Immersive screening of Northern Star

Immersive screening of Northern Star – Proof of Concept, in collaboration with ABC Buildings, this September

A story remembered, not invented. The estate itself becomes the protagonist, a Manchester council estate childhood brought to the screen through an orchestral, cinematic sound world shaped by house music. Tonally, Northern Star draws on the raw, character-driven grit of Happy Valley and the unruly energy of Shameless, while music runs through the story as its own force, not a soundtrack laid over the top, but something the characters live inside. It's not just a story. It's a world.

An invite-only immersive screening to introduce Northern Star, part of 'The Ashfield Estate' universe, on 16 September at 6:30 PM, in collaboration with ABC Buildings, directed by Darren R L Gordon and produced by Dijon Studios. Presented as a proof-of-concept, the event marks the first public step in bringing the wider series to life, with the ambition of finding partners to help take Northern Star from concept, to full production.

Set in 1999, Northern Star follows Kane, a struggling musician trying to make it in London, who returns to the Manchester council estate he grew up on after learning his father is dying. What begins as a goodbye pulls him back into the world, the people and the music he thought he'd left behind. It is the first chapter of The Ashfield Estate, and in itself, Northern Star will be a six-episode series exploring escapism, identity, and the pull of music against the backdrop of estate life.

Northern Star brings an orchestral, cinematic sound to the screen, threaded with house music. It's a sonic world shaped by Jennings' background as a multi-platinum songwriter, and central to how the series tells its story.

For Lei Jennings, writer and creator of The Ashfield Estate, the series is drawn directly from lived experience:

"This isn't invented. It's remembered. I grew up between different council estates in Manchester, and music was always the way out, the escapism," Writing Northern Star felt like the natural evolution of that. The same way a melody won't leave me alone until I've written it down or recorded it, this story wouldn't leave me alone until I made it. It's not just a story. It's a world."

Jennings describes the series as a natural extension of a career built on storytelling through music, trading melody for narrative but drawing from the same well of memory and place.

The 16 September screening at ABC Buildings will offer an early, intimate look at Northern Star as Jennings and the team seek partners to develop it further.

RSVP using the link below. If you’re in the TV & Film industry, please select the 6:30pm screening.