Starz

Starz to Broadcast ‘The Listeners’ in June

Viewers will finally be able to watch 'The Listeners' in the U.S. in June 2026.

Ani Bundel

08 May 2026 — 3 min read

Rebecca Hall in 'The Listeners' (Starz/BBC)

When the BBC announced a bumper crop of new titles going into production in early 2024, many of those titles took a while to get off the ground. This City Is Ours, for example, didn’t debut until mid-2025, and then took until 2026 to reach the U.S.; Dear England still hasn’t debuted on either side of the pond. But The Listeners wasn’t like that. The series went into production almost immediately, debuted at the 2024 Toronto International Film Festival, and was streaming on the BBC before the year was out.

However, it still took until 2026 for the show to find a home in America, an uncommonly long time in the current streaming era, despite having received critical acclaim upon its debut as an allegory for how our patriarchal society treats women's subjective experiences. (Though, considering the way things went in 2025, that might be exactly why it took so long.) Whatever the reason, Starz announced it was scooping up the rights to it in early February.

Based on a real-life documented phenomenon known as “The Hum,” the limited series stars Rebecca Hall (Dorian Grey) as an English teacher named Claire, who begins to hear a low, humming sound that no one else around her can hear. Tormented by the sound that won’t cease and that no doctors can seem to find a medical reason for, her life begins to unravel. But when she discovers that one of her students can also hear The Hum, they strike up an unlikely friendship that leads them both into a search for answers.

Here’s the miniseries’ synopsis:

Claire hears a sound that neither her husband nor her daughter can hear. This seemingly innocuous hum triggers migraines, nosebleeds, and insomnia, with no obvious source or medical explanation. After weeks of suffering, the strain starts to fracture her relationships with family, friends, and colleagues. When she discovers that one of her students can also hear the hum, the two strike up an unlikely and intimate friendship that gradually transforms into something more extreme, with devastating consequences.

Amir Waked, Rebecca Hall, Gayle Rankin, and Ollie West in 'The Listeners' — Gayle Rankin, Amr Waked, Rebecca Hall, Gayle Rankin, and Ollie West in 'The Listeners' (Starz/BBC)

Alongside Hall, The Listeners stars Prasanna Puwanarajah (The Crown), as Claire’s pragmatic husband, Paul; Mia Tharia (September Says) as Claire’s daughter, Ashley; Gayle Rankin (House of the Dragon) and Amr Waked (Marco Polo) as Jo and Omar, facilitators of a support group for those who hear the Hum; and Ollie West (The Sparrow) as Kyle, a student of Claire’s who also hears the hum.

Jordan Tannahill (Liminal) penned all four episodes, with director Janicza Bravo (The Bear) helming and Ed King producing. Tannahill and Bravo also serve as executive producers, alongside Alice Birch, Ed Guiney, Andrew Lowe, Chelsea Morgan Hoffmann & Rachel Dargavel for Element Pictures, and Rebecca Ferguson for the BBC.