New six-part drama A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder has launched on BBC iPlayer this week after filming on location in the South West with assistance from Film Offices in Bristol and Somerset last year, whilst production was based at The Bottle Yard Studios.
Commissioned by the BBC, the series is based on Holly Jackson’s smash hit novels produced by Moonage Pictures (The Pursuit of Love, The Gentlemen) in co-production with ZDFneo and Netflix. It stars Emma Myers (Wednesday), Anna Maxwell Martin (Motherland, A Spy Among Friends), Gary Beadle (Rye Lane, Small Axe), Mathew Baynton (Ghosts, Wonka) and newcomer Zain Iqbal.
London-based company Moonage Pictures is no stranger to producing High-End TV drama in the West Country, having filmed BBC drama The Pursuit of Love at The Bottle Yard Studios and on location in Bristol and Bath in 2020. For A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder, all production offices, costumes, props and storage were based at The Bottle Yard Studios whilst filming took place on location. Bristol Film Office assisted with filming in Redcliffe Caves, Redland and Westbury on Trym, and filming also took place at Avon Valley Railway Park. Screen Somerset supported filming in the village of Axbridge, which was the key location for the fictional town of Little Kilton where the drama is set.
Moonage Pictures’ Executive Producer Frith Tiplady said: “It was our genuine pleasure to return to The Bottle Yard Studios for another Moonage Pictures show. From the undeniably talented local crews to the fantastic facilities available at The Bottle Yard, Bristol was the perfect home for A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder. The Bottle Yard’s location meant we could easily access much needed rural landscapes for our chocolate box village and brooding woodland, which is home to Pip, her friends, and the deceptively dark and twisted world of A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder. Our crew was roughly 60 people with a 30 person cast and filming lasted 12 weeks, all in the Bristol region.”
(All images: BBC/Moonage Pictures)
On filming in Axbridge, Director and Executive Producer Dolly Wells said: “We were keen to shoot the show on location and to shoot it in the summer. We tried to find a version of Little Kilton which reflects the atmosphere in the book and the screenplay. What was important to us was a town that is not too small and not too big, the right size for the correct amount of suspects. We were also very keen to have a sense of the woods that surround the town, thematically that was really important.”
Five years ago, schoolgirl Andie Bell was murdered by her boyfriend Sal Singh. Case closed. The police know he did it, everyone in town knows he did it. But smart and single minded Pip Fitz-Amobi isn’t so sure and she’s determined to prove it. If Sal Singh isn’t a murderer and the real killer is still out there, how far will they go to keep Pip from the truth?
A Good Girl’s Guide To Murder is adapted by Poppy Cogan, directed by Dolly Wells and produced by Florence Walker. Executive producers are Matthew Read, Matthew Bouch and Frith Tiplady for Moonage Pictures, with Lucy Richer and Danielle Scott-Haughton for the BBC, and Dolly Wells, Holly Jackson and Poppy Cogan. BBC Studios, who have a minority investment stake in Moonage Pictures, are handling international distribution of the series.
A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder is available on BBC iPlayer now.