Copy link Copied Copy link Copied Subscribe to gift this article Gift 5 articles to anyone you choose each month when you subscribe. Already a subscriber? Login The British spies at the centre of the Apple TV+ series Slow Horses aren’t particularly handsome, or efficient, or disciplined. They’re rejects from MI5, consigned to a dark, dingy London office run by Jackson Lamb (Gary Oldman), a slovenly, scotch-swilling, flatulent burnout.
Early in season four, Lamb objects when a new no-nonsense MI5 officer (Ruth Bradley) handcuffs him during an investigation. “I’d rather not take any chances with a man who looks like he gropes people on buses,” she tells him. “You’re being hurtful about my appearance,” Lamb mutters.
“I might have to call HR.” Will Smith, the showrunner, knew he had been handed a gift when he was enlisted to work on Slow Horses . Based on the series of Slough House novels by Mick Herron, the TV adaptation has the kind of biting humour and dysfunctional, high-stakes office politics of two shows Smith wrote for under Armando Iannucci, The Thick of It and Veep .
It also has Oldman, sinking his teeth into his first starring TV role, and Jonathan Pryce, who takes centre stage in the new season as an old spy descending into dementia (which creates complications in the espionage world). Then there’s the short, bluesy theme song, performed by some bloke named Mick Jagger . Already a fan of Herron’s books, Jagger was happy to join the party.
In July, Slow Horses received nine Emmy nominations, including nods for best drama, lead actor in a drama (Oldman) and writing in a drama (Smith). Each season of the series unfolds in a quick, six-episode burst. The latest follows Pryce’s David Cartwright and his cocksure, generally overmatched Slow Horse grandson, River (Jack Lowden), as they try to keep a rogue ex-CIA agent (Hugo Weaving) from unleashing hell.
Christopher Chung plays Roddy Ho, one of a merry band of misfits, in Slow Horses. Shane Taylor In a video interview from a family holiday in Greece , Smith discussed the universality of toxic workplaces and how to get a rock legend to join your merry band of misfits. These are edited excerpts from the conversation.
What makes this such an ideal Gary Oldman role? There is a lot in that character to unpack, and Gary is confident enough to sit and wait for those moments to come out where he can just play the kind of weathered ruins of a man, and you know all that detail is there. And he’s a chameleon as well. He’s such a genuinely transformational actor that he does become that person.
It’s like every kind of inflection and movement is infused with the character. You believe that character. He is not larger than life, but there’s potentially a version of him that is cartoonish or too big.
He doesn’t care what anyone thinks of him, and yet at the same time, you’ve got to think that in his prime he was an absolutely amazing agent. Gary can sell all those things at once because he’s a genius. Lamb is in many ways a pretty despicable character – petty, selfish, even cruel.
Why, then, do we end up rooting for him? On paper everybody should hate him. He’s horrible. He’s bullying.
He’s mean. But I think he gives it out to people that deserve it. When he is gratuitous, there’s normally some kind of agenda behind it, and he’s giving it to people that have messed up or are obnoxious.
He’s unlike any character we’ve seen before in the spy genre. We’ve seen hard-drinking people who have been broken, but not somebody that broken and that irreverent and that devil-may-care. And Gary gives it enough of a twinkle that you can enjoy it without feeling it’s too cold.
There’s a scintilla of warmth in there somewhere. The fascinating thing about Lamb is the character arc is all in the backstory. We’re meeting him at the end of all these things that have happened to him and made him a ruin of a man.
So unpacking that is interesting. And Gary can have these layers within him that you can open up. You have worked with Armando Iannucci on several shows.
What were you able to learn from him? Armando taught me to trust my instincts and know that I’ll get there. I’d always felt that, but seeing him do it showed me I could do it. With Armando, a series feels like a thing that’s alive.
He sees it as a living playpen. The rehearsals are there to feed the writing, and during the shoot he’ll be altering it, and then again in the editing. And he listens to the actors, which is a key thing.
Writers in the UK are usually kept more at a remove, with a few notable examples. They are often kept away from set. And I think it’s so important for writers to interact with actors and to understand an actor’s mentality.
Actors know the characters. They’re going to have really interesting thoughts and insights. Armando always had the writing team very connected with the actors, and I really love that.
How does one wrangle Mick Jagger to perform a series theme song, and what does the song, Strange Game , add to the show? It’s funny, I just take it for granted now: Oh yeah, that’s the theme song. But that’s Mick Jagger! That’s one of the most iconic rock singers ever! Our music supervisor knew somebody in Jagger’s team. When we first approached Gary Oldman, I was the one going, “He’s never going to do it.
This is pointless. He’s a megastar.” It was the same with Jagger.
I was like, “Why would he do it? It’s just a waste of time. It’s not going to happen.” But as it turned out, Mick was already a fan of the books, so we were pushing at an open door.
Daniel Pemberton [who scores the series along with the duo Toydrum] had written a fantastic theme, and then we sent it to Mick and Mick put those lyrics on it, telling you the premise of the show: Lamb is surrounded by “losers, misfits and boozers”. It’s a fantastic song. It is one of the many blessings that seemed to rain down on this show.
How would you describe the series’s approach to the espionage world? Mick Herron is obviously a huge John le Carré fan. Unlike le Carré, Mick has not worked in the Security Service, but he has worked in offices. His idea was to imagine if the Security Service were run like any other office, with the pettiness and the backbiting and the burnouts and the people who have been over-promoted who shouldn’t be there.
Some of the actors have been contacted by people who know people in the service, and they say it’s frighteningly accurate. It is a sort of scary peek behind the curtain: Oh, my God, they’re just like us. They’re as useless as everyone else.
This article originally appeared in The New York Times . Copy link Copied Copy link Copied Subscribe to gift this article Gift 5 articles to anyone you choose each month when you subscribe. Already a subscriber? Login Follow the topics, people and companies that matter to you.
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