The TV industry has mostly shut down, but I’ve still been working during lockdown. I’m filming a series of shorts from the actor Julie Graham about five women who are in various stages of menopause, and before that I made Isolation Stories for ITV. Making it really tested all of my skills and made me appreciate my crew and what goes into everything behind the scenes when we’re just standing on our mark, pretending to cry. I’m really proud of the industry for finding a way to still be creative.
I’ve still made time to relax, though. Watching a film together as a family, with my husband and our two daughters, who are 16 and 13, has become the highlight of our day. As for series, I thought Quiz (ITV) was amazing. I know the makeup designer who transformed Michael Sheen into Chris Tarrant – I sent her a huge congratulations text because he looked so amazing. Matthew Macfadyen was brilliant, too - he’s an incredible dramatic actor and so great in everything he does, from Spooks to Succession. I could watch him all day. James Graham is another genius. His writing is so, so clever, especially his political pieces. I’d love to see him write about the current crisis.
Amanda Holden told me to watch Sunderland Til I Die (Netflix) and I was like: “Why are you watching that?!” But it’s a drama like any other. You absolutely don’t need to understand football to get into it – it’s about what happens when a company is in trouble, and all the things that people try to do to stop it collapsing. I got really invested in it.
I probably wouldn’t have watched it if I wasn’t in lockdown, but you have to find different things to watch. It was the same with Love Is Blind (Netflix). I’ve never been into Love Island or anything like that, but I gave it a go and I lost days. I even ended up subscribing to [fan favourites] Lauren and Cameron’s YouTube channel.
Another guilty pleasure of mine is Your Home Made Perfect on BBC Two, which is a property show where two designers present their ideas to homeowners and give them a virtual reality headset so they can see all of their changes. Then – unlike so many other shows where they just go through the motions but don’t end up doing the renovations – they actually make the chosen designs. It’s brilliant. If I ever do any work on my house, I want their team to design it.
I’m also on episode seven of my new series, White Lines, which is out this week. It’s a drama set in Ibiza with loads of drugs and partying – it is dropping at just the right time for a bit of escapism. It’s all about people being together, too, and there’s a lot of touching and connecting and relationships. Hopefully we can go back to that soon.
White Lines is available on Netflix from Friday
