Daily Mail - Daily Mail Weekend Magazine
Hurrah for beıge people
He’s made a career out of playing the overlooked, now Mcdonald & Dodds star Jason Watkins is hoping Hollywood will come calling...
Eventually, someone always asks actor Jason Watkins to walk on his hands. He’s been doing it since he was nine and he once came close to breaking the world record for distance covered.
Jaws drop, and not just because he’s quite nimble for a 54-year-old. Sometimes they drop because of what he’s wearing when he springs into position. ‘I did it on the set of The Crown while dressed as Harold Wilson,’ he says. ‘It did get a laugh.’ If the stage and TV work dries up, who knows when the skill might come in handy? ‘There could be a circus out there,’ he agrees.
His flexibility extends to his acting. He admits he’s made a career out of playing oddballs. He’s wowed in serious dramas like The Lost Honour Of Christopher Jefferies (for which he won a BAFTA), but also in comedies like W1A and Trollied. It takes versatility to be cast both as a vampire leader in Being Human and as Mr Humphries in the BBC revival of Are You Being Served?. ‘And in lockdown people are discovering things in box sets that I’ve been in previously, which is quite nice,’ he says.
He’s just returned to our screens in the second series of hit ITV detective drama Mcdonald & Dodds, which pairs the go-getting young DCI Mcdonald (played by Cold Feet’s Tala Gouveia) with Jason’s nerdy, oddly precise DS Dodds. On the surface Dodds is ‘bland, beige, middle-aged’, yet he has ‘a presence’, says Jason. ‘He’s one of those people who’s easily overlooked, but he’s actually rather good at what he does.’
Hurrah for the beige people then. Jason finds them appealing to play. ‘Dodds is gentle, subtle and effective. He’ll get to the finishing line,’ he says.
There are parallels with his own life. In his twenties Jason was told he wasn’t leading man material
(‘Well, look at me. I’m not Brad Pitt,’ he says) and that success, if it came, probably wouldn’t happen until he was 40.
And so it came about. He nearly gave up and had to be financially supported by his wife Clara. He even joined her working in her jewellery business for a while. ‘And I’ve never forgotten it,’ he says. ‘I’m doing OK today, but it took a long time to build that. As a character actor it takes a while to even get in the room.’
He’s not only in the room now, but choosing the furnishings. He says he’d like to give Hollywood a whirl. ‘I’m not going to be cast as a superhero, but I could play a villain. It would be a challenge. Some of the stuff coming out there is brilliant, and it has mass appeal, which is what we all want. We want our work to be seen.’
Ten years ago he would not have been making these sorts of decisions because his career took a back seat to his home life – which
pretty much imploded overnight when he and Clara lost their daughter Maude to sepsis. ‘Maudie’, as he calls her, died on New Year’s Day 2011, aged two, after developing a cough. Even after repeated visits to the doctor and A&E, they were wrongly told that Maude just had croup. She died in the night, bringing their world crashing down.
Jason and Clara’s way of dealing with their seismic loss has been extraordinary. They’ve campaigned endlessly for charity and privately counselled other bereaved families. Jason dedicated his BAFTA to Maude, and the film Nativity 2 ended with a moving credit to her.
They have two children now – Bessie, Maude’s older sister, 13, and Gilbert, nine, who turned out to be a balm to their grief. Clara insisted she wanted another child soon after losing Maude. ‘It was primal. Clara wanted another child not as a replacement, but because she didn’t want to be cheated by life. It was a way of re-establishing her role as a mother.’
He chats about the strains of parenting in this pandemic, and the pride – and terror – of discovering your kids are just like you. ‘Gilbert sits gazing out of the window when he’s supposed to be working and I think,
“That’s how I was.” How can you criticise your children for being the way you were?’
The bigger question is how can you have a normal family life when you’ve been through the worst? ‘It was very hard early on,’ he admits. ‘Because Maude died in the night we didn’t sleep as we were always worried. But it does ease. Children don’t let you stay in that place. They’re wiser than you think, and have their own needs. What I say to any parent now is enjoy your children. Don’t expect too much of them, or yourself. Some of the nicest times are spent just hanging out with them. Just mess about!’ n
Mcdonald & Dodds, tomorrow, 8pm, ITV.