Prey

“FAT LADY DETECTIVE” & BROKEN GLASS: THE REAL-LIFE DRAMA BEHIND ITV’S PREY (2014)

When Prey slunk onto ITV in 2014, it looked like just another gritty northern cop thriller. What viewers didn’t see was the real-world dust‑ups, on‑set mishaps and industry shade swirling just off camera. No Predator, no aliens… just critics getting dragged on Twitter, actors literally kicking through glass, and a writer who turned redundancy into a ratings winner.

Scandals & Controversies

The “Fat Lady Detective” Insult That Started a Mini War

• During a BBC Radio 4 review of Prey’s first episode, critic Philip Hensher dismissed Rosie Cavaliero’s DS Susan Reinhardt as “the fat lady detective” on air .
• The reaction from the Prey camp? Nuclear.
• Director Nick Murphy publicly called the comments “pitiful”, and snarked that the show had apparently been reviewed by Saturday Review meets Heat Magazine ^[1].
• Star John Simm went straight for the jugular on Twitter/X, reportedly calling Hensher “a prick” and adding that he was “delighted he didn’t like it” ^[1].
• Production company Red weighed in too, saying they were “appalled” that Cavaliero’s breakout turn was reduced to a body‑shaming soundbite ^[1].
• Result: Hensher got ratio’d in spirit, Prey got free publicity, and Cavaliero became an unofficial poster girl for “brilliant, non‑glossy TV cop” energy.

On-Set Drama & Near-Misses

When an Actor Literally Kicked Through REAL Glass

• Season 2 leaned hard into a rough‑and‑ready, handheld style — lots of running, jumping, and not a lot of glamorous lighting. The production notes admit it was a “guerrilla-style” shoot, with minimal kit and maximum physicality .
• In one scene, Nathan Stewart‑Jarrett (DC Richard Iddon) had to boot a door. Problem: the pane in the door was real glass, not the sugar-glass actors normally get ^[2].
• He kicked straight through it, slicing his ankle with small but real cuts, then carried on working ^[2].
• Official line: he was “fine.” Unofficial line: the man is built for action cinema.

The Train “Oh My God” Moment That Survived the Cutter

• Writer Chris Lunt has talked about scripting a big set‑piece in Episode 2 where Marcus Farrow (John Simm) nearly gets hit by a train — written specifically to make readers gasp when they turned the page .
• The production not only shot it, they kept it in, proving Prey wasn’t afraid to spend its stunt budget on pure adrenaline.

Cast Feuds & Tea (Or Lack Thereof)

No Simm vs. Glenister Feud – Just a Quiet Life on Mars Reunion

• Fans love to imagine tension whenever John Simm and Philip Glenister are mentioned in the same sentence, thanks to their Life on Mars history. But on Prey, the “drama” is structural, not personal:
• Simm leads Season 1 as Marcus Farrow.
• Glenister leads Season 2 as David Murdoch.
• They never actually share the screen; the show’s anthology structure swaps one “prey” protagonist for another while Rosie Cavaliero’s DS Reinhardt links the stories ^[2].
• Writer Chris Lunt even wrote Season 2’s Murdoch role with Glenister specifically in mind, calling it “dream” casting ^[2]. That’s not feud energy; that’s full-on fanboy.

Rosie Cavaliero: The Cast’s Secret MVP

• The police advisers reportedly told Lunt that Cavaliero’s Susan Reinhardt was “one of the best coppers on television” – a rare bit of behind‑the‑scenes praise he’s repeated in interviews ^[4].
• Philip Glenister called her “terrific… very natural, real and great fun”, adding she was “perfect in that role” and effectively carried the show ^[2].
• Translation: internally, Prey revolved around her, even if the marketing shouted louder about the blokes.

Set Vibes: Birthdays, Blackpool & Barely Any Glamour

Philip Glenister’s On-Set Birthday Party

• Season 2 might look relentlessly bleak on screen, but behind the camera, the crew turned into a budget‑friendly party planner squad. During filming, they threw Glenister a surprise birthday bash:
• Trailer decked out with balloons and bunting
• Full cast and crew rendition of “Happy Birthday”
• A bottle of champagne presented to him on set ^[2]
• Think less A‑list yacht party, more “ITV thriller but make it wholesome”.

Filming on Blackpool’s Golden Mile – With a Live Audience

• To give Season 2 a strong North West identity, the team shot in Manchester, the Lake District, and Blackpool’s Golden Mile ^[2].
• For one showpiece stunt sequence on the seafront, the crew had to close part of the street, and hundreds of people stopped to watch filming ^[2].
• Glenister loved it: he was keen to get iconic landmarks like Blackpool Tower into the show, making the seaside chaos part thriller, part accidental street theatre ^[2].

