RAMS producer hires Timothy Spall, Lydia Leonard, Sverrir Gudnason for Northern Comfort

Charades handles world sales.

Icelandic director Hafsteinn Gunnar Sigurdsson (Either Way, Under the Tree) and producer Grímar Jónsson (Under Tree, Rams, The County) have secured a stellar cast for their biggest project to date, the comedy Northern Comfort, based on a script by Sigurdsson, Halldor Laxness Halldorsson (Ordinary People) and Tobias Munthe.

In the title role is Lydia Leonard (Call My Agent UK) as Sarah, an English businesswoman with a pathological fear of flying who is gearing herself up for an overseas holiday with her new boyfriend Tom (Emun Elliott of The Rig).

She enrols in a fear of flying class led by team leader Charles (Simon Manyonda of Pennyworth series), and is sent on a test trip to Reykjavik, together with a colourful group of people played by Timothy Spall (Mr Turner, Secrets & Lies), Sverrir Gudnason (Falling, Borg vs McEnroe), and Ella Rumpf (Succession, Raw).

In other main roles are Rob Delaney (Catastrophe, Deadpool 2) as a cargo pilot who flirts with Lydia, and Björn Hlynur Haraldsson (Lamb, Blackport), cast as a dotcom magnate who gets entangled with Alfons and Coco.

“Northern Comfort is a comedy that takes us on an unexpected journey with an unlikely group of characters whose paths would never have crossed had it not been for the fear they all share,” said Sigurdsson. “The theme of managing fear and vulnerability lies at the core of the story. These very human experiences are rich foundations for all the things I love to see in films: absurdist comedy, human drama and colourful characters that take you on a visual and cinematic journey.”

The film is co-produced with Mike Goodridge of Good Chaos, UK, as well as Sol Bondy and Fred Burle of Germany’s One Two Films, with co-financing from the Icelandic Film Centre, Nordisk Film & TV Fond, Medienboard Berlin Brandenburg, RÚV, ZDF/ARTE, Creative Europe and HES Honest Equity Strategies. Distribution rights have been snapped by Scanbox for Scandinavia, Sena for Iceland, Weltkino for Germany, Film4 for UK free TV.

The film was developed with the backing of Film4 in the UK, and financed in association with Rocket Science. Christoph Lange of HES and Thorsten Schumacher of Rocket Science serve as executive producers.

Filming will be split between Iceland, the UK and France.

Charades will start to pitch the project to world buyers at the virtual European Film Market (February 10-17).