Colin Firth and Olivia Colman to play married couple in new period drama

Colin Firth and Olivia Colman are set to play a married couple in new period drama Mothering Sunday.

The award-winning duo, who both received Oscars for playing British royals in The King's Speech and The Favourite, respectively, will join up-and-coming actress Odessa Young and The Crown's Josh O'Connor for the new movie, according to Deadline.

Mothering Sunday is an adaptation of Graham Swift's acclaimed novel, and is set over the course of one day in 1924. The story follows Young's character, Jane Fairchild, a maid in the household of Mr and Mrs Niven, played by Firth and Colman, who is given the day off to celebrate the engagement of their neighbour's son Paul, played by O'Connor, who is also her lover.

Filmmaker Eva Husson, who previously helmed Girls of the Sun, will direct the historical drama from a script penned by Succession and Normal People writer Alice Birch.

Discussing the project with Deadline, Husson said that the project was a dream come true.

"It truly felt like the planets aligned when this wonderful screenplay, Mothering Sunday, somehow found its way to me," she shared. "Alice Birch seemed to whisper in my ear, and I felt everything I'd done so far prepared me for this specific story. It was a culmination of all that I am obsessed with in life: writing, sensuality, and pure cinema.

"I finished the script in tears, not from sadness, but because it cracked me open, like the most honest works do."