Handheld, Natural-Light Hell (That Looked Great On Screen)

• Director Lewis Arnold (Season 2) is described in the production material as an “actor’s director”: hyper‑prepared, incredibly energetic, but happy to let his cast tweak scenes ^[2].
• They shot with very little lighting and mostly handheld cameras, to keep it fast and raw ^[2].
• Upside: Prey looks like a premium thriller. Downside: everyone’s constantly sprinting, sweating and, in Nathan Stewart‑Jarrett’s case, occasionally bleeding.

Behind the Scripts: Chris Lunt’s Thriller Glow-Up

Redundancy to Red Production Darling

• Before Prey, Chris Lunt wasn’t a TV “name” – he was working at a CGI company until being made redundant in April 2010 ^[4].
• He used the career crash‑and‑burn as fuel, knuckled down, and **pitched Prey in May 2010** ^[4].
• With mentoring from Nicola Shindler at Red Production Company (who’d been developing his work since 2006), he shifted from high‑concept sci‑fi ideas to a grounded fugitive thriller ^[4].
• He’s openly said he wanted Prey to be less “procedural” and more straight-up chase thriller, citing mash‑ups of North by Northwest, The Bourne films, Enemy of the State and Minority Report as influences ^[4].

Why We Never Got a Season 3 (Spoiler: Boringly Sensible)

• Lunt has explained that Season 1 was written as a self-contained story; when it became a hit, ITV quickly ordered a second story in the same “prey” format ^[2].
• To avoid diluting the idea, they didn’t bring back Marcus Farrow – instead crafting a new “ordinary man in extraordinary trouble” arc for Glenister’s David Murdoch ^[2].
• After Season 2, Lunt moved on to other projects, and there’s no evidence of any dramatic row or cancellation scandal – just an anthology that did its six episodes and quietly left the stage .
• Over on BBC America, though, Season 2 was reportedly “burned off” in late‑night slots, leading some US fans to assume the show had “flopped” there, even as it retained strong critical praise ^[6].

Wild Trivia & Fan-Facing Facts

Award Love for John Simm

• Simm’s sweaty, relentlessly-running Marcus Farrow performance earned him a Royal Television Society North West award, cementing Season 1 as more than just a throwaway thriller .

Critics Quietly Obsessed

• Season 1 boasts a 100% Rotten Tomatoes rating from nine critic reviews, with several outlets calling it “engrossing” and praising the cast as “stacked” and “very capable” .
• Variety and The Hollywood Reporter both leaned into that “great acting covers up any story wobbles” angle, which is just polite critic-speak for: “We’d watch John Simm run down a motorway for three hours.” ^[6]

Casting Flex: Benedict Wong & Adrian Edmondson

• Before Marvel and Sorcerer Supreme duties, Benedict Wong dropped in as DS Ashley Chan, while Adrian Edmondson played senior cop ACC/DCI Warner across Season 1 ^[9].
• Add in Craig Parkinson, Anastasia Hille, Heather Peace, MyAnna Buring, and Sammy Winward, and you’ve basically got a British TV Avengers lineup hiding inside a three‑part fugitive story ^[2][9].

Sammy Winward Swaps Emmerdale Fields for Kidnap Thriller

• Ex‑Emmerdale regular Sammy Winward plays Glenister’s pregnant daughter Emma, who’s kidnapped in Season 2’s opening setup. She’s described in press as “acting her socks off” and talks about how different Prey felt compared with the pace of soap filming ^[10].

Fans Speculate, But Romance Rumours Are MIA

• Despite Reddit threads and Facebook fan groups dissecting the show, there are no credible reports of on‑set relationships, affairs, or messy breakups attached to Prey.
• All the tea we DO have is professional – glowing comments about chemistry, collaboration, and that infamous public defense of Rosie Cavaliero.

The Takeaway

No secret pregnancies, no lawsuits, no trailer punch‑ups – Prey isn’t that kind of drama. But what it does have is:

• A critic getting absolutely dog‑piled for body‑shaming the lead.
• An actor bleeding for the shot after accidentally hoofing real glass.
• A writer who turned a redundancy notice into a mini‑phenomenon.
• A cast that threw birthday parties, ran themselves ragged on handheld chases, and publicly protected their leading woman when it counted.

Not bad for six little episodes of a “simple” Manchester cop show, is it?