Six-Part Beatles Drama 'Hamburg Days' Begins Filming in Germany, Liverpool and Munich

Production has started on Hamburg Days, a six-part drama about the formative years of The Beatles. The series will chart the band performing more than 250 gigs in Hamburg between 1960 and 1962. It has been inspired by the memoirs of artist Klaus Voormann, who played bass on some Beatles records and designed the cover of the Beatles' Revolver Album in 1966.

Hamburg Days is produced and financed by both British and German companies. Filming will also take place in Merseyside and Munich. The drama will be shown on BBC One. Producers say the series will show the band, which at the time included bassist Stuart Sutcliffe and drummer Pete Best, meeting Voormann and photographer Astrid Kirchherr.

Kirchherr, who died at the age of 81 in 2020, has been credited with helping develop the band's mop top hairstyle. She was engaged to Sutcliffe, who left the band to do an arts course in Hamburg. Sutcliffe died of a brain haemorrhage at the age of 21 in 1962.

The drama has been scripted by Jamie Carragher, one of the writers behind the HBO series Succession. It will be directed by Christian Schwochow, who worked on the series The Crown, and Laura Lackmann. The cast includes Rhys Mannion as John Lennon, Ellis Murphy as Paul McCartney, Harvey Brett as George Harrison, Louis Landau as Stuart Sutcliffe and Patrick Gilmore as Pete Best.

Luna Jordan will play Astrid Kirchherr, with Laura Tonke as her mother Nielsa and Casper von Bülow as Klaus Voormann. The cast attended the launch of a Hamburg exhibition of The Beatles' letters on Saturday along with Liverpool City Region mayor Steve Rotheram and Hamburg state secretary Christoph Holstein.

BBC News reported that the gathering included Rotheram, who has been on a trade mission to the city.

Meanwhile a four-part movie series about the band is currently being filmed in Liverpool for release in 2028, directed by Sam Mendes. The biopics star Harris Dickinson as John Lennon, Paul Mescal as Paul McCartney, Barry Keoghan as Ringo Starr and Joseph Quinn as George Harrison.

Hamburg Days will depict the band's transformation and its relationships with German artists including Voormann and Kirchherr.

The drama arrives as Merseyside has recently been hosting the most production shoots in the UK outside of London.