Daniel Radcliffe to star in prison drama 'Escape From Pretoria'

Daniel Radcliffe will play the lead in Escape From Pretoria, a joint production venture from producer David Barron, Footprint Films and The Works Film & Television Group.

The project tells the true story of Tim Jenkin (Radcliffe) and Stephen Lee, two twenty-something white South Africans branded ‘terrorists’ and imprisoned in Pretoria maximum security prison in 1978.

Jenkin and Lee - joined by fellow inmate and French national Alex Moubaris – decide to send the regime a clear message and escape. 

The film is written and directed by Francis Annan and is adapted from Jenkin’s autobiography Inside Out: Escape from Pretoria Prison. It starts shooting in early 2018 on location in South Africa.

Barron (producer of Kenneth Branagh’s Cinderella, Harry Potter, Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein) and Footprint Films’ Mark Blaney and Jackie Sheppard will produce the film. 

It is co-produced with The Works Film Group and sold globally by The Works International. Executive Producers for The Works Film & Television Group are Martin McCabe, Deepak Sikka and Mick Southworth.

David Barron said: “I am very excited to work with the immensely talented Francis Annan on this astonishing true story.  Political without being polemical, Escape From Pretoria is a rare combination of genre and drama and I am delighted to bring together the potent combination of Daniel Radcliffe and Francis Annan.”