Adrian Lester talks The Undeclared War

His character has ousted Boris Johnson in a coup to take control of the Conservative Party and country, but comes from an equally privileged background. “Every part of that situation is a real tangible thing that we have around us today,” says Lester. But a black PM? “A black PM in Britain’s future will happen. It’s just a case of when,” the 53-year-old actor adds. “In our multicultural society, it is inevitable that there will be a prime minister of colour at some point.”

Researching a modern-day politician, of whatever rank or party, was easy, says Lester. He simply watched Question Time, listened to the Today programme and noted how politicians seem to answer questions… but never actually do. “I started pulling up interviews, and watched politicians speak the truth without saying anything that could be pulled out and wrapped around a different argument and fired back at them. That’s how politicians speak. They never use specifics, because any specifics mean three days later your answer can be fired back at you. So, politicians speak with an absence of facts and use opaque responses.”

Episode one of the Channel 4 drama hinges on the global hacking of the internet and, thanks to the work of an intern at GCHQ, the discovery of malware at the heart of the British communications systems. Is Lester familiar with hacking, coding and general computerisation?

“At heart, I’m analogue,” he confesses. “I’m one of those people who has to buy something if they walk past a stationery shop. If I was in the psychiatrist’s chair they would note that I still have to make marks with a pen on a piece of paper. And yes, I still have my vinyl collection, although I do value the era of MiniDiscs. I talked about MiniDiscs to my children the other day and they said, ‘What?’”

We are currently in something of a golden age of TV drama, and Lester is at the pinnacle of that world, having recently featured in ITV’s Trigger Point and Mike Bartlett’s BBC drama Life. He’s also a hit on stage, having just been nominated for a best actor Tony for his Broadway debut in The Lehman Trilogy.

“I want to play different people all the time,” says Lester, whose TV credits also include several series as professional fraudster Mickey Stone in BBC1 hit Hustle. “Hustle worked really well for me because every week, my character was a different character. I’m not the kind of actor who’s going to fit well with a long-running series unless that series offers me the chance to be in new and different situations every week. And I like what I do on stage, where you research a character, work hard on it and then walk away.”

Following the success of Hustle, Lester made a move to the US. I was at the Cannes Film Festival in 1998 at which he starred in the festival’s opening movie, Primary Colors. It earned him a nomination from the Chicago Film Critics’ Association for most promising actor and seemed like a first step into the inevitable Hollywood career. That didn’t quite happen, yet if this is frustrating for him, Lester doesn’t reveal it, perhaps because he has flourished so much elsewhere.

“It’s a much wider field. Hollywood is struggling to find new ideas and new mediums, and keeping up with the changing face of media, whereas TV drama has been doing this for a while. One of the key moments was when Netflix had the idea that if you were in Britain and tuned into Netflix, you didn’t get American Netflix. You got British Netflix with British actors. The same thing happened in Spain and in France. It means the gates to production and a platform for brilliant new voices can be accessed by the entire world.”

Meaning greater diversity in performers?

We are on the phone, but I sense Lester is bracing himself yet again for the question about being a black performer who helms prestigious TV series, and his views on how easy or otherwise that is. It ought not to be necessary to ask it, but it is. Still.

“Everyone has a different path,” he says. “Your own story – my own story – is not an indication of an industry-wide problem unless you can find a truth that sits within the entire industry. There is an absolute line of truth that sits behind what made actors like Lennie James, David Harewood and Idris Elba leave the country for the US. It has been a problem throughout our entire industry.

“When we were in lockdown and George Floyd was murdered, the entire western population had to realise there is something very wrong with society. After the Floyd atrocity, every company looked at the way in which they might be adding to the problem. So the Oscars start to shift, and Bafta starts to shift, and movies and films that are greenlit start to shift.” He sounds glad, but also angry.

“People like Lenny Henry and Lennie James have been in this industry for 30-plus years and have spoken about the problem again and again. But it’s only been in the past five years that the industry has started to look at itself and take note.”

Lester pauses. “It is why the brilliant talent we lost to the US are actors who now feel they have the cachet and status to come back and take roles they wouldn’t have been given otherwise. We all have kids and we want to make sure they grow up in a different world. We have shouted about the problem, we have done a great job, but there’s no room for complacency.”

We talk about the BBC licence fee and Channel 4 losing its protected status and being privatised. “Once the money is at risk, people try to mitigate by being more narrowminded about what is put out there. Once the Government starts to threaten channels like Channel 4, channels that don’t adhere to the rules of just making money, the channel will stop thinking outside the box.”

He is a passionate advocate of our homegrown drama. “The best things from American TV drama are modelled on what British TV drama did. Shows of 60 minutes with no adverts. Shows where you can sit with a character and watch them slowly develop. That flavour. That form. That identity. I love it when I see that on Netflix or Amazon, but you know, BBC iPlayer was there first. We forget that we have this ability to do [drama] so well, but it only happens when producers don’t think about profit.”

The Undeclared War starts tonight, 30th June 2022, at 9pm on Channel 4. Looking for something else to watch? Check out our TV Guide or visit our dedicated Drama hub for the latest news.

The latest issue of Radio Times magazine is on sale now – subscribe now and get the next 12 issues for only £1. For more from the biggest stars in TV, listen to the Radio Times podcast with Jane Garvey.