Sean Bean’s drama paints bleak future

Actor Sean Bean says he is ‘fascinated’ by dystopian stories like his latest drama Curfew.

British actor Sean Bean has made a career out of dying violently on screen.

His best-known characters – Ned Stark in Game Of Thrones, Boromir in Lord Of The Rings, and the Irish republican terrorist Sean Miller in the Jack Ryan movie Patriot Games – all met gory and premature ends.

Now the 60-year-old Yorkshireman is back on the small screen, starring alongside Adam Brody and Billy Zane in the British action drama Curfew, and the big question is will he make it out alive from this one?

In the series, set in a bleak future, the British government, in an attempt to stop the spread of a mysterious and deadly virus, has imposed a strict nightly curfew and the only escape from it involves taking part in an illegal and potentially fatal 1000-kilometre street race that takes place once a year.

Bean’s character Errol Chambers, also known as The General, is one of the competitors and it remains to be seen if Bean can last the distance – or add to his tally of spectacular death scenes.

A renowned criminal, The General has built a life with his girlfriend Faith (Reign’s Rose Williams), supplying an increasingly desperate population with what they need to survive in the world of the curfew. However, Faith is pregnant and he is looking for change.

‘‘I think The General is someone who wants to make a fresh start,’’ Bean says of his character. ‘‘He’s had a lot of tragedy in his life. He’s lost his children and he wants to make a new life with Faith. She’s pregnant and they’re desperate to take this baby to a new place and start a new life.

‘‘I don’t know if it’ll be a straight life, but probably an improvement on his past.’’

However, first they must beat out their equally desperate and determined fellow contestants who also want that one chance to escape totalitarian Britain for a place on an island where scientists are working on a cure for the virus.

The General and Faith’s opponents include ambulance driver Kaye (Phoebe Fox) and her sister Ruby (Aimee-Ffion Edwards), medical facility escapee Michael (Malachi Kirby) and family man Simon Donahue (Adrian Lester).

It appears The General already has history with Michael.

‘‘There’s a kind of animosity, because we arranged to go on a bank robbery together and he let me down,’’ says Bean.

‘‘He comes to me with a proposition and I remind him that I don’t forget things like that, so he’s already got him on the back foot.

‘‘The General’s always pushing for something and is very manipulative and there are these very strange mood changes he has, so it’s like dealing with a caged tiger – you just don’t know what he’s going to do.’’

Bean describes the series as dangerous, exciting and ominous but with a lot of humour.

‘‘It’s something different and I thought it was quite relevant to what’s happening today,’’ he says.

‘‘I wouldn’t say [we’re in] police states, but it’s going in that direction. Things are getting quite militarised in America and you wouldn’t like to think that will happen here [in Britain], but that’s what’s happening in our story.

‘‘I always find those dystopian tales and images quite fascinating – this kind of comparison to 1984 and stuff like that. I’m just fascinated by that darkness – it seems to be a very subterranean society that people are living in.

‘‘There’s no communication, there’s just a darkness and a curfew, but there are these few people who want to get out of it.’’

However, while the series might be dark, Bean had a ball filming, particularly in the race scenes.

‘‘I did quite a bit of stunt driving. I had great instructors, so I was in safe hands,’’ he says.

‘‘They pulled off some amazing stunts, but I got involved a little. I drove the Jag and drove it pretty fast actually. It was fun. It’s a big, muscular machine and you can really throw it around. It needs you to because it’s just a real beast of a car and I really enjoyed that.’’

Curfew, Sky 5, Friday, February 7, 9.30pm.