MYSTERY STOREYS
Game of Thrones star Gemma Whelan is now hitting the heights with new crime drama The Tower that sees her playing a detective investigating two suspicious deaths at a high-rise tower block. JANE HAASE learns more
FROM fantasy to period drama, Gemma Whelan has become a familiar face on our TV screens appearing in shows as varied as Game of Thrones, Gentleman Jack, and Upstart Crow.
Now she takes the lead role in new crime drama The Tower as Detective Sergeant Sarah Collins.
The script was adapted by Homeland writer and executive producer Patrick Harbinson from the novels by Kate London, a former Met Police Officer.
Waterloo Road’s Tahirah Sharif plays Lizzie Adama, the rookie foil to Gemma’s experienced officer, and the actress says viewers will be “dripfed” aspects of her life as she has to deal with making some of the most difficult decisions she’s ever faced.
The series kicks off in jaw-dropping fashion, as a veteran beat cop and a teenage girl fall to their deaths from a tower block in south-east London.
Left alive on the roof of the building are a fiveyear-old boy and newbie police officer Lizzie Adama. However, within hours, she has disappeared and DS Sarah Collins is charged with leading the investigation.
She not only has to track down Lizzie before she comes to serious harm, but also to uncover the truth behind the grisly deaths.
There are difficult questions to answer too: what chain of events took two police officers and two children to the roof of that tower block – why did two of them die and why did two of them survive?
The cracking cast also includes Emmett J Scanlan and Jimmy Akingbola, and the show runs for three consecutive nights.
Here Gemma, 40, sheds some light on the drama and how it feels to be taking the lead.
How does Sarah react when she gets the call to go to Portland Tower?
She’s an everyday detective. Nothing like this has ever happened on her watch before, so this is a shock to her. We find her on an average day and then things change quite dramatically.
What has been Sarah’s career path through the force?
I think she is very, very good at her job and very, very dedicated to her moral compass, which is absolutely dead straight. I would say she has climbed well and that she is well liked.
What did you already know about being a detective sergeant?
Not a lot actually. I spoke to Kate London at length about it and there was a detective on set we could talk to. We also had quite a lot of extras who were exdetectives, ex-police and ex-paramedics so they had seen it all. It was really great to nibble their minds and ask the questions that we all want to ask about their job and what they’ve seen and how they behave.
For instance, I didn’t know what happens when you take a forensic suit off so we were doing something slightly wrong. One of the coppers said, ‘We wouldn’t have done that. It would have gone straight into the evidence bag.’
Did you talk to Kate London about how she was able to compartmentalise her emotions in the job?
Yes I spoke to her and to several people about how you put that away and go home and have a normal life. Some of the detectives on set were talking about having to do a death call, when you have to speak to a family and report a death.
The typical answer is that you get hardened to it but also there are people you can debrief with and talk to. There is support, so that you don’t take the job home with you.
Do you like wearing Sarah’s hopefully-soon-to-be iconic orange coat?
That’s thanks to costume designer Georgina Napier, who worked with Jim Loach on Save Me Too. I don’t think they are going to be vastly upset if it doesn’t turn iconic, I just think they wanted to be able to find Sarah in a crowd.
That was the thought behind it. There was also a no blue rule. No one is in blue at all in the whole thing. It’s just stepping away from some of the typical police choices you might make for a drama.
I have certainly learned from Suranne...how hard she works and the dedication she brings, how disciplined she is. On her Gentleman Jack co-star Suranne Jones
Are there things that you’ve learned from working with actors like Suranne Jones on Gentleman Jack about how to lead a show?
Yes, I have certainly learned from Suranne. She’s got so much dialogue to learn on Gentleman Jack. When I was learning all the lines I started very early and I thought of her a lot and how hard she works and the dedication she brings, how disciplined she is. It put me in good stead. I needed to turn up and know it and bring my game.
Suranne’s ethos certainly bled into what I was doing.
Writer and executive producer Patrick Harbinson rates you with Claire Danes as the very best he’s worked with: ‘A class act: prepared, kind and generous.’
Oh wow, that’s very, very nice. That makes me a bit emotional.
■ The Tower starts on Monday, ITV, 9pm