Martin Clunes transforms into Huw Edwards in first look at shocking TV drama

A new drama series will tell the story of the downfall of disgraced BBC presenter Huw Edwards.

For two decades, the broadcaster – who was one of BBC’s highest paid presenters – fronted News at Ten, during which time he announced the death of Elizabeth II and covered the coronation of King Charles and Queen Camilla.

However, in July 2023 Edwards was suspended after allegations of sexual misconduct against him were made public. Although the South Wales Police and the Metropolitan Police found no evidence of criminal conduct, he was hospitalised soon after and went on to resign in April 2024.

But three months later police announced they’d charged the presenter with three counts of making indecent images of children, which included a child as young as seven, and receiving 41 illegal images from a convicted paedophile over WhatsApp.

After pleading guilty Edwards, now 64, was then given a six-month suspended jail sentence and placed on the sex offenders’ register.

Now, a new drama series will re-tell the story of his fall from grace. Channel 5 has announced the commission of the two-parter – which currently has the working title of Power: The Downfall of Huw Edwards.

The series, which stars Doc Martin’s Martin Clunes, will explore the story of ‘how a vulnerable 17-year-old was groomed by one of the most powerful figures in television’.

It’s also been shared that the series will ‘investigate the newsreader’s double life as it spirals out of control, leading him to make the greatest announcement of his career – his total exit from public life following his conviction for serious child sexual offences’.

The first look image from the series shows Clunes, 64, transformed into the former star BBC presenter.

Sitting at a desk in the TV studio of the BBC newsroom, he bears a striking resemblance to Edwards, who worked at the broadcaster for nearly 40 years.

In the shot, Clunes stares right down the camera, with a stern expression on his face.

A year in the making, the drama is the first collaboration between 5’s factual and scripted commissioning teams.

At the same time that he was presenting the evening news each night, Edwards was repeatedly soliciting explicit sexual photos from young men, and in particular grooming a vulnerable 17-year-old. 

He had also struck up a separate online friendship with a man who, from December 2020 to August 2021, repeatedly sent him messages containing child abuse imagery which he accessed, including so called ‘Category A’ images – the most extreme.

However, everything began to unravel when a national newspaper broke the story that a ‘top BBC star’ had paid a ‘teenager for sexual pictures’, which set in motion the investigation and eventual conviction of Edwards.

Channel 5 has said the series ‘builds on extensive factual research over the past 12 months, including extensive first-hand interviews and co-operation from those at the heart of the scandal’.

‘This unflinching drama paints a complex, emotional and nuanced portrait, revealing how the grooming of a vulnerable 17-year-old over many months led to Edwards’ downfall, disgrace and the end of his life in the public eye,’ it added.

Speaking about telling the story on screen for the first time, Channel 5’s chief content office Ben Frow said: ‘This is an important and shocking story – of how a man in a position of power and trust betrayed that status. By gaining exclusive access to the key individuals involved and those who investigated the story, we explore the human cost behind the headlines. As a close collaboration between 5’s factual and scripted teams this is a first for the channel.’

Power: The Downfall of Huw Edwards is directed by Bafta and Emmy award-winner Michael Samuels, best known for his work on The Windermere Children and Any Human Heart, and was written by Mark Burt (The Trial).

Following Edwards’ conviction, the BBC began removing his past TV appearances from some of its archive footage, including his voice from the Doctor Who episode Fear Her.

A plaque honouring him at Cardiff Castle was also taken down.

Edwards had been on screens for 40 years and rose to become the highest-paid presenter on the channel with his 2023/2024 pay bracket of £475,000 to £479,999.

The month after his arrest the BBC announced that it had asked Edwards to return more than £200,000 of the salary paid after his arrest in November 2023.

However, that had not happened by August last year, with the BBC issuing a statement that read: ‘Huw Edwards has not returned any money paid to him by the BBC after his arrest, in respect of any of his work for either BBC public service or the BBC’s commercial operations,’ the BBC said.

‘The BBC has asked for all the money paid to Huw Edwards by the BBC for the period November 2023 (arrest) and April 2024 (resignation) to be returned.’

Earlier in the year, BBC chairman Dr Shah had also reiterated calls for the money to be returned.

‘Frankly, if Huw is listening to this: Give it back Huw, just give it back. Really, just give it back. You know you should and you should do it,’ Dr Shah, who has been BBC chairman since March 2024, told Times Radio.

He added: ‘We’ve been asking him and asking him and asking him. We’re getting legal advice on it.’

The BBC board had also previously said that ‘had he been up front when asked by the BBC about his arrest, we would never have continued to pay him public money’.

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