Matthew Macfadyen has
been tempted back to a major TV series for the first time since the
long-running Spooks ended two years ago, in which he played a very modern role
as counter-terrorism chief.
Now he has re-emerged as Detective Inspector Edmund Reid, a late 19th-century
policeman whose beat is London’s East End, haunt of the notorious Jack The
Ripper.
The
time is April 1889, six months after the Ripper has claimed his last victim,
hacking a fifth young woman to death - and people are beginning to
venture out after dark again, in the cautious hope that his murderous reign of
terror is over.
Murder: Matthew Macfadyen stars in the latest TV series Ripper Street set during the time of Jack the Ripper
But is it? After all, the series is called Ripper Street.
The
famously buttoned-up Macfadyen reacts with mock
horror: ‘I couldn’t possibly give
anything away’, he says. ‘But I will say that Inspector Reid is a very
modern policeman, and what he investigates takes him beyond the Ripper’s
crimes.
'He
is beginning to see huge new advances in forensics and pathology as for the
first time police work becomes truly scientific, and he can see that this is
the future’.
Return: This is Matthew's most recent BBC production since starring in spy series Spooks
Copper: The actor plays senior police officer Edmund Reid on the hunt in the East End of London
I watched the opening scene as Macfadyen as Reid – tall, imposing, well-dressed
in a long heavy coat and a black bowler hat, and sporting distinctively
fashionable sideburns - sips his beer in Whitechapel’s packed Brown Bear
tavern.
He
smiles as his fellow drinkers cheer on a brutal bare-knuckle fight. It’s
all good fun - or what passed for fun in the late 19th century - but
Reid’s off-duty moments are numbered.
Suddenly, a scream echoes through the fog-shrouded warren of
streets. The naked body of a young prostitute has been found
with her throat cut. The murder has all the Ripper’s
hallmarks, and panic once again grips the East
End.
Ladies of the night: Prostitutes like Rose (played by Charlene McKenna) were the infamous targets for Jack the Ripper
Jackie the Ripper? Although the legendary murder
is universally known as a man, some historians have suggested he was in
fact a she
There
really was a senior police officer called Edmund Reid - a 5ft 6ins Druid, who was one of the first
people to parachute from a hot air balloon in the police team
hunting the Ripper, but Matthew says he hasn’t based his character on
him.
Matthew, a strapping
six-footer, has played his fair share of action roles, but nothing as
dare-devil as that: ‘There have been
so many films, TV dramas and documentaries about the Ripper, who was never
caught, of course, but I haven’t seen any of them.’
He hadn’t even read much about him – or, as some
theories have it, her - but he says although he would normally carefully
research a subject before taking on a part, he decided to stick with the
character as created by series writer Richard Warlow.
‘Inspector Reid, as we see him, has nothing of the jaded or hard bitten
copper about him. I wanted to get away from the classic police
chief, the seen it all, done it all sort of officer, and he’s
definitely not that.
'He has a very strong moral compass. A
priority of the time, I suppose. He’s not typically Victorian, he’s
not sermonising and then doing naughty things behind closed door,' he said.
Medic: An elite squad is selected to investigate
the murders with Adam Rothenberg the sharp-minded US army surgeon
Captain Homer Jackson
Back up: Jerome Flynn plays Reid's tough sidekick Detective sergeant Bennett Drake
‘I
also
found him interesting because he was very curious. He’s not
afraid to try new things, unconventional ways of policing. This was even
before finger-printing and they were clutching at straws in a lot
of ways in trying to solve a crime.’
‘He’s quite progressive and interested in technology and, the innovations of
the age, which were enormous especially in Victorian times.'
‘So
there’s a lot to play with – it’s good fun. And the writing makes it for
me. Richard Warlow has a wonderful way with language,
so Ripper Street is big, bombastic, colourful and grimy,' the actor raved.
Macfadyen was in Spooks between 2002-4, but returned for the finale two years
ago, and It was while working on the drama that he met and
married his co-star Keeley Hawes.
Tension: In the show Drake and Captain Jackson don¿t get on at all.
Autopsy: There are vivid scenes where the team have to examine the bodies of young women who have been murdered.
He remembers thinking ‘Phwoar, I fancy you’, when he first set eyes on
her. She had only been married to cartoon designer Spencer McCallum
for two months, but she fell for Macfadyen very quickly.
‘After just a few weeks he suddenly came out with it in the rain’, she once
recalled. ‘He said, “I love you”. I thought, “Oh dear, here
we go again.”'
They now have two children, Maggie and
Ralph, as well as Keeley and McCallum’s son Myles.
Ripper Street is due to be shown in America and,
dubbed in several languages, all over the world, with a second series
commissioned even before the first episode has been publicly
screened.
Whitechapel
itself, with its dingy shops, factories, pubs, an orphanage, asylum,
even a toymaker’s shop and of course, the police station were all
recreated by designer Mark Gerhaty in a disused Victorian barracks in
Dublin, where the scenes of everyday hustle and bustle were filmed.
Modern relevance: Starring Lucy Cohu as Deborah
Goran, Ripper Street is about a time that wasn¿t so long ago and it
certainly feels quite resonant now
Trapped: Rose works for an exotically-gowned madam known as Long Susan, played by Myanna Buring (Breaking Dawn Twlight part 2)
It
wasn’t always easy during the 19-week shoot though, because they were often
held up by heavy rain:
‘It
was wet, cold and then very sunny.' says Matthew, 'it’s a soggy old
place is Dublin. But actually we all loved filming there.
'The barracks were like a
big playground, big enough to recreate a huge area of
Whitechapel, and we filmed in Dublin Castle and Kilmainham
Jail, all as if it was the East End of London.’
Macfadyen’s co-stars are Jerome Flynn (Soldier Soldier, Game of Thrones), who
plays his tough sidekick Detective sergeant Bennett Drake, and American
actor Adam Rothenberg (House, Alcatraz, Person of Interest) as the sharp-minded
US army surgeon Captain Homer Jackson.
Each week the three of them solve a different crime in the East End –
including murders eerily similar to the Ripper’s modus operandi, so there is
the constant fear that the serial killer is on the prowl again.
