SIXTY SECONDS
THE TORCHWOOD STAR, 41, ON KEEPING FAITH, JOYRIDING AND HER CHARACTER IN NEW CRIME THRILLER WE HUNT TOGETHER
Wednesday, June 3, 2020
How have you been getting on in lockdown?
Our ten-year-old has got on with what she wants to do but the six-year-old needs a lot more attention. It’s all about normalising the situation, isn’t it? Our biggest job is keeping spirits up and if we’re happy, the kids are going to be happy. But it’s a marathon, not a sprint. Literally for me, because I need to get a run in every day – that’s where I get my thoughts together.
You also tweeted ‘fish pie… red velvet cake… vodka tonic… 90s tunes… hot bath…’
That’s the title of my autobiography! All of those things together – heaven.
Who is DS Lola Franks, your character in We Hunt Together?
She’s difficult. Very complex, with a deep, dark, damaging . secret that has shaped and broken her. She’s a recluse who struggles with life and herself but she’s also very dry. She wants to be disliked, so she doesn’t have to have any relationship with anyone, but I was drawn to how inappropriate she was because of that.
Is it hard to play the darkness?
It’s like home schooling – OK for a day or so, then you’ve really got to put the graft in! It’s easy to feel quite low playing someone like Lola but you’ve got to leave it at work. I was very fortunate to have Babou Ceesay as my co-star – a beautiful man and funny beyond belief. It was one of my happiest jobs.
At least Lola’s got a nice motor.
Don’t even start on that Ford. I’m not a confident person but I will say I can get into any car and drive it. I was driving from an age I shouldn’t have been driving but this car was sent to challenge me. When Lola’s being angry with her car, that’s not acting: you had to be double-jointed to change gear and it still didn’t make any difference.
You spent some time with murder detectives as research.
Yes – they didn’t go into specific detail but it was helpful to run things past them: etiquette, what I’d wear to tell somebody their partner’s been killed, whether you keep a poker face during interviews. Just things to fill up my bag of acting tools.
Did they approve of Lola’s knitwear?
It’s all about how she presents herself. Lola doesn’t want attention, she wants to look frumpy, almost like a ghost. The cardies and jumpers had their own pet names. One cardigan that had buttons missing and was too small was called Zsa Zsa Golightly.
What can you say about series three of Keeping Faith?
That we’ve stopped. We started in January and only had six weeks of filming left. I have a sense of grief because what’s in the can is everything we’d hoped for and it’s the final series so we’ve gone all-out. All we can do is sit and wait but that show is my priority – it came at a time when I needed to challenge myself and prove to myself I was still doing the right thing.
How do you account for the show’s success?
Good story and characters. We wanted to tell a story so real that you felt like you were observing somebody’s life. We didn’t shy away from anything – if it ever looked like a drama, we’d stop shooting. So plucking out a tone that was difficult to fulfil, then fulfilling it.
John Barrowman.
How tough was it acting opposite your husband, Bradley Freegard, when he’s playing such a schmuck?
Easy, because he’s one of the kindest people you could meet. Heads turn when he walks into rooms because he’s a big guy but he’s a gentle giant, really.
If Brad was anything like Evan, he’d have been kicked out the door within a month!
If I wasn’t an actor, I might be in prison for joyriding
What would you have been if you weren’t an actor?
In prison for joyriding? My dad has diabetes so let’s say he prepped me very young to be able to help out if there was a situation. If that meant a car, it meant a car… I am fascinated with medicine – I’d signed up for a midwifery course before Keeping Faith came along – so the older I got, I think I would have ended up in that field.
John Barrowman’s appearance in Doctor Who excited a lot of chatter about Torchwood coming back.
I know. That chapter will never be closed for me, it was the chapter that started the book. When Russell [T Davies] calls, I’ll always say yes. He’s a friend and it’s nice to work on a happy ship. We check in with each other every couple of weeks. That show had a chemistry that worked.
What ambitions do you have left?
My next goal is writing. I started my production company, Empty Room Productions, last year and it’s going well. I’ve gone to script with a channel on one of my ideas and there are three other things I’ve written so it’s about placing them. Russell has been incredibly helpful with advice.
We Hunt Together is on Wednesdays at 10pm on Alibi. For TV To Go see page 19