By Janet Christie

Copyright scotsman

Ruth Bradley is back starring opposite Gary Oldman, Jack Lowden and Kristen Scott Thomas in season 5 of Apple TV+’s 2025 EMMY-nominated and BAFTA Award-winning spy series Slow Horses. The 38-year old Irish actor reprises her role as Emma Flyte, MI5’s Head Dog working alongside Slough House’s band of misfits and mavericks to defeat sinister forces at large in a UK under siege in the series, created by Will Smith and based on the Slough House series of novels by Mick Herron. Dublin born and raised, Bradley started acting as a child and had an agent at 15, going on to appear in hits such as BBC’s The Gold, Guilt, Channel 4’s most successful drama in 20 years, Humans, BAFTA award winning The Fall (BBC2/Netflix), Ted Lasso, Electric Dreams alongside Bryan Cranston, Love/Hate, In Her Skin, for which she won the best actress award at the Milan International Film Festival and the 2023 independent film Embers. What’s it like to join a show that you’re a fan of that you’d been watching? Brilliant. Absolutely no negatives.
It’s so lovely to have been a fan then join it and it still continue to be as great. Probably because the same showrunner and crew and so much established cast were still there. It’s been great from the word go. Have there been any surprises? The Slough House set is a surprise because obviously the exterior is a real location, but the interior is all set. It’s in a huge sound stage and such a brilliant set. If you go close there’s flies dead on the windowsills. And it’s three stories so when we shoot in those staircases, they’re real, but it’s all manmade, amazing. Your character, Emma Flyte, how has she developed from season four to five? She’s way more humble now. She started out thinking she’d arrived early in this position and this was the beginning of the rest of her life and it was going to be plain sailing but in season four she took a real bashing from beginning to end. Now she’s stripped back to basics and her Met training, getting the head down and doing her job. Her ego is more in check and she wants to do her job well. I think she just wants to win Taverner over, because she lost her big time by the end of last season. How did you research being head of MI5 Security? I looked more into working in the Met because that’s where she came from. Then being head of MI5 security, it’s the first time a woman has taken on that position. She’d probably thought she had been poached because she was brilliant, and she is, but she hadn’t been aware of any machinations around why she may have been picked. So she’s much more humble. And ready. Last season her appearance was more casual but this time round she looks like Tavener has taken her shopping (not that that would ever happen). Saul [Metzstein] the director of this season was interested in her look being more serious and she’s aware she really messed up last year. She learned a lesson and Saul was interested in showing that in her physicality and clothes, so just a sharp black suit, her hair doesn’t get in the way, there’s not as much glam maybe as last year which also informed how I wanted to play her. She also knows what she’s up against with Lamb and his team this time. Totally. I think she underestimated Lamb big time, and probably the rest of them. Lamb gets away with a lot because people expect nothing of him. But also last season Emma was in this position of power and it clouded her judgement and her ego had maybe taken over. She’d decided they were of no consequence, which was part of the joy of watching that unfold and her realising they’re constantly ahead. So she knows Lamb is the most important person in the room and there’s always a ruse – and that the Slow Horses are pretty brilliant too, but she would never admit that to them.
She knows they’re probably not to be messed with. Apart from Roddy. She left the Met because it didn’t sit with her strong moral compass. Now that she’s seen inside MI5 has that shifted again? I think she doesn’t want to see what might be going on in MI5 so is maybe turning a blind eye because it would be earth shattering to think this as bad, just in a glossier cover. It becomes evident there are huge similarities between the two. There’s some comedy with the sexism as the season goes on as well. Has her opinion of Taverner [ MI5 Deputy Director-General and Head of Operations] changed? I think it’s more nuanced, definitely, but I think her MO is still to impress Taverner and do right by her.
If she’s going to put all her chickens in one basket, it’s going to be Taverner not Whelan [Director-General of MI5]. Her world in this season is very much Taverner. She is her mentor so she thinks I’m just going to follow exactly what Tavener says because she’s lived this and she’s done this and maybe one day I can be her. Did you have a back story, soundtrack, a perfume for her? Yes, all of those. I always have a backstory, a childhood and where they grew up and how they came to this place. And the soundtrack is different for each season but not necessarily music she would listen to, but what it feels like in her world. And the perfume was Le Labo Santal 33.
It’s very kind of musky and unisex. It’s strong. That could come in handy, especially around Lamb with his personal habits. That’s so true. So her background, has she worked her way up? Yes. For a woman to come from the Met she would have had to battle lots of things in a predominantly male environment, and quite a tough physical environment, from what I researched. In season four she thinks that’s all behind her which is why it’s so crushing when it turns out it’s not. Emma Flyte is a very physical role. Did you have to do a lot of fitness training? Yes. It was good fun and great to feel that fit, but exhausting. It’s like a full-time job going training and weightlifting and eating protein all day. But it’s quite nice to do another job where the character isn’t doing that. You do whatever is required of you. So my body is a tool and you can explore different things, because usually I wouldn’t be lifting weights or sprinting. Has her way of dealing with Lamb changed? Has Taverner given her any tips? In season four, Flyte says, ‘Oh, I’ve met men like him before and Taverner says ‘no, you haven’t’. She warned her from the off but Flyte paid no attention.
