Mrs Wilson
Keeley Hawes on her mysterious role in spy thriller Mrs Wilson
TUESDAY / BBC1
Keeley Hawes shines as mysterious Dorothy in this extraordinary true spy story based on Luther star Ruth Wilson’s grandmother, Alison, who discovered her husband was a bigamist. We visit Keeley during filming to find out more about her role…
Mrs Wilson TUESDAY / BBC1 / 9Pm
By anyone’s standards, it’s been a momentous year for Keeley Hawes. After proving her remarkable versatility again with a stellar turn as manipulative but ill-fated Home Secretary Julia Montague in BBC1’S hit thriller Bodyguard, she’s about to finish filming on the final series of ITV’S The Durrells, in which she plays kindly matriarch Louisa Durrell.
On top of that, Keeley has also shot two period thrillers – C4’s Traitors, set in the aftermath of World War Two, and BBC2’S Cold War drama Summer of Rockets – both set to air next year.
Before that, though, the busy star is currently appearing in a different, but equally challenging, role in BBC1 period drama Mrs Wilson. The three-parter stars Luther’s Ruth Wilson as her own grandmother Alison, who in last week’s opening episode discovered that her husband, Alec (Iain Glen), was a bigamist.
Keeley plays mysterious Dorothy, who has already turned up unannounced at Alec’s funeral before disappearing.
This week, as an intrigued Alison tries to track down Dorothy, the shocking truth about her involvement with
Alec starts to come to light.
TV Times met Keeley,
42, during a break in filming on the set in London, to find out more…
How would you describe dorothy? Dorothy was an actress and she and Alec met in Lahore in
the 1930s, when she was very glamorous and moving in all the right circles. In our story, she and Alec have this immediate attraction and fall in love. She’s the total opposite of all the other women, physically and in terms of personality, which is really interesting.
Have you researched the real dorothy? I’ve looked for information and there isn’t really anything because she’s no longer with us, and her son Mike also passed away. In discussions with Ruth and the director, the important thing for the story is that when these two women meet they are very different characters. It’s extraordinary that these two disparate people have lived parallel lives with the same
man. It’s heartbreaking.
what’s it like working with ruth knowing that this is her own family history?
We had a fantastic scene together that was exciting. I’m a big fan; she’s brilliant and lovely to work with. She and her family have been so generous in allowing this story to be told – it’s wonderful. Ruth made the drama happen and is the driving force but she has been so relaxed, and will have a laugh about it and go, ‘Wasn’t it crazy?!’
do you have to keep reminding yourself this is a true story?
Yes, because it’s one revelation after another and it’s one of the most incredible stories I’ve ever heard. If it wasn’t real, you’d think it was too much, but truth is stranger than fiction. Everybody’s got a slightly bonkers family but few have one like this. Although some people’s immediate reaction when I’ve spoken about this is, ‘Guess what happened in my family!’
despite alec’s lies, have you ended up feeling sorry for him?
This all happened before Facebook, you couldn’t do it now, but just after the war everything was collapsing and it was a perfect storm for Alec. I can’t help having sympathy for him, though.
I try to think, ‘How could you?’ but it was such a mess and he got himself in so tight that he couldn’t unravel it. He did whatever he did for his own reasons.
did you get the impression that he was, at heart, a family man?
As far as each wife was concerned, he was a brilliant father. And, as awful as it sounds, he always seemed to be doing the right thing by each of them. All his children and women loved him so much, and the family are protective – they don’t want him to be portrayed in a bad light. It’s interesting they all feel a deep love and respect for him, regardless of the trouble he got into, which says a lot about him – and them.