Where was Wreck filmed? How the show brought the cruise ship Sacramentum to life
A guide to the filming locations of BBC Three's Wreck
It is a TV cliché to say that the location feels like a character in the show, but it is nevertheless true about Wreck, the latest comedy-drama from BBC Three.
Wreck is set aboard the Sacramentum, a cruise ship that has everything a VIP guest could want while sailing the seven seas. A pirate-themed bar? There is one on location. A stage where you can watch Velorum’s hottest Cher impersonator? Check. Cabins with stunning ocean views and a crew willing to tend to your every need? All available for the right price.
The setting of the BBC Three show, however, presents a challenge to its makers – how do you find a filming location that can give you every kind of space that the cruise ship has in one place?
The Wreck team, however, found the answer in a shooting location about as far as you could get from a luxury yacht.
Was Wreck filmed on a real cruise ship?
No, it is not – though the show’s makers did consider it, and one of the locations the filming crew used was a real boat.
“There was no cruise ship to actually shoot on,” Wreck director Chris Baugh told BBC Three. “We did try of course, but it’s very difficult to actually bring a film crew onto a working cruise ship, especially during COVID times, which was going on quite prevalently back then.
“So my challenge became how do we create the illusion of a cruise ship without actually going on to a real cruise ship?”
Despite not being able to film on a real cruise ship, the Wreck crew did shoot some exteriors of the side of the ship on the real SS Nomadic, a boat now housed in Belfast that provided support for the doomed HMS Titanic in 1911. Thaddea Graham told said: “The company who built it tried to make it look really glamorous, so we filmed on there for a lot of the deck scenes – that was a real honour.”
Where was Wreck filmed?
The interiors of the Sacramentum, meanwhile, were recreated within a factory in Ballymena, in County Antrim, Northern Ireland that, for nearly 50 years until 2018, had produced tyres.
This building was perfect to bring the cruise ship to life for multiple reasons. First, it was large enough to accommodate the multiple cabins and other rooms that production needed. Second, it had existing architecture that could stand-in for parts of the ship.
As Chris explained: “What was great about it was that it had these other existing spaces – the locker rooms, the canteens, a giant industrial engine room. It had all these other spaces that we could utilise and add to with our art direction and our production design to make it feel like the underbelly of the ship.”
When Wreck writer Ryan J Smith first saw the sets, he was amazed. “We walked into this factory and it was genuinely like walking onto a cruise ship. It was crazy.
“They didn't have a lot of time to build it as well. What they managed to do in such a short space of time was unreal. I spent a lot of time on this set when I was still writing the show. So it was great to be able to explore and hang out in the cabins.”
The level of detail was higher than most viewers will be able to spot in the show. Alice Nokes, who plays Sophia, said: “Each of the cabins had little hidden trinkets related to each character.”
According to director Chris, around 70 percent of what we see in Wreck was filmed in the factory, but a number of other locations were used. For example, Belfast’s Waterfront Hall stood in for the cruise ship’s amphitheatre where we see the Sancramentum performers rehearse.
“For the more lavish upstairs locations,” Chris said, “it was about finding locations around Northern Ireland that were really lush, premium feeling locations where we could add portholes and CGI sky outside and make them feel like part of the ship.
What it was like to film Wreck?
All the cast had one word to describe their experience filming in the factory – cold.
Jamie actor Oscar Kennedy said: “It was really, really cold. It was hard to pretend we were off the coast of Miami and pretend we were warm in bikinis and shorts!”
The temperature meant that the crew had to think of novel solutions to not appear cold on screen. As Thaddea Graham revealed: “You could see our breath sometimes, which is a big problem for VFX [visual effects]. So someone suggested we chew on ice cubes before speaking.”
One performer, however, was thankful for the cold – whoever was in the Quacky suit. Chris said: “it was definitely hot in there, but outside the suit was so cold that hopefully it balanced out a little bit.”