She deals with him differently this time. She wouldn’t show him but she has so much more respect for his mind and that he’s way ahead of everybody. Is it true Gary Oldman was an idol of yours ever since you saw him in Bram Stroker’s Dracula [1992] and that made you want to become an actor? Totally. I already knew I wanted to be an actor, whatever that was, but then I wanted to be THAT actor. I kind of wanted to be him, to play parts that were that varied and really jump in and he was so juicy in all these characters and such a chameleon. He was a huge inspiration for the kind of actor I wanted to be. And does he know this? Did you tell him? He knows it now, yeah. I think he might have read something. How did he respond? Well, he’s such a gracious, kind person. He hasn’t overtly said it. But he’s very kind and he’ll chat to me and he knows well. As far back as I could remember I wanted to be an actor. I think I wanted to move people through my own emotions. That if I could feel something and be honest, somebody else might feel it. My mother is an actress, primarily in theatre when I was a kid, and I met an actress who worked with her and said ‘I remember you in the rehearsal room, every day from five months old. You’d just be quiet and watch.’ Maybe something got in there when I was pre-verbal. My mother could use her body and emotions to tell a story, which is also a very Irish thing as well. Meeting an idol like Gary Oldman and working with them, does it change what you thought about them? The polar opposite, which is such a rare thing I suppose. But he’s equally just as lovely and genuine a person as he is an actor. Do you ever get a pinch me moment when you’re in a scene opposite him? Definitely, that’ll kind of pop into a rehearsal every now and then absolutely. It’s wild because you watch this person’s performances and then find yourself in a scene and it seems like it’s all a dream or something. What would your childhood self think about that? I think my brain would have exploded. It just seemed like another world when I was a kid. I wish I could go back and tell her. Do Gary Oldman or other actors give you advice? Nobody says ‘maybe do this’, they’re pretty respectful so not really unsolicited advice. I often ask more about life, particularly with older actors who have succeeded in making a personal life and a professional life and have made great choices. I like to ask a lot of questions. What’s the best bit of advice you’ve been given? Lots of bits I’ve taken up along the way. Early on I heard somebody say your life needs to be as important as your work and that was really helpful. I think in my 20s I was obsessed then the older I’ve got the more I’ve thought you need a well to draw on. If you’re not living your life and picking yourself apart, not in a self-critical way, but looking at human behavior, you don’t have as much to draw on. So obsessing about parts, stepping back from that changed so much because you’ll never win that competition. You’ll always be yourself so you’ve just got to run your own race. What was the highlight from season five filming? Is there one day that stands out? There’s an amazing location, a London landmark where we filmed, that had to be shut down and that was insane. Somewhere you’ve been around for years and all of a sudden to have it as your ‘office’ was crazy. And London’s such a character in this show. Guilt was like that, showing Glasgow and Edinburgh on the screen. Yes, I used to eat up there in an amazing cafe on Calton Hill. I love Scotland and had a great time on Guilt. I’d love to do a show in Edinburgh because that was mostly filmed in Glasgow and just a few days in Edinburgh. But it’s such great craic. It’s a similar vibe to working in Ireland. Was Angie in Guilt fun to play? Yeah it was great fun. This Chicago girl who is not what she seems. And Angie was interesting because was she really falling in love with this guy? How did you prepare for the role in Guilt? It’s sometimes easier when there’s something obvious you can do because you can say right, what is Chicago like? What’s a Chicago accent and work with a dialect coach and think about what kind of world did she come from where she ended up in this pub meeting this strange woman? Is she really in love with Jake or is she playing this and deciding along the way? I think by the end of the first season she’s in love with him and thinks let’s run off into the sunset, but she’s a very impulsive character who thinks not a jot about whether this is a good idea. You have a new exciting project coming up. Can you tell us what that is? No, I can’t. It’s an independent film but that’s all I can say. Why are you so drawn to independent films? There’s less money so fewer people involved in that aspect and it’s much more about the story and is character driven, which is what I want to see, characters and human beings relating and sparking off each other. As an audience member it’s where I go to be moved, more than huge, big budget action things. It’s so hard for an independent film to get made that when it does it’s going to be pretty special. The Brutalist was just under $10 million and was the most incredible piece of storytelling from a very clear visionary. Was that what drew you to 2024’s Ember set in a secure psychiatric unit, for which you spent two years researching sexual surrogacy and tantra. The research aspect of a job I find so enjoyable and I’ll study whatever it is. There was an amazing film called The Sessions in 2012 with John Hawkes and Helen Hunt, based on a true story about a sexual surrogate and patient, and then this script came along. Generally there’ll be a client or patient and a therapist dealing with the psychogenic sexual issues and a sexual surrogate, who might not know what the psychological issues are. It was fascinating to figure out how to play that and what kind of a person you would have to be, which led me to studying tantra, because the therapist advising on the film had started there. It’s not just a physical thing but that your heart is open and you’re just completely pure love for the person you’re in a session with. Has that awareness stayed with you? Definitely, that studying has stayed, from so much work with energy. So often with other people we just plow through. It’s like when kids meet each other and stand at a distance and stare then move forward, whereas we just fly in and often jump over our energy. Obviously we can’t go to meetings and stand on the opposite side of the room and stare without speaking, but to feel our own energy is so powerful, to just try and dance with people, which sounds kind of crazy, but is something I’ve learned. Do you think there’ll be more Slow Horses? Yes because the books are all there. Each standalone book is a series and the show is very faithful to them. Each has a different vibe – some are more comedic, some more tragic. And some dialogue is lifted directly, so I read them then put them aside. Is there anything else you can tell us about what else you’ve got coming next? We’re going to the Emmys with Slow Horses because it’s been nominated for season four for Best Show and we all get to go, sit in the plane and chat and have a big hug. That’s when I’m most excited about. It’s such a gorgeous cast and we haven’t seen each other in a while, so it’ll be brilliant. Credit: Ruth Bradley stars in Season 5 of Apple TV+’s Slow Horses from 24 September, running weekly until 22 October.