PBS' 'Ridley Road' holds lessons to America from '60s London
ABC News
It took eight long years for Sarah Soleman to get a murky part of Britain’s post-World War II history from the pages of a book to our TV screens
NEW YORK -- It took eight long years for Sarah Soleman to get a murky part of Britain’s post-World War II history from the pages of a book to our TV screens.
She had been impressed by Jo Bloom’s 2014 novel “Ridley Road” about a Jewish-led underground anti-fascist resistance movement in London in the 1960s. But making it into a series was hard-going at first.
“It got rejected everywhere. No one wanted to make it. It felt very niche,” she explained. Then two things happened: Brexit in England and Donald Trump in the United States. Suddenly, nativist lurches in democracies weren't so niche.
“I just had to be relentless in pushing it. And I’m glad I did, because, actually, it reveals a lot about the country when it came out,” said the English actor, writer and activist.
