'Dope Girls' Will Arrive on Hulu This July

Part of the fun (or frustration, depending on your perspective) of being a lover of British television and entertainment who happens to live in the United States is the seemingly endless task of figuring out how you can watch those programs in our country. Good news: So many streamers, networks, and niche online portals are desperate for content that the odds are better than ever that the particular British show you want will come to America somehow. The question is just where and when. Some networks (like PBS) are destinations for British content, and trumpet their acquisitions accordingly. Others simply include British releases among the endless list of titles arriving on their services each month, with some exceptions for co-productions or a buzzy hit that caused a particular stir in the U.K. And still more just drop them at what often feels like random, leaving fans to find out the show they were searching for crossed over on its own. (No, I'm never getting over The Burning Girls just randomly popping up on Roku one day.) But, every so often, the news of a new acquisition arrives, and all you can say is: Finally. 

Hulu has scooped up Dope Girls, a gritty six-part period drama that follows the story of the women who were reluctant to give up the self-sufficiency (and earning potential) they'd gained during the years of World War I. (If you're thinking this show has pseudo-feminist Peaky Blinders vibes, you're not wrong.) Inspired by Marek Kohn’s nonfiction book Dope Girls: The Birth of the British Drug Underground, the series follows two very different women seemingly destined to clash with one another: Kate Gallaway (Julianne Nicholson), a single mother who turns tor running a nightclub in the hopes of supporting her daughter, and Violet Davies (Eliza Scanlen), part of the first wave of female officers to join the Metropolitan Police.

Here's the series synopsis. 

It is the end of World War One. As Britain celebrates the Armistice on the streets of London, men return from the front expecting to rejoin society and pick up where they left off - but a newly empowered generation of women are loath to simply return to the kitchen.

Using Soho’s expanding illicit underground clubland scene as their playground, women explore previously unimaginable opportunities on either side of the law.

Alongside Nicholson and Scanlen, the series also stars features Umi Myers (Bob Marley: One Love) as Billie Cassidy, Geraldine James (Silo) as Isabella, Rory Fleck Byrne (This is Going to Hurt) as Luca Salucci, Dustin Demri-Burns (Slow Horses) as Damasco Salucci, Eben Figueiredo (The Serial Killer's Wife) as Matteo Rossi Salucci, and Sebastian Croft (Heartstopper). 

Other notable cast members include Michael Duke (Get Up Stand Up), Ian Bonar (I May Destroy You), Laura Checkley (Detectorists), Will Keen (His Dark Materials), Fiona Button (The Split), Harry Cadby (Everything Now), Nabhaan Rizwan (Kaos), Riya Kansara (Polite Society), and Jordan Kouame (Wolf Hall: The Mirror and the Light). 

Dope Girls is created by Polly Stenham (The Neon Demon) and Alex Warren (Eleanor), who also serve as lead writers. They're joined by Matthew Barry (Industry), Matthew Jacobs Morgan (The Rig), and Xiao Tang (You Killed My Robot). Shannon Murphy (Killing Eve) is the lead director with Miranda Bowen (Women in Love) also helming episodes.

Stenham, Warren, and Barry are also executive producers, alongside Kate Crowther and Jane Tranter from Bad Wolf, Michael Lesslie for Storyteller Productions, and Rebecca Ferguson for the BBC.

All six episodes of Dope Girls will premiere on Hulu on Monday, July 28.