Interview with Lesley Manville

How would you describe your character, Gail Spicer?

Gail is middle-class, wanting to have the best house in the village and to be highly thought of. She’s kind of aloof and cold, and a bit unforthcoming. She’s the subject of a long and unhappy marriage that has really made her not a very of warm person. She’s got a dog and is one of those people who like the dog more than people really.

Do you think it is important to her how she is perceived in the community?

Yes, definitely. She wants to be perceived as somebody who is successful and who materialistically got everything she wanted, with the nicest house and the designer clothes. She wants to have the whole package and to look to the world as being a success story, but actually, privately she’s far from it. She’s in a deeply dysfunctional marriage and is actually rather lonely and isolated.

What would you say her role within the community is? How does she get involved?

I don’t think she does really. That’s the point, is that she doesn’t fit in. She’s allowed her life to become so rarefied that she doesn’t really fit in with the community and that’s because of the unpopularity of her husband Malcolm. He’s trying to get this new estate of houses off the ground and nobody in her community particularly wants it, so there’s a general feeling that they are a very unpopular couple anyway. That adds fuel to her whole opinion of herself, which is that nobody really likes her much and it’s probably true.

You touched on Gail’s relationship with Malcolm. What else can you tell us?

God knows why they’re still together really. It’s a terrible, terrible relationship that’s deteriorated over the years but neither of them have done anything about it. The best thing that they could probably do would be to walk away from each other but it’s like a lot of marriages. There’s nothing left, it’s empty, and there’s bickering and absolutely vile really. They’ve got a son who is off and functioning having his own life. And then she’s got this dog who she seems to care about more than anything.

Had you worked with Peter Firth before?

No, I hadn’t so that was a delight. He‘s a really lovely guy.

And how does Gail react to Hattie’s disappearance?

I don’t think she has any sort of real genuine concern, but she feigns a concern for it. When her husband is implicated obviously she starts to get worried simply because of the effects that would have on her life and how humiliating it would be for her. Her concern is more to do with the shame it’s going to bring on the family if her husband is involved.

There’s a lot of suspicion, everyone is suspicious of someone close to them?

That’s what it does successfully, is that you genuinely can see reasons why a lot of the characters could have done it. It’s clever in that way.

What made you want to play this role?

The character is interesting and I really like Brian (Welsh, the director). When I met him I wanted to know how he was going to do it because I think if it was treated another way it could be quite sort of mundane television. But he was quite clearly going to make it a bit quirky and I could tell by the way he was shooting it as well that it was going to have an oddness about it - an unconventional take on the whole thing and that was one of the key factors. That was ultimately what made me keen to do it really.