The Scotsman

‘My 12-year-old nephew was a massive part of me taking the job on’

Line Of Duty star Vicky Mcclure tells Georgia Humphreys about her role in Amazon teen drama Alex Rider

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Vicky Mcclure admits that, when she got the call about new Amazon Prime series Alex Rider, she’d never heard of the eponymous character before.

Originally created by British novelist Anthony Horowitz, Alex is an ordinary teenage boy who is unwittingl­y dragged into the dangerous and morally compromise­d world of internatio­nal espionage.

The Nottingham-born star, 37, decided to ask her 12-yearold nephew if he knew about it.

“I basically got the response of, ‘Yeah, ‘course I know Alex Rider,’” she recalls, chuckling.

“So, I felt very uncool. And then felt, ‘Well, how cool would it be if I was in it?’ He was a massive part of me taking the job on, because a lot of my work is quite adultbased drama, so people like my nephews can’t even watch it.

“And then, when I read the script, I just went, ‘Absolutely’. It was jam-packed full of loads of different characters, action, genuine emotions and relationsh­ips.”

In the eight-part series, which has been adapted from the books by screenwrit­er Guy Burt, Mcclure – known for shows such as Line Of Duty and This Is England – plays Mrs Jones, the deputy head of MI6, who becomes Alex’s profession­al guardian.

Otto Farrant, 23, takes on the role of the protagonis­t who, after discoverin­g his uncle and guardian, Ian, was an agent for the British Secret Service and died at the hands of an unknown assassin, realises everything he’s been told about his past is a lie.

Blackmaile­d into working for the Department, Alex is given a cover identity as the son of a billionair­e and thrust into the terrifying world of Point Blanc Academy – a school for off-the-rails teenagers located in the remote French Alps.

“I read the books when I was a kid,” says Farrant, who has starred in BBC dramas Mrs Wilson and War And Peace.

“I loved Alex Rider, because he’s such a relatable character in that he is just a normal kid who is thrown into this world of espionage and has to adapt super-quickly, and I really admired that and looked up to that. So, I guess that was appealing to me to want to play.”

Part of the appeal of the series for Mcclure was that Mrs Jones is such a strong female character.

Indeed, Burt wanted the series to appeal more to young women; in a recent interview with Radiotimes. com he revealed that he only agreed to the project on the “condition” that another female character was added.

It’s empowering to see female characters who aren’t just on screen as love interests, and Mcclure affirms this is something she has noticed happening more as her career has gone on.

“I have been very, very lucky – I’m really aware of that – but it’s been nice not

“It’s been nice not to continuall­y play the love interest”

to continuall­y play the love interest, or the sort of obvious roles,” she notes.

“I think, if you look at television now, the majority of some of our biggest shows we’ve had, they’ve had female leads and they’ve carried the show, and long may it continue.”

As the biggest job he has had yet, what did Farrant find was the most challengin­g moment during filming?

“I just had to have stamina. The director said to me at the beginning of this, ‘This is a marathon, it’s not a sprint’ and that was very clear to me after two weeks.

“I found learning certain fight sequences quite hard because I’m actually not that co-ordinated,” he adds.

“I’d be a really bad spy in real life. I’m terrible at keeping secrets.”

I suggest he should turn to Mcclure for advice on keeping secrets. As one of the main stars of the twisty Line Of Duty – one of the BBC’S biggest shows – she has to deal with constant questions about fan theories and what writer Jed Mercurio has in store (particular­ly when it comes to the identity of ‘H’).

She laughs at this. “You just keep your mouth shut.”

While the UK has been in lockdown during the Covid-19 pandemic, there have been a couple of short videos written by Mercurio – starring Mcclure, and her Line Of Duty co-stars Martin Compston and Adrian Dunbar – shared on Twitter.

The idea of the sketches was to raise money for charity Asks For Masks, whose aim is to get PPE to people working on the front line, and the actress says: “It’s been nice to go to work, for all of a minute.

“It’s great that we’re doing it for a great cause, but when Jed sends through a sort-of mini script of Line Of Duty in lockdown and it says, ‘Vicky wears a onesie’, who am I to complain?” laughs Mcclure.

Filming of series six of the police drama was halted back in March, because of the coronaviru­s outbreak.

And Mcclure hasn’t heard anything yet about when they might return to set.

“There will be a lot they need to work out before we can get back to work, so, we will just sit tight.”

● Alex Rider launches on Amazon Prime Video tonight

 ??  ?? 0 Vicky Mcclure as Mrs Jones with Otto Farrant as Alex in Alex Rider, based on the teen spy created by Anthony Horowitz
0 Vicky Mcclure as Mrs Jones with Otto Farrant as Alex in Alex Rider, based on the teen spy created by Anthony Horowitz

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