Across several months in 1973, the Port Talbot area of Wales was shaken by the chilling murders of three young women, who all went missing after going on nights out in the area.

Despite the efforts of the local police force, the killer was never found at the time, leaving the murdered teenagers’ families without the answers they so desperately yearned for.

It wasn’t until the early 2000s, some 30 years after the crimes took place, that the mystery was solved using pioneering DNA evidence. The murderer, Joseph Kappen, was the first person ever to be posthumously identified as a serial killer via familial DNA profiling.

This remarkable true story has been dramatised for gripping BBC One series Steeltown Murders.

Life on Mars’ Philip Glenister and Gavin and Stacey’s Steffan Rhodri lead the cast as the police officers at the heart of the investigation – DCI Paul Bethell and Phil ‘Bach’ Rees – in the noughties timeline, while Scott Arthur and Sion Alun Davies play their younger counterparts in 1973.

Ahead of the series launch, we spoke to Glenister and Rhodri to find out more.

HOW DID YOU APPROACH TELLING THIS TRUE, SENSITIVE STORY ON SCREEN?

SR: In this, certainly the integrity with which the story is told has been crucial, in terms of how it represents the story for the family, knowing that there are family members, obviously, who are going to be very aware that this is going on.

And I think… the story, crucially, is about the diligence of the police work, rather than the heroics.

I mean, it becomes heroic, because of the diligence, if you like, but it’s not swashbuckling police work of, you know, swooping in and glamorous cops saving the day.

WHAT DID YOU KNOW OF THE STORY BEFORE YOU TOOK ON THE ROLE?

SR: I didn’t know anything consciously. I was six years of age in 1973, and the wood where this crime happened was about a mile from where my junior school was.

I didn’t know definitely, but I sort of had a sense, I think… at six you hear adults talking about things.

And certainly after that… life changed, really. Different events change lives in different communities, and this one very much changed Neath, Swansea valleys, Port Talbot – that whole area.

The real Phil and Paul were talking about just obvious changes, like the Kingsway in Swansea, suddenly the police stop booking people for parking outside nightclubs because they knew that parents wanted to be able to pick up their kids who were going to nightclubs.

There must have been such a huge change in people like 10 years older than me, and their behaviour.

PG: I hadn’t heard of it. I was a bit older than Steff, I was ten in ‘73. But because I grew up in London, I didn’t really know much about it.

Although I went on holidays a lot, because we had a lot of relatives in Wales, I don’t remember it ever being talked about.

HOW DID YOU APPROACH PLAYING YOUR REAL LIFE CHARACTERS? DID YOU GET TO MEET THEM?

SR: A lot of it’s just instinctive and unconscious, for me.

And then I met Phil, the real Phil – we’d met Paul as well, but I met Phil separately – and a lot of how I’d decided suddenly changed just by meeting him.

I realised, like, I really knew this guy. I knew so many guys like him that I used to meet growing up. I had a really good chat with him, and I realised that – like I was talking about the diligence – that he was a copper through and through, and he was a really decent, good man.

The integrity of this case really mattered to him, he really wanted to do the best job he could, in a very diligent way, for these families.

For me, meeting him was crucial.

PG: We met Paul before we started filming, over dinner. I didn’t go in armed with a load of questions. I just sort of let us have natural chemistry that came together, you know, between us, and just asked him certain points about the case.

And as Steff was saying, what came across was this dogged determination, you know, to bring some kind of conclusion or some answers for the families and for himself.

 

STEFFAN, THIS SERIES TELLS THE STORY OF AN IMPORTANT BIT OF WELSH HISTORY – USING FAMILIAL DNA PROFILING TO POSTHUMOUSLY IDENTIFY THE KILLER. WHAT DOES IT MEAN TO YOU TO HAVE THAT WELSH HISTORY SPOTLIGHTED?

SR: I always feel very proud when Wales is being a first at anything, and I think absolutely, it’s crucial in this.

I think that comes across. I mean, it’s interesting, because you can’t really go on too much about it in the script. But I think, I hope, it does come across exactly how crucial this was, it’s very difficult to sort of lay it on too thick.

We’re so familiar now… we’re so familiar with watching TV drama, reading news stories and going: ‘Oh, they’ll sort that out with DNA’, you know, but that was not the case.

The whole point of this story is that this was a world first and it’s amazing.

So yeah, absolutely, in that sense, I was very proud.

Steeltown Murders starts on BBC One at 9pm on Monday, May 15.