Dame Helen Mirren admits it herself: she does \u201cbitch\u201d well.<\/p>\n
Far less intimidating in real life than she is on the small screen in the TV crime drama Mobland, Mirren tells The Watchlist that she and co-star Pierce Brosnan relished the opportunity to dive into the meaty roles of the matriarch and patriarch of a notoriously unforgiving gangster family for a second time.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat a treat at this end of our lives, you know what I mean?\u201d Mirren asks as she sits alongside Brosnan in a London hotel to discuss the acclaimed Paramount+ show. <\/p>\n
\u201cIf I was in my forties and someone said, \u2018You know, just wait, you\u2019re going to have one of the best roles of your life when you\u2019re in your blahblahblah \u2026\u2019 <\/p>\n
\u201cYou know, it came. And it is a miracle. It\u2019s fabulous. We have such a good time doing this.\u201d<\/p>\n
Mirren plays Maeve to Brosnan\u2019s Conrad, the pair ruthlessly sitting at the helm of the Harrigan crime family. Family \u2013 a highly dysfunctional one at that, to which many of us would likely relate \u2013 is at the centre of the story from creator Ronan Bennet.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think it surprised the two of us really because we were doing (2025 film) The Thursday Murder Club together and this job came along and I read the script,\u201d recalls Brosnan. <\/p>\n
\u201cWe both read the script, and Helen said, \u2018Are you going to do it?\u2019 And I said, \u2018Yeah, I think I\u2019m going to do it, I want to come back to London\u2019, and she said, \u2018OK, let\u2019s jump at it.\u201d<\/p>\n
Looking at her co-star, Mirren adds, \u201cWe held our noses and jumped in the deep end.\u201d<\/p>\n
The pair had previously appeared on screen together in classic British gangster film The Long Good Friday back in 1980, and more than 45 years later, their on-and off-screen chemistry remains. <\/p>\n
\u201cIt is all down to Pierce, I am a bitch and really difficult and he\u2019s an angel,\u201d Mirren cracks.<\/p>\n
Watching the pair chat freely is like enjoying a rally between comrades in a warm-up before a Wimbledon tennis match. <\/p>\n
They finish each other\u2019s sentences and speak with great affection and admiration, more like lifelong friends than colleagues.<\/p>\n
\u201cI just let her take the field here; I just followed her, you know,\u201d Brosnan explains. <\/p>\n
\u201cIt has been a joy. Guy Ritchie (director and executive producer), when we kicked off the season, said, \u2018Can you believe it?\u2019 He said it a few times, so it is lovely to be an unexpected surprise.\u201d<\/p>\n
Also starring Tom Hardy, Paddy Considine, Joanne Froggatt and Toby Jones, the second season of Mobland doesn\u2019t hold back, with serious bloody action from the opening minutes of the first episode.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s the best playground to play in so far,\u201d Mandeep Dhillon, who plays Seraphina Harrigan, tells The Watchlist. <\/p>\n
\u201cI mean, you\u2019ve got Dame HM, as we call her, DHM at the helm, being kind of this Machiavellian Lady M character, master puppeteer, which kind of sets the bar, and all of us have been fortunate enough to be given lovely, juicy, complex storylines, even more so in season two.<\/p>\n
When The Watchlist offers to Mirren that she plays \u201cbitch\u201d well, she smiles and replies: \u201cI do, I know. It is very weird playing Maeve. <\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t know where she comes from, quite honestly. I walk on, I put the costume on and I\u2019m just in another world. <\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t take her home with me at all, I\u2019m not that sort of actress but I get in there and I\u2019m just \u2026\u201d<\/p>\n
To that, Brosnan chimes in: \u201cIt is a free for all. It is a street fight. Likewise for me with Conrad. <\/p>\n
\u201cWhen you read the text by Jez Butterworth, this great writer, he just gives you these jewels, this wonderful character, but honestly, I thought about how to play it and then when I came to play it on the very first day, it just popped out of the box.\u201d<\/p>\n
In response, Mirren notes that she can \u201cfeel that. I see that happen. He is so different from you as a person.\u201d<\/p>\n
Mobland season two is streaming now on Paramount+. Read the full cover story with Helen Mirren and Pierce Brosnan in a new issue of The Watchlist, out in the Sunday papers. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Dame Helen Mirren admits it herself: she does \u201cbitch\u201d well. 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