A “brutal” new Channel 4 drama is set to leave viewers gripped. Five years after the success of It’s A Sin, award-winning screenwriter Russell T Davies returns to Channel 4 to explore the most corrosive forces facing the LGBTQ+ community today.

First Images Of Channel 4 Drama 'Tip Toe' From Russell T Davies

Five-part series Tip Toe will examine the danger as prejudice creeps back into our lives. The drama follows bar owner Leo (Alan Cumming) and electrician Clive (David Morrissey), who live next door to each other in Manchester.

“Just as life should be settling down, the world around them is growing more tense. Words become weapons, opinions become radicalised, and gradually, two neighbours become deadly enemies in a tense, suburban thriller which challenges everything we consider to be safe,” reads the official synopsis.

“The series, populated with a cast of vibrant characters and underscored with Davies’ trademark wit and deft humour, is an urgent yet gripping tale that brings a spotlight to bear on the re-emergence of an incipient threat.”

Lead stars and former neighbours Alan Cumming and David Morrissey appeared on ITV’s This Morning on Monday (May 18), where they spoke to hosts Cat Deeley and Ben Shephard about the importance of the series.

Cat began: “If you’ve got your eye on the next new binge-worthy series, look no further. Actors Alan Cumming and David Morrissey are starring in a new thriller set in a quiet Manchester suburb, where tensions between two neighbours take a very dark turn.”

After watching the show’s tense trailer, Alan said: “I find it so overwhelming and brutal. It’s a tough watch.” He added: “It’s a story about two neighbours that goes haywire, but it’s about the way that violence and hatred are sort of normalised so much in our culture nowadays. It’s hopefully a wake-up call for everybody.”

Cat went on: “One of the things that was so interesting to me was it started and then the layers of the onion were peeled back, and just how dark Clive got.”

David then explained: “Russell plays with the timeframe brilliantly, so you feel that you know where you are in the story, you feel you know these characters and what’s going to happen. And then he’ll suddenly take you back a few days, take you back a year or whatever, and you see a different part of it. It’s about those assumptions.”

This Morning

Alan Cumming and David Morrissey appeared on This Morning (Image: ITV)

David also revealed that his 40-year friendship with Alan “really helped” while filming the more difficult scenes.

25 years later, the team behind the ground-breaking Queer as Folk are returning to Manchester and Canal Street with this vital story that speaks not just to the queer community, but to the world today.

Russel T Davies previously said in a statement: “It’s my honour to combine my old home, Channel 4, with my second home, Canal Street. This is a show I had to write because the world is getting stranger, tougher and darker, and frankly, the fight is on.”