Dirty Business Channel 4 unveils 10-metre 'Fountain of Filth' as water-scandal drama begins
Channel 4 has rolled out a provocative public installation to promote dirty business channel 4 as the three-night drama debuts, placing a 10-metre-wide fountain on London’s South Bank to highlight the human cost of Britain’s sewage scandal. The stunt accompanies a factual drama based on a decade-long investigation into England’s water companies and a cast led by David Thewlis.
Dirty Business Channel 4: The Fountain of Filth on South Bank
The broadcaster’s in-house agency 4Creative partnered with Glue Society and Biscuit Filmworks to create The Fountain of Filth, installed at Observation Point from 23–25 February to coincide with the series’ run. The public display features bronze-like statues of men, women and children appearing to vomit murky brown water, and a suited business executive at the top with pockets and a briefcase brimming with cash as a symbolic reference to alleged water company failings.
The fountain is 10 metres wide and open to the public; a plaque with a QR code directs visitors to specially commissioned interview films where people who believe they were made ill by sewage-polluted waterways recount their experiences. The activation is part of a wider national campaign that includes ad vans bearing messages such as ‘Get Ready for Their Close Up’ outside some water company headquarters and vans asking ‘Would You Swim Here?’ at affected beaches. Channel 4’s marketing team said the campaign puts the human cost at the forefront.
Ashley Smith and Peter Hammond's River Windrush inquiry
The drama interweaves multiple real-life strands. In one timeline set in the Cotswolds in 2016, neighbours recently retired spot brown murk in the River Windrush and begin their own investigation. Ashley Smith, played by David Thewlis, is portrayed as a former “Line of Duty” cop who previously investigated corrupt officers. His neighbour Peter Hammond, played by Jason Watkins, is an Oxford maths professor who devises an algorithm to spot patterns in confusing data.
The two men reject the water company’s explanation for the pollution and combine Ash’s instinct for dishonesty with Peter’s data work to build a wider picture of damaged infrastructure. The drama claims three decades of underinvestment left networks degraded; that neglect, the narrative shows, contributed to environmental calamity on a national scale with thousands of instances of rivers and seas tainted by untreated sewage. Real footage shot by campaigners is woven into the drama to illustrate the extent of the damage.
The Preens, Dawlish and the E. coli tragedy
A secondary timeline begins in 1999 with Mark and Julie Preen, played by Tom McKay and Posy Sterling, who take their two daughters to Dawlish in Devon because the beach had Blue Flag status indicating cleanliness. They discover what appears to be effluent discharging from a shore pipe; eight-year-old Heather steps into the contaminated water and within two weeks dies from E. coli O157 poisoning.
The drama follows the aftermath: the cause of the outbreak remains unclear in the provided context and a jury returned a verdict of misadventure. A coroner recommended tertiary treatment of all sewage in the area to render it pathogen-free and suggested a summertime ban on dogs on the beach.
Environment Agency, 'operational self‑monitoring' and three decades of underinvestment
Dirty Business extends its scrutiny beyond companies to the regulator itself. The series depicts failings within the Environment Agency and introduces a third strand located in EA offices in 2008. A policy shift near the end of the Labour administration, later amplified by spending cuts and deregulation in the 2010s, moved the burden of identifying potential breaches of environmental law through “operational self-monitoring, ” a change the drama argues worsened outcomes.
What makes this notable is how the drama ties individual tragedies and citizen investigations to systemic decisions about regulation and investment, suggesting a chain of causation from policy shifts to polluted waterways and public harm.
Cast, production and campaign tactics
The series is produced by Halcyon’s Heart, creators of Partygate, and is based on a decade-long investigation into England’s water companies. Alongside David Thewlis and Jason Watkins, the cast includes Asim Chaudhry, Tom McKay and BAFTA Rising Star Posy Sterling. The marketing push was devised with media partner OMD UK.
Creative directors involved in the campaign framed the fountain as deliberately provocative. David Wigglesworth, Executive Creative Director at 4Creative, said the installation was intended to turn a familiar public fountain into a national talking point. Miketta Lane, Director of 4Creative, said the work aims to make people look closer at what water companies are doing to rivers and seas. Nic Moran, Head of Marketing at the broadcaster, said the campaign makes the sick truth of Britain’s sewage scandal impossible to ignore.
The drama has been called brutal and brilliant by at least one review, and commentators have suggested that, like past television dramas, it could intensify public disgust and exert pressure to change official attitudes. Dirty Business airs on Channel 4 on Monday 23 February at 9pm across three consecutive nights.
