Peaky Blinders creator Steven Knight: 'It would be dull if I only told Birmingham stories'

But in his new Disney Plus show A Thousand Blows, the story is centred on the East End of London in the 1880s. So how did it feel for Knight to pen the project, which has an unmistakably London feel about it?

Chatting exclusively to RadioTimes.com, Knight said: “I mean, I love to tell Birmingham stories but it would be dull if I just told Birmingham stories.

"There’s so many resonances and similarities between all of the British cities at the time if you go to the rough bit, there is a similarity there – that is the story I want to tell.

"It doesn’t have to be specifically Birmingham, I like to tell working-class stories and histories that haven’t been told.”

The series sees Knight reunite with Stephen Graham, with the pair having worked previously together on Peaky Blinders, Taboo and A Christmas Carol.

A Thousand Blows sees Graham as Sugar Goodson, a previously on-form boxer who is wrestling with his own jealousy at newcomer Hezekiah Moscow (Malachi Kirby), who originally came to London in the hopes of being a lion tamer.

As if that wasn't a complex enough story, the series also unpacks the real-life history of the Forty Elephants, an all-female criminal gang that was led by their appointed queen, Mary Carr (Erin Doherty).

Read more:

• Steven Knight teases Stephen Graham's Peaky Blinders film appearance
• Stephen Graham reveals how A Thousand Blows came about – with a hint of Peaky Blinders bartering

Speaking about what made him want to bring these three intersecting tales to life in A Thousand Blows, Knight told RadioTimes.com: “I’ve wanted to do the Forty Elephants story for so long because it’s just an incredibly compelling story that has so much resonance with modern times.

"There were always 40 of them, they were all women, they had a queen who was their leader and they made a living out of robbery, cons, tricks and all kinds of deceptions. I just thought, why has nobody done this? Why has nobody put this on the screen?"

He continued: "I was then approached by Stephen and Hannah [Walters] with the idea of the true story of somebody called Hezekiah Moscow, who was a Jamaican boxer who actually came to London with his friend to become a lion tamer.

"I just felt that, because it took place in the 1880s in London, that was an opportunity to tell that fantastic story of hardship and triumph and marry that with the story of the Forty Elephants and put those two things together.”

A Thousand Blows comes to Disney Plus from 21st February. You can sign up to Disney Plus from £4.99 a month now.

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