‘I was attracted by someone who is constantly fighting with himself’

Richard Madden and Keeley Hawes talk to Gemma Dunn about their new BBC thriller, Bodyguard

Richard, you play David Budd, a former war hero now working for the Royalty and Specialist Protection branch of London’s Metropolitan Police Service. How much did you know about being a highprofile bodyguard before the series?

Very little; the nature of their job and their character is they give very little away. So I had very little to go on, which was quite interesting, because it gave me a chance to get into the head of him as a husband and a father, and that side of things. With David, it was more about being a soldier who had been through a lot – that’s where I started to build up where he was, as a young man who went to war.

Torn between his duty and his beliefs, he sounds like an intriguing character to play?

I was attracted to the contradictions within this man – a man who deeply cares and wants to protect, but who also has these strong political opinions that get in the way of that. So I was attracted by someone who is constantly fighting with himself, but with this inherent good in him.

David also suffers from PTSD. How did you approach the subject in a responsible way?

Funnily enough, it’s very hard to get people to talk about PTSD, so that was a struggle to begin with. I’ve got a couple of friends who were in the army, and even just to get them to talk about their experiences was very difficult. So we worked together to balance it out, but I think sadly it’s still a very untouched-upon subject for a lot of people.

Keeley, did you take inspiration from any of our female politicians, in order to play Home Secretary Julia Montague?

At the time [of filming], Amber Rudd was Home Secretary, so parallels were always going to be drawn. But I’m not playing Amber Rudd – that wasn’t what we were going to do – but she’s a very good example and she was brilliant for me to research. It’s fascinating,

0 Keeley Hawes and Richard Madden in Bodyguard

actually. It’s changed my ideas of politicians, as silly as that sounds. I ended up listening to a podcast on Radio 4 that Amber Rudd’s sister was giving, and she was talking about Amber’s upbringing – a side we don’t often see when we look at our politicians.

It’s very much a public job these days – but everything is so controlled. Would you agree?

It’s very controlled, and the good ones make it look as though it isn’t controlled at all. It’s really fascinating. I actually went away for a couple of days while we were filming, and I walked out of my hotel room and there was this guy standing there in the corridor and I thought, ‘What the hell is he doing?’ He was a bodyguard! It’s the only time I’ve seen it in my life.

Is that level of protection something you would struggle with?

I don’t know why you would choose it. It’s awful. It’s different for me because I have three children, so I can’t imagine something like that taking over my own life. But yeah, you just give yourself over and I think that would be the only way to deal with

it. You can’t live normally, but at the same time [you’d] be incredibly grateful because you are at risk every day.

Has working on this series made you more sympathetic to those under scrutiny, then?

Yes, I think so. It’s not popular to say that you’re sympathetic to politicians, but I’d like to think that most politicians have gone into those roles because they want to make a difference, and they’re doing what they do for the right reasons, regardless of what we may think of those reasons or their opinions. You can only do that job if you really believe in change.

Line of Duty, The Durrells and now Bodyguard is quite a variety – have things changed for you in terms of the roles you’re being offered?

I’m very lucky that, particularly after Line Of Duty, people, in terms of casting me, have been more imaginative. Maybe they’ve realised that I am willing to go to places that maybe they thought I wouldn’t.

● Bodyguard starts on BBC1 on Sunday at 9pm.