{"id":10280,"date":"2022-01-23T10:00:02","date_gmt":"2022-01-23T09:00:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.radiotimes.com\/?p=1551168"},"modified":"2022-01-23T10:47:19","modified_gmt":"2022-01-23T09:47:19","slug":"vicky-mcclure-on-finding-authenticity-in-trigger-points-lana-i-enjoy-making-characters-i-can-relate-to","status":"publish","type":"rss_feed","link":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/radiotimes\/rss_feed\/vicky-mcclure-on-finding-authenticity-in-trigger-points-lana-i-enjoy-making-characters-i-can-relate-to\/","title":{"rendered":"Vicky McClure on finding authenticity in Trigger Point\u2019s Lana: \u201cI enjoy making characters I can relate to\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"

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By Helen Daly\n \t\t<\/p>

Published: Sunday, 23 January 2022 at 12:00 am<\/p>

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In terms of on-screen tension, television drama probably doesn\u2019t get much tighter than Trigger Point<\/a>, which is set in the world of the Metropolitan Police Bomb Disposal Squad. Just imagine being called out to a home-made bomb. Your job is to defuse it. You\u2019re holding your \u201clucky\u201d wire clippers. Your life could go either way; and this isn\u2019t a wartime situation. This is your day job. This is what Trigger Point is all about, and it\u2019s gripping.<\/p>\n

\u201cI didn\u2019t know anything about bomb disposal before,\u201d says Vicky McClure, who plays explosives officer Lana \u2018Wash\u2019 Washington in the six-part ITV drama.<\/p>\n

\u201cI knew there were people who dealt with bombs, but I had no understanding of their role. It\u2019s a fascinating job, because it seems like nothing to them. There is a calmness to them, which I wanted to take on.\u201d<\/p>\n

Her character is a straightforward team leader, casually listening to hardcore grime in her car before masterfully striding forth and coping with various hurdles, including a bomb linked up to a light switch, a possible suicide bomber and a terrified child hidden under a bed. She looks as if she has never done anything else.<\/p>

Obviously an in-depth study of how explosives officers do their job helped, she says. Apparently they don\u2019t wear their helmets when defusing a bomb because the tiniest nudge from the rim of a hard hat could set it off. It has also given her insight into recent atrocities: the bomb detonated last November outside Liverpool Women\u2019s Hospital, for example.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhenever you see any kind of terrorism so close to home, it sends a ripple of fear into everyone,\u201d says McClure. \u201cWhat I know now allows me to understand more about the device. Knowing how they are put together. Some of them are made from a jar of nails and other stuff\u2026 you wouldn\u2019t think it would make so much damage. It\u2019s very scary.\u201d<\/p>\n

It\u2019s a prime role for 38-year-old McClure, who was last seen as DI Kate Fleming in Line of Duty<\/a> and as spy handler Mrs Jones in teen drama Alex Rider<\/a>, and not just because she is in every scene and every storyline.<\/p>\n

The role combines a streetwise toughness and matter-of-factness that she delivers very smoothly, with great authenticity. There is nothing of the drama queen about McClure, on- or off-screen. This is what might have led Trigger Point executive producer Jed Mercurio, who wrote Line of Duty, to say, \u201cShe\u2019s the top of every casting wish list in British TV.\u201d<\/p>\n

McClure laughs. \u201cThat is incredible and\u2026 I don\u2019t know \u2013 it\u2019s a funny industry and such a strange world. To hear that from Jed is really flattering. We have been working together for over 10 years and I\u2019m fully aware of his talents. The fact that we\u2019ve been on the journey together is really special. I\u2019m always pinching myself.\u201d<\/p>\n

McClure\u2019s present position at the head of every casting wish list in British TV drama is perhaps thanks to her untraditional route in, a route that is perhaps key to how she manages to seem utterly normal and not stagey on screen. Born in Nottingham, she attended free after-school drama classes at the Television Workshop from the age of 11, for 10 years. No special treatment or privileges for McClure; no private school doing Shakespeare, and no RADA, but loads and loads of improv, and company work, everyone bouncing off one another and making it look normal.<\/p>\n

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Shane Meadows auditioned her at the age of 15 and cast her in his 1999 film A Room for Romeo Brass, but the notion of acting being the day job didn\u2019t happen for another few years until she was cast as Lol in Meadows\u2019s 2006 film This Is England and the subsequent 2010 Channel 4 mini-series This Is England 86, written by Meadows and Jack Thorne. Her performance in that won her both RTS and BAFTA awards for best actress.<\/p>\n

On Trigger Point, written by Daniel Brierley, much of her role is improvised. \u201cThe people I\u2019m working with know what kind of actor I am. There is a particular scene in which I asked for a whole take being improvised. It might never see the light of day, but it helped me with the character. In Line of Duty, I couldn\u2019t improvise because it was a police procedural, but having that freedom in Trigger Point, allowing you to be able to react, was great. I think sometimes if the writer will allow you to loosen the script, it\u2019s good. It\u2019s tough in terms of continuity, but they were up for it and it\u2019s what we learnt all those years back at the TV Workshop. We didn\u2019t study Shakespeare. We improvised!\u201d<\/p>\n

She\u2019s also firm in her praise for co-star Adrian Lester, who plays fellow explosives officer Joel Nutkins. \u201cAdrian Lester, he has done it all, seen it all, he is a pro. And a gentleman and a great laugh. We all had a really great time.\u201d<\/p>\n

Viewing Trigger Point, it\u2019s obvious that these years of workshopping paid off; McClure is simply so normal, so believable and so embedded in character that you can\u2019t look away. \u201cI was lucky to have spent 10 years there,\u201d she says. \u201cIt wasn\u2019t in London so it was never a first stop on casting directors\u2019 lists. My upbringing made me feel I wasn\u2019t entitled to anything that comes my way, and I had to manage rejection.\u201d<\/p>\n

But how did she cope between that first film and This Is England? \u201cI worked in retail. H Samuel, Boots, Dorothy Perkins. Then an office for eight years.\u201d She says it was grounding but also enabling. \u201cYou do have to have some funds and that\u2019s why I worked, so I could afford to get to London. I would have to take a day unpaid off work and go to London for auditions.\u201d<\/p>\n

She\u2019s resolutely realistic, however, and if it hadn\u2019t worked out for her, McClure says there was no question; she would have done something else. \u201cIt\u2019s not about having a back-up plan. It\u2019s about not putting acting on too much of a pedestal. I adore my job, but I adore life and there are a lot of other things out there.\u201d<\/p>\n

Loved this\u00a0Big RT Interview<\/a>? Check out these\u2026<\/strong><\/h3>\n