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New drama opens the door on a dark and dangerous world. New drama opens the door on a dark and dangerous world

Original new drama Yr Amgueddfa (The Museum) begins on S4C on Sunday, May 30. The drama, filmed at National Museum Cardiff, will offer viewers a brand-new genre – the art crime thriller - for the first time on the channel.

DELA HOWELLS (Nia Roberts) is a successful woman – a faithful wife to her husband ALUN (Steffan Rhodri) and a loving mother to two children DANIEL (Samuel Morgan-Davies) and MAGS (Mared Jarman). She has just accepted the post of director general of the museum and life is good.

On the same night that she is celebrating her new job in a party at the museum, she meets a young man CALEB (Steffan Cennydd), who has come along as the guest of her gay son Daniel. Dela is totally entranced by Caleb and falls into a passionate relationship with him.

But Dela soon discovers that Caleb has some more sinister reasons for beginning a relationship with her as she becomes embroiled in the dark and dangerous world of art crime.

Boom Cymru (35 Diwrnod - Parti Plu, Parch) is producing the drama, which stars some of Wales’s best-known actors including Nia Roberts (Y Gwyll/Hinterland, Bang, The Crown, Craith/Hidden), Steffan Rhodri (Gavin and Stacey, A Very English Scandal), Sharon Morgan (Pobol y Cwm, Martha, Jac a Sianco) and Delyth Wyn (35 Diwrnod).

There are also some new faces in the cast including Steffan Cennydd (The Pembrokeshire Murders, Craith/Hidden, Enid a Lucy), who stars as Caleb, and Samuel Morgan-Davies and Mared Jarman playing Dela’s children, Dan and Marged.

Nia Roberts said that she was delighted to be offered the role of Dela: “As an actor, when you reach your 40s, it’s really unusual for someone to send you a script where you play the main part. You tend to play the mother, wife or sister. I just think the lives of middle-aged people are really interesting! And it’s so great to play a woman in her late 40s who is strong and complex but also a woman who feels that sex is still a big part of her life.”

Steffan Cennydd is reluctant to say too much about his character Caleb as much of the drama centres on his actions and his mysterious past. He said: “When we first meet Caleb in the early scenes he seems perfectly ordinary but, I think discovering Caleb’s history and what makes him take the decisions he does is the real drama of the series.”

The third part of each of the six hour-long episodes is devoted entirely to Caleb’s story. Steffan explains: “When I read the script, one thing I really enjoyed was this odd thing that happened in part three where you see what Caleb has been doing between the scenes that you see in the first two parts. It’s really different and what really attracted me to the script.”

Bafta Award-winning author Fflur Dafydd has created and scripted Yr Amgueddfa and she is working once again with the experienced producer Paul Jones who has produced dramas including 35 Awr, Con Passionate, Martha, Jac a Sianco and Parch.

Fflur admits that she is obsessed with Welsh institutions – it was she who wrote Y Llyfrgell (The Library) and turned it into a film of the same name based at the National Library of Wales in Aberystwyth.

Fflur said: “It’s nice to be able to draw attention to Wales’s institutions in a more creative way. It is some sort of mission in my work – going after things which feel a little bit invisible even though they are huge and important. Through the art crime genre it feels that I am creating something which is totally unique to Wales, and because conventional thrillers are becoming a little bit old-hat, it’s quite nice to go after crime in the art world, where there are excitement and secrets of a different sort.”

Paul Jones from production company Boom said: “I remember as a young child being dragged by the scruff of my neck through the National Muesum’s lofty galleries and then in my teenage years the galleries were a place to shelter from the rain on many a Saturday afternoon. Filming  Yr Amgueddfa, I had the opportunity to visit once again, but this time creating a drama full of deception and plotting within its walls.”

Boom Cymru followed all guidelines, legislation and protocols put in place by Welsh Government in order to ensure that filming was carried out safely.

THE CAST:

Caleb - Steffan Cennydd
Dela - Nia Roberts
Alun - Steffan Rhodri
Daniel - Samuel Morgan- Davies
Mags – Mared Jarman
Elinor (Dela’s mother) - Sharon Morgan
Fioled - Delyth Wyn
Sadie - Hanna Jarman
Elfin - Simon Watts
Sulien - Geraint Todd
Lisa - Mali Tudno 

Yr Amgueddfa
Sunday 30 May 9.00, S4C
English subtitles available
On demand: S4C Clic, iPlayer and other platforms
A Boom cymru production for S4C