6 November 2011

Anson Mount (Law & Order Conviction, The WB Presents The Mountain) and Colm Meany (Star Trek The Next Generation, The Murdoch Mysteries) star in Hell On Wheels, a thrilling, fast-paced historical drama set in the years after the Civil War in the United States. With the simmering anomostity between the North and the South it is decided to unite the country from East to West by building a rail road to California.

Hell On Wheels tells the epic story of post-Civil War America, focusing on Cullen Bohannon, a Confederate soldier who sets out to exact revenge on the Union soldiers who killed his wife. His journey takes him west to 'Hell on Wheels,' a dangerous, raucous, lawless melting pot of a town that travels with and services the construction of the first transcontinental railroad, an engineering feat unprecedented for its time. The series documents the railroad's incredible feat of engineering and construction as well as the institutionalised greed and corruption, the immigrant experience, and the plight of the newly emancipated African-Americans during reconstruction.

The series is being filmed just outside of Calgary. There is a chance that you might see some of the same locations or at least skylines if you also watch CBC's Heartland.

Hell On Wheels is co-created by The Brothers Gayton (Faster, Uncommon Valor, Salton Sea, Bulletproof) and produced by Joe & Tony Gayton, Jeremy Gold, John Shiban, David Von Ancken, John Morayniss, Michael Rosenberg, Mike Frislev, and Chad Oakes. As has come to be of little surprise in recent years it is E1 that is behind this series. Joining E1 on the production are Endomol USA and Calgary co. Nordic Pictures. Endomol is distributing Hell On Wheels in Europe while E1 has the rest of the world and all non-conventional broadcast media rights. E1 has taken a few projects now that had been in the rubbish bin and turned them in to successes a few years after they were initiallty discarded. It looks like Hell On Wheels will be another for the tally.