From Crimea with Love

‘A revealing account of the tricky reality behind TV’s glamorous image’ Daily Mail

In the summer of 1992, Jason Salkey was cast in a role that would change his life forever. Sharpe’s Rifles, a Napoleonic war drama, was to be shot in the Crimean Peninsula. Little did the producers know that they would be sending Jason and the crew to film in a rapidly disintegrating Soviet Union. There they faced near-starvation and danger round every corner as they set about creating one of Britain’s most successful and critically acclaimed television programmes. From Crimea with Love documents the mishaps, blunders, incompetence and downright corruption that made Sharpe’s Rifles go down in British television folklore for its unique tales of hardship. Follow the cast through intense depravation and constant catastrophe until they become every bit the jaded, battle-hardened soldiers we saw on screen. Tapping into his diaries, photo journals and video log, Jason brings you an eye-opening, jaw-dropping insider’s account of one of the best-loved shows ever made.

Author Biography

Jason is a British actor, a regular on screens, big and small, over thirty years. His debut job was a huge commercial campaign for Miller Lite beer UK that made his face instantly recognisable across Britain. In 1992 he landed the part of Rifleman Harris in a drama based on Bernard Cornwell’s Sharpe novels, a show that lasted five seasons and was eventually screened across the globe. Sharpe started out filming in the chaos caused by the newly broken-up Soviet Union prompting Jason to maintain a diary which has formed the basis of his Sharpe memoir, From Crimea With Love.