WEST Lothian actor David Tennant has recreated the famous photo of Russian defector Alexander Litvinenko lying in a hospital bed before his death from poisoning.
Tennant will star in the role in a new ITV drama, which will explore the story of the Metropolitan Police officers who investigated the case of the Russian defector when he was found in declining health at University College Hospital in London.
Litvinenko was a former Russian federal security services and KGB officer, and outspoken critic of President Vladimir Putin, who died in agony in November 2006 after ingesting a radioactive substance.
His wife, Marina Litvinenko, will be portrayed by the Russian-American actress Margarita Levieva who starred in The Deuce and The Blacklist.
ITV said former New Scotland Yard officers Clive Timmons and Brent Hyatt, along with Marina Litvinenko’s lawyer Ben Emmerson KC and the former spy’s family, have helped the production.
Mark Bonnar, of Catastrophe and Quiz fame, will portray Timmons, while Utopia’s Neil Maskell takes on the role of Hyatt.
A UK public inquiry concluded in 2016 that Dmitri Kovtun and Andrei Lugovoi had deliberately poisoned Litvinenko by putting Polonium-210 into his drink at the Millennium Hotel in Mayfair.
The inquiry found the poisoning had “probably” been carried out with the approval of Putin.
The European Court of Human Rights also ruled last year that Russia was responsible for his killing – something the country repeatedly denies. Russia also continues to refuse to comply with international arrest warrants for Kovtun and Lugovoi.
The inquiry said the use of the radioactive substance – which could only have come from a nuclear reactor – was a “strong indicator” of state involvement and that the two men had probably been acting under the direction of the Russian security service the FSB.
Litvinenko will be available to stream on ITVX in December.
