The spying game (From The Northern Echo)

The spying game

4:47pm Thursday 25th August 2011 in Features

Esteemed actor Bill Nighy felt drawn to the lead role in the BBC’s new spy thriller Page Eight – and even found himself a little star-struck, he tells Lisa Williams.

SITTING in a high-ceilinged room in a grand private members’ club and clad in a dapper navy suit, Bill Nighy blends in immaculately with the lounging gents.

The 61-year-old, who has built a career playing well-spoken, slightly eccentric, establishment figures, has a genuine appreciation – bordering on “fetishist” love – of good suits.

In fact it was the clothes, in part, that attracted him to his latest role as MI5 spy Johnny Worricker in new BBC one-off thriller Page Eight.

“When I got the script and saw I wore a dark blue overcoat, got to smoke (in my case herbal) cigarettes in the rain on Battersea Bridge in the dark – all of this was attractive,” he says, in that familiar charming drawl.

“I’m drawn to parts where your trousers match your jacket.”

In the drama, written and directed by David Hare, Worricker faces the biggest dilemma of his career when he gets hold of a explosive, incriminating file.

Nighy explains: “My character comes into possession of a dossier which implicates the Prime Minister in a conspiracy to mislead Parliament and to be involved in some very dark dealings.”

In order to get to the truth, the spy is forced to leave his job, identity, and family behind, to explore the information left behind by his former boss after his sudden death. He no longer knows who to trust, and that includes beautiful neighbour Nancy (Rachel Weisz).

Self-effacing Nighy prefers to pour praise on the star-studded cast rather than focus on his own performance.

Felicity Jones, who plays Johnny’s daughter, is “remarkable”, Judy Davis “came all the way from Australia to play the part” of one his colleagues, and Ralph Fiennes, as the Prime Minister, is “extraordinary”.

“Then there’s Rachel Weisz, obviously, and Sir Michael Gambon, who is my hero. I don’t say it lightly. He’s my hero,” Nighy says emphatically.

He pauses for a second, gathers together some invisible crumbs from the tablecloth in front of him, then says: ‘‘I did actually text David (Hare) one night after we did a scene with Sir Michael, as I like to call him, and said, ‘I have to thank somebody so I think I’ll thank you, because that was one of the greatest days in my professional life’.

“It’s a cliche and I don’t care, but he’s touched by genius. I’ve known him since I was young. He used to creep up behind me in the National Theatre canteen and swear in my ear. Then he’d say something nice and that would keep you going for 18 months.”

Sir Michael plays one of Worricker’s most trusted colleagues and friends in the murky world of espionage, and both characters demonstrate how difficult it is for spies to maintain the semblance of an ordinary family life.

“It is extraordinarily weird to be a spy,” ponders Nighy. “You can’t tell anyone, even very close members of your family, unless it’s absolutely necessary. And you can’t talk to your best friends about it. It’s a pretty fundamental change of life.”

Nighy admits he’d “happily play Johnny Worricker for the rest of my days” and says he and Hare have already been talking about a second film.

This is obviously dependent on how the first is received, but if there’s one person who won’t be reading the reviews, it’s Nighy.

Despite his status as one the UK acting scene’s stalwarts, with recent roles in Harry Potter, The Boat That Rocked and Love Actually, the actor admits to crippling insecurity.

He won’t watch himself on screen, hates having his photo taken (although hiding behind his thickrimmed specs makes that a bit easier, he adds), and will do anything to avoid reading reviews of his work.

“Frankly, I can’t pay the price so I don’t do it any more. I never used to be able to resist reading them, got burned a couple of times and thought, ‘I can’t take it’.

“Similarly, if I’m doing theatre and I’m told I peak in the second act during a particular passage, that’s not good for me either, because I’ll become too wonderful,” he jokes.

Another awful thing about acting, he recounts, was having to audition when he first started out. Recoiling into his seat in horror, he says: “I can’t exaggerate how horrible a life of auditioning is.

“Imagine if you had to go 50 times a year to some place to meet strangers who for the most part were not over-excited about meeting you, to demonstrate your job, and 90 per cent of the time they say no. That’s what actors do.

“It can’t be overstated how wonderful it is not to have to audition any more. Any actor will tell you, it’s like Christmas.

“When it first happened, I couldn’t work out what was wrong with the meeting until I realised they were trying to sell me the gig. You throw all your usual shapes and it’s unnecessary.”

Has he ever bristled at seeing an actor, in the part he missed out on, winning an Oscar?

“I don’t watch the Oscars. I don’t watch awards shows. And I’ve done all right, if you know what I mean?”

he says, looking up and, for the first time, flashing a full smile.

• Page Eight is on BBC Two on Sunday, August 28