‘I’m so proud to come from Hackney, on a council estate, and just the mad diversity of who inspired me’
Idris Elba tells Georgia Humphreys about his semi-autobiographical show, In The Long Run, the importance of community and the future of Luther
Being on set for In The Long Run is like a time capsule for Idris Elba. The charismatic star, 47, created the Sky One comedy, which is loosely based on his own childhood and vividly and colourfully transports us back to 1980s London.
He also stars in the show – which is back for a third series – as factory worker Walter Easmon. The character is based on his dad, Winston, who died from lung cancer in 2013.
And he recollects moments during filming when “I might sit on the sofa for five minutes, and just look around and go, ‘Wow, this really was my life’.”
His mum, Eve, is an avid fan of In The Long Run, he adds fondly.
“I bought mum an ipad for her birthday recently, and she’s not tech-savvy whatsoever, but as one of the things to help her learn, I had all the episodes of season three sent to her as a special preview.
“After a week she calls me and goes, ‘It’s great, but how do you turn the volume up on the ipad?’” He chuckles. “She worked it out in the end.”
As for the rest of the family, they’ve seen “bits and pieces” of the show.
“My uncle [who Valentine, played by Jimmy Akingbola, is based on] has not. He has not talked to me about it or him or the show; I’m sort of dreading having that conversation because he’s going to be like ‘That’s not me! You missed that part!’” he quips.
Elba, who married his third wife Sabrina Dhowre in 2019, is also a musician. He began his career as a DJ long before he hit our screens, and has performed at festivals such as Glastonbury.
His most memorable TV roles are Stringer Bell in HBO’S The Wire and, of course, the titular character in hit BBC series Luther (which, he teases excitedly, they are “close” to making into a film in the future).
As for the silver screen, he played a villain in last summer’s Fast And Furious sequel Hobbs And Shaw, plus in 2018 he made his directorial debut with feature Yardie.
But In The Long Run must surely feel like a very different kind of project, as it’s so personal.
“I didn’t set out to do a comedy, I set out to tell a story of a portion of my life which, when I look back, I laugh my head off, about people that I met, people that inspired me, the area we grew up in,” he notes.
“I’m so proud to come from Hackney, on a council estate, and just the mad diversity of who inspired me as a kid.”
He says the show wasn’t designed to poke fun at anything – and “there were some really dark memories of that time as well”, he confides – but the idea is to “tell the story, but look at the lighter side of it”.
One storyline in series three sees Walter’s wife Agnes (Madeline Appiah) get suspicious about developers taking an interest in the Eastbridge Estate where they live with their son Kobna (Sammy Kamara), which would threaten the existence of their community.
And the possibility of his home being demolished is something Elba can remember happening himself.
“I left Hackney, the Holly Street estate, in the 80s, and the estate has been knocked down since – apart from one tower that’s still there,” recalls the actor, who has two children from previous relationships – 18-year-old Isan, and six-yearold Winston.
“But the talks of it being knocked down echoed way, way before.”
His parents wanted to buy a property, and decided to move to Canning Town, he adds. But he recalls a crucial time of living in the Holly Street estate was when “everyone was thinking about, ‘Are they going to knock down our building? What does that mean? Can we buy it? If we buy it, does it save it?’”
The new episodes also see the welcome arrival of Walter’s Mama [Ellen Thomas], from Sierra Leone (Elba’s father’s native country) – and Walter is desperate to impress her.
Meanwhile, Bagpipes (Bill Bailey) has a near-death experience that makes him question the meaning of life, Valentine finally finds love and Kirsty (Kellie Shirley) sets up her own catering business.
What’s really notable about the heart-warming In The Long Run is how themes of family and community underpin the series.
Over the last few months – during lockdown measures enforced because of the Covid-19 pandemic – does Elba think we’ve got a bit of that sense of community spirit from the 80s back?
“Yes, 100 per cent. I think just because the nature of being locked down in to your home, you start to become aware of what’s around you, who’s around you. You’re suddenly
“I didn’t set out tod o a comedy, I set out to tell a story of a portion of my life”