The Control Room, a brand new BBC thriller set in Scotland, stars Iain De Caestecker as Gabe, an emergency call handler who receives a call from a woman in distress, who then appears to know him from the past.
Co-starring with De Caestecker in the three-part series are Joanna Vanderham, Sharon Rooney and Daniel Portman, all of whom play crucial roles in Gabe’s story.
The series features numerous impressive locations including the control room itself and a Christmas tree farm, but just where were those scenes filmed?
Read on for everything you need to know about where The Control Room was filmed.
Where was The Control Room filmed?
The Control Room was filmed in Scotland, in and around Glasgow, including Rose Street and also up near Stirling. The show was made using a predominantly Scottish crew and Scottish cast.
In a recent Q&A with RadioTimes.com and other press, the show’s stars Iain De Caestecker and Joanna Vanderham were both very positive about filming in Scotland.
De Caestecker said: “There is something about going home that you feel a bit more at ease there. I spent some time before that filming in America, which I really loved, it had been a really cool experience.
“But out there, there can be more of an emphasis on being an actor off screen rather than on screen sometimes, and all the other stuff that comes along with it. And being back to Scotland there’s just zero pretentiousness, and I just find it’s a really, really down to earth place.”
Meanwhile Vanderham said: “Working in Glasgow for me is a dream because my mom looks after my dog and I get to go and see my dog every weekend. But the crew in Scotland at the moment is just… the bar’s been raised since I was last there for sure because we have a lot of productions filming there.
“I think it’s a lovely opportunity to get show off how beautiful Scotland is and the people that are there. It’s a show that is centred on real people in an extraordinary situation and I think that’s mirrored in the casting and I think that’s mirrored in the locations that have been used.”
Where is the Christmas tree farm?
De Caestecker revealed in the Q&A that the Christmas tree farm which features in the show is a real location, with Vanderham adding that the shoot took place “in late summer, early autumn”, making it “a weird experience”.
Vanderham explained: “One of the nights we were filming night shoots, and this mist had settled on the Christmas trees. And we had our big floodlights, obviously so everyone could see what they were doing, and it was just as if there was like diamonds just all over the Christmas trees. It was so magical.
“But we were thrown in the deep end with some of the some of the weather and we got very intimate with the forest, let’s put it that way. I think we had to just accept the fact that we were going to look like drowned rats by the end of it on one of those days.”
How was the control room Gabe works in created?
In the Q&A, De Caestecker revealed that the show’s control room was “actually built … in an old police control room, so it was kind of already structured to fit a control room quite nicely”. He said that the production “came in and we took that over and they built a brilliant set in there.”
The Control Room starts on BBC One on Sunday 17th July at 9pm with the full series then available on BBC iPlayer. Looking for something else to watch? Check out our TV Guide or visit our dedicated Drama hub for the latest news.
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