Peaky Blinders: The Immortal Man director explains new version of theme song: "There's tragedy in his voice"

More than a decade after he helmed three episodes of the opening season, Tom Harper is back in the director's chair for big screen spin-off Peaky Blinders: The Immortal Man, which is currently showing in select UK cinemas.

Ahead of the film's Netflix release this week, we spoke with Harper about returning to the franchise now it's a major global hit, and asking Nick Cave to record a new version of his iconic track – and Peaky theme tune – Red Right Hand.

You worked on the very first series – what’s it like to come back to Peaky Blinders?

We didn’t know what it would become, obviously, but we had real cinematic aspirations for it and to be able to realise that was too good an opportunity to miss.

Did Nick Cave record a new version of Red Right Hand for a key scene with Cillian?

Yes, when we put that scene together in the edit it immediately felt wrong with the original Red Right Hand, which feels like Tommy’s a young man, full of bravado and swagger and cool. Of course, Tommy still has some of those things, but he’s broken and he’s cracked.

So, we went back to Nick and he re-recorded it for us and I think it works perfectly. Tommy and Nick match each other a little bit. Nick’s older, wiser and sadder maybe. There’s tragedy in his voice, it’s more cracked, more broken. It’s beautiful and human.

• Read More: Peaky Blinders icon Cillian Murphy: "I do believe in generational trauma, I also believe it can be stopped"

Why did you decide to keep Cillian and Barry apart for a long section at the beginning of the film?

It was always inherent in Steve’s script and the question was: “How long can you make people wait? When are you just going to piss off your fans?” I always wanted to push it as long as we could without feeling self-indulgent.

Structurally, there are two very different energies – the stillness and the isolation of Tommy and the chaos and the energy of Duke. And you play them off each other until they come together and you get this kind of explosion.

You’re a Quaker, did you worry about the violence in the film?

I think that terrible violence exists in life and I think that storytelling helps us to understand things and to try and look at that in the most truthful, human way possible.

It’s why I’m interested in this story of the Shelbys and always have been. As a group of people, they have experienced this great trauma. They came back from fighting for their king and country and were cast aside by the government, so they tried to take back something for themselves.

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Read More:

• Rebecca Ferguson reveals why she studied Cillian Murphy’s sex scenes and how intimacy coordinators were used for Peaky Blinders film
• Peaky Blinders: The Immortal Man review – Big screen spin-off keeps a firm red right hand on proceedings
• Peaky Blinders star breaks silence on major character absence from The Immortal Man film: "It’s something you don’t see on TV"
• Steven Knight explains how Peaky Blinders film ended up quite different from his initial plans

Peaky Blinders: The Immortal Man is currently showing in select UK cinemas. The movie will stream on Netflix from 20 March – sign up from £5.99 a month. Netflix is also available on Sky Glass and Virgin Media. The Peaky Blinders series is available to stream on BBC iPlayer.

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