The Red King location guide: Where is the Alibi drama filmed?
The series is based on the Welsh island of St Jory, but is it a real place?
There's a new police drama in town, and The Red King not only centres on an intriguing criminal case, but also hones in on elements of folk horror and mystery that will surely leave viewers gripped.
The new series arrives on Alibi tonight and stars Anjli Mohindra as Grace Narayan, a police sergeant who is sent to the island of St Jory as a punishment for reporting officers at her former station.
The Red King is "a character-driven mystery-thriller, that combines the powerful story of a knotty police investigation with chilling, atmospheric folk-horror through the island's eerie past devotion to a pagan God called the Red King and the cult of the True Way," according to the synopsis.
The small island of St Jory may be shrouded in mystery, but it sure is picturesque. Is it a real place, though?
Read on for everything you need to know about the locations used in The Red King.
The Red King location guide: Where is the Alibi drama filmed?
The island of St Jory in Wales does not exist.
While Saint-Jory is a commune in the southwest of France, St Jory is a fictional town made up for The Red King. That doesn't detract from how lovely the setting is, and while many may expect the series to be shot in Wales, the series was actually filmed in Northumberland.
Speaking about the locations used in the show, Mohindra said: "So, we are literally cherry picking the most beautiful places in Northumberland. We’ve been to Alnwick and Alnmouth, along with the beautiful coastal area of Craster.
"We’ve also been to a lovely village called Embleton. Each place is just so rich and beautiful. I feel really lucky to have spent time here as it’s so breath-taking. The locations are really going to build this striking world of St Jory brilliantly."
The small fishing village of Craster was used for the series, an area which Adjoa Andoh describes as "ridiculous, beautiful!". She spoke about other locations used, saying: "Embleton, Cambois, all the locations are stunning. We hug the coastline, so when we were in Embleton, you would go to the shop to get delicious snacks at lunchtime, then you’d walk past and there was the sea over there."
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Marc Warren explains that Craster was used for "a funeral scene" with the whole cast in attendance, describing the location as "particularly lovely".
Welsh actor Mark Lewis Jones, who stars in The Red King as retired policeman Gruffudd Prosser, admits that the "Northumberland coast is absolutely wonderful" and "does a brilliant job of doubling up for Wales".
He explained: "There are places like this, of course, in Wales, so it seems to be a good match. There’s a sort of ruggedness to it as well which is kind of necessary. It’s beautiful, but it’s not pretty, it’s not twee. I’m not saying Wales is. It has that kind of ruggedness but a beauty with it as well. It’s a lovely island; it just has these extraordinary people living on it."
As for other locations used in the series, the first episode kicks off in a police station where Grace is leaving before she heads off to St Jory.
Director Dan O'Hara said: "The building we shot in for the police station in the mainland in Newcastle, The Lumen building, was just great, slick, and modern but with not a lot of colours which is how we wanted the mainland to look."
He went on: "We’ve been to some fantastic locations in Newcastle and across Northumberland. We’ve been as far north as Bamburgh, with just stunning views where Grace finds the shelter.
"But of course, our set piece really has been the villages of Embleton and especially Craster with the harbour. They have been really important in helping to make the island of St Jory a character."
Series writer Toby Whithouse admits that "you would never know that we weren’t on a Welsh coast" and regularly has to stop himself from saying they filmed The Red King in Pembrokeshire "because it isn't", he says.
The Red King premieres on Wednesday 24th April at 9pm on Alibi, with all episodes available to stream on Sky, Virgin and NOW.
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Authors
Morgan Cormack is a Drama Writer for Radio Times, covering everything drama-related on TV and streaming. She previously worked at Stylist as an Entertainment Writer. Alongside her past work in content marketing and as a freelancer, she possesses a BA in English Literature.