdown saying that there was the opportunity to look at the show as a series of two-hour films. And I called Emer and talked her down off the ledge.\u201d<\/p>\n However, like Kenny, Heath was quick to state the benefits of the two-hour model, saying: \u201cI think when we started talking about it I could see big advantages. What it does is it gives Emer the space to write the character stuff, the issue stuff, the thematic stuff, that sometimes when you boil it down to hour-long episodes, it just becomes plot, plot, plot.\u201d<\/p>\n Similarly to the book on which it is based, the show operates across two timelines \u2013 although in the show they are intercut, rather than being told one after the other. Heath said this wouldn\u2019t have been possible with a one-hour format.<\/p> He explained: \u201cI don\u2019t think we could have done the two timelines across an hour. Imagine how little you could fit into 47 minutes when you\u2019re cutting between 1996 and 2021.<\/p>\n \u201cIt was difficult initially to get your head around that but once it was delivered it was like, \u2018Oh my god, this again will make it feel distinctive\u2019, because traditionally those two-hour films we know are kind of self-contained stories but this was going to be serialised. I think probably Prime Suspect would be the last time you\u2019ve had serialised two-hour episodes of something.\u201d<\/p>\n Additional reporting by Morgan Jeffery.<\/em><\/p>\n Karen Pirie begins on Sunday 25th September at 8pm on ITV and\u00a0ITV Hub<\/a>. You can also get a 30-day free trial of ITV Hub+ on Amazon Prime Video\u00a0here<\/a>.<\/strong><\/p>\n Check out our\u00a0Drama<\/a>\u00a0hub for more news, interviews and features or find something to watch with\u00a0<\/strong>our\u00a0TV guide<\/a>.<\/strong><\/p>\n The latest issue of Radio Times magazine is on sale now \u2013\u00a0<\/strong>subscribe now<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0and get the next 12 issues for only \u00a31. For more from the biggest stars in TV, listen to the\u00a0<\/strong>Radio Times podcast<\/strong><\/a> with Jane Garvey.<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div><\/body><\/html>\n By James Hibbs Published: Sunday, 25 September 2022 at 12:00 am ITV\u2019s latest detective drama Karen Pirie stands out for a number of reasons. Not only is its lead a young female detective, played by Lauren Lyle, but the format of the show is also different to most. The entire season is based on just […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":24,"featured_media":22602,"template":"","categories":[5],"acf":[],"uagb_featured_image_src":{"full":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/56\/2022\/09\/karen-pirie-writer-explains-how-series-format-was-changed-scaled.jpg",2560,1707,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/56\/2022\/09\/karen-pirie-writer-explains-how-series-format-was-changed-150x150.jpg",150,150,true],"medium":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/56\/2022\/09\/karen-pirie-writer-explains-how-series-format-was-changed-300x200.jpg",300,200,true],"medium_large":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/56\/2022\/09\/karen-pirie-writer-explains-how-series-format-was-changed-768x512.jpg",768,512,true],"large":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/56\/2022\/09\/karen-pirie-writer-explains-how-series-format-was-changed-1024x683.jpg",800,534,true],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/56\/2022\/09\/karen-pirie-writer-explains-how-series-format-was-changed-1536x1024.jpg",1536,1024,true],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/56\/2022\/09\/karen-pirie-writer-explains-how-series-format-was-changed-2048x1365.jpg",2048,1365,true]},"uagb_author_info":{"display_name":"importmanagerhub@sprylab.com","author_link":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/radiotimes\/author\/importmanagerhubsprylab-com\/"},"uagb_comment_info":0,"uagb_excerpt":"By James Hibbs Published: Sunday, 25 September 2022 at 12:00 am ITV\u2019s latest detective drama Karen Pirie stands out for a number of reasons. Not only is its lead a young female detective, played by Lauren Lyle, but the format of the show is also different to most. The entire season is based on just…","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/radiotimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rss_feed\/22601"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/radiotimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rss_feed"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/radiotimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/rss_feed"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/radiotimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/24"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/radiotimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/22602"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/radiotimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22601"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/radiotimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22601"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"""\"](\""https:\/\/images.immediate.co.uk\/production\/volatile\/sites\/3\/2021\/05\/karenpirieepisode129-b784c55.jpg?quality=90&resize=620%2C413"\" "\\"\"\"\\"\/")
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