50 years ago, Muriel McKay had been mistaken for media tycoon Rupert Murdoch’s wife and was being held for ransom by the mafia – so the headlines claimed. But the following negotiation, investigation, and trial presented a very different version of events. The key players in this astonishing crime story speak out for the first time in the exclusive documentary, The Wimbledon Kidnapping, debuting in the US on Sundance Now on Tuesday, November 16.
Britain’s first-ever hostage and ransom case galvanized the nation in 1969. McKay’s mysterious disappearance confounded the police, Fleet Street, and hundreds of clairvoyants in their search for the respectable 55-year-old housewife. Taking place in the last days of the 1960s – a decade defined by the potency of tabloid press, the arrival of the Windrush generation, and challenges to the established social order – two Indo-Trinidadian brothers were eventually convicted of Muriel McKay’s murder. But 50 years on, the search for the truth continues. The Wimbledon Kidnapping examines the extraordinary case that reflected the contemporary winds of change in British society.
From the multi-award-winning team at Caravan (Killer Ratings), the feature-length documentary is produced by Joanna Bartholomew (9/11: Phone Calls from the Towers) with Executive Producer Dinah Lord (Grayson Perry: Who Are You?).
