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Liverpool Echo
Liverpool Echo
Entertainment
Kate Lally

Anne Williams drama airs on ITV this week showing Iron Lady's tireless fight for justice

An ITV drama about "Iron Lady" Anne Williams and her fight for justice will air from Sunday (January 2).

Formby mum Ms Williams died in 2013, aged 62, after spending more than 20 years searching for the truth about what happened to her 15-year-old son, Kevin, and the other victims of the Hillsborough disaster.

The four-part drama, Anne, will portray the events after Kevin became one of the 97 innocent men, women and children unlawfully killed at the tragic FA Cup semi-final.

READ MORE: Maxine Peake felt 'huge responsibility' to play Anne in ITV Hillsborough drama

The script has been written by Kevin Sampson, who was at the Sheffield stadium on April 15, 1989, and spoke with Anne for his book Hillsborough Voices.

Kevin said: "It was interviewing Anne for Hillsborough Voices that really hit home with me what a remarkable, unusual and inspirational woman we were dealing with.

"In the best possible sense of the word here was an ordinary woman who had been compelled to do absolutely extraordinary things to simply get the truth to understand what had happened to her little boy on the day.

"She famously said 'I can see what they are trying to do, they are going to try and wear me down, they are going to try and wear me out, but I can tell you, I will wear them down before they wear me out'.

"It was that contrast between the slightly shy and reserved person that you were speaking to and the lengths that she was going to to do her son justice - and by doing so to do everybody justice because she never saw this about just being about her and about Kevin."

Maxine Peake, who plays Ms Williams, said she hopes the drama will help to showcase the power of standing up in "solidarity" against the establishment.

Praising Peake's portrayal in the poignant series, Anne's daughter Sara Williams said: "I felt I was watching mum."

She said it is important her mum's fight for the truth is relayed to as many people as possible, adding: "It is everything mum believed in, the truth being out there, and the drama really does show it."

The first episode sees Kevin, played by Campbell Wallace, desperate to go to the semi-final against Nottingham Forest at Hillsborough stadium in Sheffield.

His mum and step-dad are uneasy about letting him go, but after seeing how badly he wants to, they relent.

When he doesn't return home, and following reports of fatalities, Anne and Steve drive to Sheffield to try to find him.

*Anne will be shown on ITV across four nights from January 2 to January 5. An accompanying documentary, The Real Anne - Unfinished Business - will be broadcast on January 6

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