Idris Elba spent three days filming the new Luther movie on Wimbledon Common last month. If you walked past North View on the 11th, 12th or 13th, you may have wandered through a major film shoot without having a clue.
The Wimbledon and Putney Commons Conservators posted a public notice on 9 February warning visitors about “some filming” and asking people to avoid the Windmill car park on Thursday the 12th. Surrounding roads at The Quadrant were closed, with disruption and limited parking. Path closures near North View were in place, with diversions signed. Polite, practical, named nobody. Most people who read it probably assumed it was a TV crew filming a nature documentary or similar.
But no. Board papers from the Wimbledon and Putney Commons Conservators out this week describe it as “quite a significant shoot.” Both the Windmill and Richardson Evans Memorial Playing Fields car parks were taken over by crew vehicles across the three days.
No coverage anywhere identified Wimbledon Common as a filming location. Entertainment sites noted a crew at Parkland Walk and Crouch End on 18 February, but the Common dates went unreported until now.
The new film is the second Luther Netflix movie, a sequel to Luther: The Fallen Sun, which clocked up 180 million viewing hours in its first five weeks on the platform. Ruth Wilson is back as Alice Morgan (she appeared to die at the end of BBC series five, but the film isn’t explaining that yet), alongside Dermot Crowley as DSU Schenk. Series creator Neil Cross wrote the script. Jamie Payne directs.
The production has been shooting across London since February under the codename “Hawksmoor” (not the final title), with a wrap planned for May. The Fallen Sun filmed in late 2021 and came out in March 2023. If this one moves at the same pace, expect it on Netflix in 2027.
Which means sometime next year, anyone who walks past North View will be able to sit down, put Netflix on, and see exactly where they’ve been.
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