Vicky McClure Battles 'Insomnia' at Paramount+

At this point, just about everyone in the entertainment business knows that Paramount Pictures will not make it out of the streaming wars alive. It's not the first time something like this has happened; the real oldheads remember when RKO Pictures failed to make it when the transition to TV came along, and NBC swallowed them wholesale. However, which suitor (Skydance vs Apollo & Sony) will take over the 112-year-old corporation remains up in the air as of this writing. It's enough to give anyone Insomnia....which is perhaps why, when the Great Paramount+ U.K. Cancelation came along a few months ago, Insomnia was spared the axe.

All joking aside, Insomnia had enough internal power to keep itself chugging along while other projects like Castaways and No Escape were tossed overboard. For one thing, author Sarah Pinborough, whose 2022 novel the series is based on, is part of the production and executive producing. For another, star Vicky McClure (Line of Duty) is also an executive producer, and her company, Build Your Own Productions, signed on to fund the series along with Left Bank. In short, having both the author and star that deep in the show's creation (and putting up the money to make it) made canceling it far too awkward a prospect for Paramount+ to contemplate.

So, while most of the series viewers expected to arrive this spring and summer have gone the way of the dodo, Insomnia is completed and will be out before the end of May 2024. There's even a trailer assuring everyone the show is real and will debut on Paramount+... at least on the U.K. side of the pond.