Matthew Macfadyen Teases Ripper Street Series 3

Philip Bates is a writer at Kasterborous Doctor Who News and Reviews - All the latest Doctor Who news and reviews with our weekly podKast, features and interviews, and a long-running forum.

Eight months after it premiered on Amazon Prime Instant Video, the long-awaited third series of Ripper Street comes to BBCOne tonight. This comes after the Internet giant struck a deal with Aunty Beeb to save the critically-acclaimed series, but why was it axed in the first place?

Lead star, Matthew Macfadyen isn’t giving many clues:

“I think there was a new person and anything that wasn’t their baby was… I don’t know, I really don’t know… but it’s been a rocky old ride.”

Fortunately, it’s returned, and the regular cast (Macfadyen alongside Jerome Flynn, Adam Rothernberg, and The Impossible Planet‘s MyAnna Buring) are joined by a familiar face: Louise Brealey, aka Molly Hooper from Sherlock. Ripper Street creator, Richard Warlow says:

“Lou is magnificent. Obviously she comes from a very successful crime show so that’s great. She’s such a fine actress and she’s been great to have around. A lovely addition.”

Macfadyen also hints at a change in dynamic for the show as a whole, and certainly for his character, DI Edmund Reid:

“He’s become very insular and a bit odd, quite anal, and he’s made this enormous archive cataloguing every villain and snitch – like a first computer database so he can cross-reference. His eyesight’s getting worse and he’s very lonely. His relationships have all broken down.”

Matthew, who is married to Time Heist star Keeley Hawes, made a name on the superb spy thriller, Spooks, but he reveals that he was cautious to start with:

“I’ve always loved John le Carré – A Perfect Spy is still my favourite novel – and that’s because Dad had them lying around the house… We really didn’t know what people would think about all the cut screens and stuff at the time. I was really frightened. I remember thinking: this is not good, this is really naff. But like it or loathe it, it went for ten years and they made a movie.”

Spooks‘ Tom Quinn; The Enfield Haunting‘s Guy Playfair; Ripper Street‘s Edmund Reid: all very dark roles. His next, however, is a much lighter affair:

“I’m about to start this really sweet film about the Von Trapps [from The Sound of Music]. I play Georg Von Trapp, the Christopher Plummer role… although Plummer hated the film and called it The Sound of Mucus. [Laughs]”

For those who haven’t seen Ripper Street Series 3 on Amazon yet, the first episode, Whitechapel Terminus, which opens with a particularly stunning train crash, begins tonight at 9pm on BBCOne. Two more series have already been commissioned, while the final two episodes of Series 3 are directed by Saul Metzstein (A Town Called Mercy; The Name of the Doctor).

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