Dark night soul of the
Vicky McClure stars in this eerie drama as a woman plagued by sleeplessness, echoing her mother’s own struggles
For Vicky McClure, catching Line Of Duty’s bent coppers and defusing bombs as Trigger Point’s Lana Washington is all in a day’s work. So for her latest role, she is stepping outside of her comfort zone – by playing an office worker. “I wanted to wear five-inch heels,” she laughed. “I said, ‘Give me nails!’ Although it was a pain in the a**e when they said, ‘You’ve got to get your infills done.’ What? I’ve got to keep this up?” But Bafta winner Vicky, 41, doesn’t play your average office worker in Insomnia. In the Paramount+ thriller, she stars as Emma, a lawyer with a stay-at-home husband and two children who is tormented by sleep deprivation as her 40th birthday nears. Terrified that she is becoming like her mother, who suffered a violent psychotic breakdown at the same age, Emma tries to hold her life together while confronting her traumatic past.
“There are a lot of complications that come back to haunt Emma,” Vicky said. “There’s a massive story there and you see, as the series unravels, it just gets worse.”
Vicky was drawn to the role after hitting the same milestone. “I turned 40 last year so I thought, ‘This is for me.’ I like anything that feels relatable and real,” she said. “It goes into ultra realism at times but I could just tell that it was something I haven’t delved into a lot before.”
She was also ready to take a break from prime-time detective dramas. “My agent said, ‘It’s very grown-up,’ and I said, ‘Yeah – I feel like I’ve grown up. I’m 40 now!’” she laughed. “There’s a lot of procedural dramas that I do and I enjoy it. There’s a lot to get out of it but this wasn’t that and I was excited to step into something that felt different.”
Getting Vicky on board was a
dream come true for writer Sarah Pinborough, whose screenplay is based on her book of the same name.
She said: “I thought, ‘Christ – I put her in a pond in the middle of the night!’ But I couldn’t wait to tell people that I had Line Of Duty’s Vicky McClure in my show.”
Starring opposite Vicky is Young Wallander’s Leanne Best as Phoebe – Emma’s distant sister who suddenly re-enters her life and tries to convince her to make up with their estranged mum, who is in a hospital bed.
The sibling dynamic came easily to the pair. “Me and Leanne look so similar, even we could see it,” Vicky said.
“We’ve known each other for quite a bit of time now. “We’ve done I Am Nicola and Line Of Duty, so we had a relationship from the get-go. It was amazing to use that because it’s complicated.”
Thankfully, turning 40 is where Vicky and her character Emma’s similarities end. “I’m very lucky because I have a great relationship with my mother. She’s my everything,” she said.
“I’ve never suffered with insomnia but even just a bad night’s sleep or missing a few hours can take you off kilter – and Emma’s issues are beyond off kilter.”
Vicky had to tackle some heavy scenes as her character displays worrying and sometimes dangerous behaviour while in a trance-like state at night but she is used to it in her line of work.
“Some of the stuff is really dark and you can’t help as an actor to put yourself in their shoes and think how that might feel,” she said. “But I do a lot of dramatic work – I’m drawn to these kinds of roles.”
She thanks Day Fever – the daytime discos she runs with her husband Jonny Owen – for keeping her upbeat when shooting gloomy roles. “God knows why I’m so happy. I’m day dancing at the moment. It’s massive!” she smiled.
Working on a relaxed set also helped. “We had six or seven weeks in the house which became Emma’s family home. The crew would be like, ‘Where’s Vicky? In bed?’ I figured I might as well use the bedroom as my own,” she said. “It felt like a very safe place to get into character.” Despite the intense days of filming, Vicky has no plans to move away from dark dramas.
“I love watching comedy but I like stuff where there’s something I haven’t done before, where I can learn something new,” she said. “I’m in an amazing position and I’m always grateful. Plus, I haven’t used a tear stick yet. I’m just a good crier!”
I was excited to step into something that felt so different