Nervous flyers, look away now: Channel 4’s newest airplane thriller is almost upon us.
Called In Flight, it introduces us to single mother Jo, who suddenly finds herself neck deep in a murky world of corruption and hired killers when she’s blackmailed into being a drugs mule.
As a flight attendant, she’s the perfect smuggler – but unsurprisingly, Jo isn’t keen, and her attempts to escape her new situation are going to cause issues for herself and her family.
The six-part drama is set to start on August 12 and has been written by Mike Walden, who previously worked on detective show Marcella. In short, the credentials are good and the cast is stacked: so who’s in it?
Jo Conran, played by Katherine Kelly
Jo is a single mother and flight attendant whose life is turned upside down when her son becomes involved with a dangerous criminal gang. Soon, she’s working as their drug mule, all the while trying to find a way out.
Katherine Kelly is a regular face on our screens. She first broke through as Becky McDonald in the soap Coronation Street (for which she won the British Soap Award for Best Actress in 2009), but has since gone onto appear in tens of TV shows.
Those include playing Lady Mae in Mr Selfridge, DI Jodie Shackleton in Happy Valley, Elizabeth Sutherland in Gentleman Jack and the Post Office employee Angela van Den Bogerd in Mr Bates vs The Post Office.
Cormac, played by Stuart Martin
Cormac is the crime boss responsible for blackmailing Jo. Though we don’t know much about him, we do know that he’s a nasty piece of work.
Martin is a Scottish actor. Born in 1986, he studied at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland and has appeared in the Channel 4 drama Babylon, the American pioneer TV series Jamestown and Miss Scarlet and The Duke.
Dom Delaney, played by Ashley Thomas
Dom is Jo’s ex: a customs officer who finds himself sucked into her life once more.
Ashley Thomas, also known as Bashy, is a British actor and rapper. Born in Hammersmith in 1985, he studied at the BRIT School and worked as a postman and bus driver before breaking through. He was part of the UK’s emerging grime scene, worked on Adulthood with Noel Clarke and featured on the 2010 Gorillaz song White Flag alongside Kano.
In 2013, he decided to focus on acting full-time. He played Jermaine in Top Boy, appeared in BBC series The Interceptor and appeared in the Steven Knight adaptation of Great Expectations for the BBC, for which he received a royal Television Society Programme Award nomination.
He’s also slated to appear in the upcoming Netflix series Hostage, alongside Suranne Jones.
Sonny, played by Harry Cadby
.jpeg?trim=63%2C0%2C64%2C0)
Talk about nominative determinism: Sonny is Jo’s son, who finds himself in way over his way with Cormac’s crime gang.
Cadby is a new face on the acting scene. He trained at LAMDA, and in 2022, appeared in BBC drama Inside Man with Lydia West, as well as horror series Red Rose. He’s appeared in BBC show Dope Girls, and in April 2025 he was reported to be joining the cast of A Woman of Substance.
Kayla, played by Corinna Brown
.jpeg?trim=63%2C0%2C63%2C0)
Again, we don’t know much about Kayla, but Brown is an actor on the up. She was born in London, and grew up doing dance, at one point performing in variety shows at the Hackney Empire. In 2012, she made her TV debut in the BBC Three film My Murder, opposite John Boyega; in 2020, she graduated from acting school. Since then, she’s been playing Tara Jones, one of the main characters in Netflix show Heartstopper.
Zara, played by Ambreen Razia
.jpeg?trim=63%2C0%2C63%2C0)
Zara is a fellow flight attendant who works with Jo. Razia is an actor and writer. Born in South London to a Pakistani single mother, she took her grandmother’s first name as her surname. In 2015, she wrote and starred in the show The Diary of a Hounslow Girl, which won her best newcomer at the Asian Media Awards. Since then, she’s appeared In shows like Black Mirror, Ted Lasso and Murdered by my Father.
Melanie, played by Bronagh Waugh
While we don’t know much about Melanie, Waugh herself is an actor from Northern Ireland. Carrying on the soap tradition, she is best known for playing Cheryl Brady in Hollyoaks, which she did until 2013 – but has also appeared in shows like The Fall, Unforgotten and Strike.
In Flight is streaming on Channel 4 from August 12
