Sophie Okonedo will star as a high-flying lawyer about to become the first black director of public prosecutions opposite Adrian Lester in Peter Moffat’s new BBC1 drama, Undercover.
The casting makes the six-part drama a rarity in BBC1 primetime for having two black actors in the lead roles. It comes as the corporation attempts to improve its record on diversity both on and off screen.
Okonedo, Oscar-nominated for her role in the 2004 film Hotel Rwanda, starred on Broadway with Denzel Washington and said in an interview last year that she got many more job offers from the US than the UK.
“The balance is ridiculous,” she said. “There’s something amiss here.”
Okonedo will play Maya, about to become the first black DPP, co-starring with Adrian Lester who plays her husband, undercover police officer Nick.
Moffat, whose previous credits include Silk and Criminal Justice – which also starred Okonedo – said he had been “itching to get back to look at the parts of the justice system, the media and public life that time and again have been shown to be occupied by the good, the bad and the very ugly”.
Okonedo said Moffat had written an “extraordinary story that is relevant and at the same time utterly compelling. He asks hard questions of us all. The part I play is a Titan of women, called Maya who is not afraid to say the unsayable.
“She is a truth seeker and is prepared to shine light into the darkness corners come what may. I am tremendously excited, honoured and of course a little frightened to play her.”
Just as Maya’s career is about to take off she discovers that her husband has been lying to her for years and she does not know if he is concealing an affair or something more sinister.
In an interview with the Guardian last year, Okonedo said: “I do notice that – over the last year – I’ve had maybe two scripts from England and tens and tens from America. The balance is ridiculous.
“I’m still struggling [in the UK] in a way that my white counterparts at the same level wouldn’t have quite the same struggle. People who started with me would have their own series by now, and I’m still fighting to get the second lead or whatever.
“I think I’m at a certain level and have a good range, so why isn’t my inbox of English scripts busting at the seams in the same way as my American one is? There’s something amiss there.”
A six-part drama, Undercover will begin shooting in and around Cornwall and London from July.
