Cover story
New mystery thriller The Deceived, starring Emmett J Scanlan, Emily Reid and Normal People’s Paul Mescal
The Deceived
Monday-thursday, Channel 5 HD, 9pm
LISA MCGEE IS best known as the creator of hit C4 sitcom Derry Girls, but there’s a much darker tone to her latest project, the four-part psychological thriller The Deceived.
The Channel 5 drama, being shown across consecutive nights this week, begins as English student Ophelia Marsh (Emily Reid) embarks on an affair with her charismatic professor Dr Michael Callaghan (Emmett J Scanlan), who is married to Roisin Mulvery (Catherine Walker), a famous author.
‘Michael is an English professor at Cambridge and a wannabe novelist – but it is his beautiful wife who has become a very successful author,’ explains Peaky Blinders star Scanlan. ‘Michael finds that challenging to live with, and doesn’t like playing second fiddle to anyone.
‘He has affairs with his students and plays on people’s vulnerabilities. He drops hints to Ophelia that he’s unhappy, and that she’s the only woman he cares about. He’s jealous of the attention that Roisin has earned over the years – and his jealousy manifests in destructive ways.’
When Michael goes missing without warning, Ophelia tracks him down to his home town in Ireland, where she discovers Roisin has recently died in a fire – just after Michael told her about their affair.
As Ophelia takes up residence at Michael’s sprawling family home, she meets rugged local builder Sean (Normal People’s
Paul Mescal) and Roisin’s suspicious mother Mary (Eleanor Methven), who is aghast to find Ophelia wearing Roisin’s clothes.
As she stays with Michael in his house, Ophelia begins to feel increasingly uneasy. At night she’s plagued by unexplained noises and strange sights. Is her mind playing tricks on her – or are there malevolent forces at work?
MENTAL TORMENT
‘It’s so upsetting what happens – Ophelia is so strong, but she becomes diminished by the situation she finds herself in,’ says Reid, who recently starred in ITV dramas Belgravia and The Trouble with Maggie Cole. ‘She is incredibly clever in quite an analytical way. She’s a very rational person – so as the story unfolds, it becomes increasingly terrifying for her when she begins to question her own rationality.’
At night, Ophelia hears a strange knocking coming from behind a locked door to a mysterious room – which later turns out to be Roisin’s study. On Roisin’s computer, Ophelia discovers emails from someone called Ruth (Shelley Conn). But who is Ruth and what is her connection to Michael and Roisin?
‘Her love for Michael takes her to a scary place psychologically, and soon the world she inhabits starts to become very dangerous,’ says Reid, 22. ‘Everything is a bit uncanny. You can never quite pinpoint what is wrong but there is constantly something that is not quite right.’
As Ophelia gets drawn into the disturbing mystery, the house’s oppressive atmosphere takes its toll on her mental well-being.
‘The house where we did the majority of the filming was the strangest, kookiest little place,’ reveals Reid. ‘I don’t think the set designers really had to do anything apart from bring in a couple of props. I certainly didn’t go up to the top floor on my own. There were definitely some strange energies in that house – which was great, because you didn’t really have to do anything imaginatively as an actor. It was all done for you.’
CLASSIC INSPIRATION
Mcgee and her co-writer, Tobias Beer, are married, and the pair drew on their shared love of classic Hollywood thrillers for their inspiration.
‘When we first met, we realised we both loved watching old Hitchcock films,’ says Beer. ‘Dial M for Murder is our favourite and we watch it every Christmas, but there are lots of others that we love. When it came to writing
The Deceived, Alfred Hitchcock’s 1940 film Rebecca was a big influence on the story. We were interested in seeing whether we could write something that was modern in its setting but which had a period feel to it.’
Working on a psychological thriller inevitably meant long days of intense emotions for the cast, but Scanlan, 41, reveals the actors did let their hair down once in a while.
‘I always have a music playlist for every character I play,’ he reveals. ‘Myself and Dempsey Bovell [who plays Michael’s friend Matthew] had a scene together, and I accidentally pressed shuffle on my list as everybody was setting up. Suddenly, She Drives Me Crazy by the Fine Young Cannibals started to blare out. It’s impossible to listen to that and not dance, so myself and Dempsey just started dancing around. In fact, I’d like to take this opportunity to apologise to all the crew who had to watch it!’