Apologising to some actors
So I first saw Claire Foy in Little Dorritt in 2008 and she kept cropping up in other things. She was in the adaptation of The Night Watch, the Sarah Waters novel, in 2011. I wasn't keen. I found her a weak link.
In 2015 she was going to be in Wolf Hall as Anne Boleyn and I was sceptical. Then. Then! I saw her in Wolf Hall as Anne Boleyn. And she absolutely blew my socks off. She was amazing. Crackling with fierce energy, coming out fighting, damaged and raw.
Now I'm like, Claire Foy is in it? I'm there. I even watched her seasons of The Crown. And I hate the royal family. She plays the younger queen with barely-contained rage. This also applies retrospectively. Since Wolf Hall I've rewatched The Night Watch and thought Foy knocked it out the park as Helen. Such a stunning vulnerability and vitality. I was so wrong.
My apologies to Claire Foy.
Rachael Stirling was in the unhinged adaptation of the first Sarah Waters novel, Tipping the Velvet. The best thing that came out of that adaptation was the French and Saunders parody. Girl, that accent. No. But Tipping the Velvet was so important (and had Jodhi May in it) so we watched it a lot. Then every time Rachael Stirling popped up in something we were like "Oop, there she is," and did the accent.
In 2012, there was going to be this TV series set in the Fifties about women who used to be codebreakers at Bletchley. Hello, I said. And Rachael Stirling was in it. Oh No, I said.
Then I watched it. I don't know how to describe the absolute phenomenon that is Millie, Stirling's character. It's like Stirling was made to play her. I cannot imagine how anyone else could have played her. She is perfect as Millie. Singular.
My entire sexuality can probably be summed up in this gif of Rachael Stirling as Millie eating a biscuit:
My apologies to Rachael Stirling.
Look, that gesture with the hands over the head is so human but when do we see that acting? Props also to Hattie Morahan and the legendary Julie Graham here. Sterling work by all. My apologies also to Anna Maxwell Martin and Sophie Rundle for not mentioning their amazing work in Bletchley Circle so far in this post and only squeezing it in at the end.
A similar thing happened with Jodie Comer. The first two things I saw her in I thought she was bland. Then of course Killing Eve happened and it's like, "Oh, so you were acting. Someone made you be bland, got it."
My apologies to Jodie Comer.
So we're blaming the directors and writers, I guess, for having these incredible actors and making them bland and boring.
Still, apologies. I have learnt my lessons, eventually.
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