Killing Eve’s Harriet Walter: "Women should be allowed to be controversial, difficult and rude" – harpersbazaar.com

There is a scene in the third episode of Killing Eve season three so unexpected and irreverent that it takes you aback. Villanelle and her former assassin trainer Dasha, played by Harriet Walter, are talking over a restaurant table in Barcelona when the baby that they have acquired starts crying and throwing food. Dasha, without fuss or hesitation, swiftly picks up the child, walks her across the street and places her firmly in a rubbish bin. She walks back to the dinner table and the pair continue their conversation as if nothing has happened.

To me, that moment defines what sort of spirit were to take the whole series in, says Walter on the phone from her London home. Its an emblem of tongue-in-cheek cruelty a black comic ridiculousness. Part of the appeal of Villanelle and Dasha is that sometimes they do things that people in their darkest imaginations want to do but cant. If a baby is crying, you might think, I want to put him or her in the bin, but of course you don't for obvious reasons. In Killing Eve, it amuses people because audiences know that there have been times that they wanted to do the same thing.

Walter is Killing Eves latest and most dangerous new recruit in terms of what she has taught the shows star murderess. She assumes the role of a Russian former Olympic gymnast and KGB veteran who trained and mentored Villanelle her disguises, accents and imaginative forms of killing were all from the Dasha school of assassins.

For Walter, playing such a gloriously immoral and wild character was very freeing. Over her five-decade-long career, which was topped off with a damehood in 2011, the actress has played a lot of genteel, distinguished women, from Clementine Churchill to Lady Macbeth to Lady Caroline Collingwood in the hugely popular HBO series, Succession. Erratic and unconventional Dasha, who favours leopard print and 70s sportswear, was an opportunity to show off another facet to her personality.

Villanelle and Dasha do things that people in their darkest imaginations want to do, but can't

Its different to anything Ive ever done, she says. I have a crazy side to me that no one has ever seen I dont think anyone has ever thought of me like that before. In theatre, Ive played wider roles, but on-screen, they go on what you look like and think you can play only aristocratic people. Its nice to play someone loopy. It was very liberating.

Perhaps the reason Walter is so skilled at playing members of the aristocracy (but also, we see now, unpredictable, brash assassins) is because her family comes from such stock. Her father is the late actor, Sir Christopher Lee, and her lineage goes back to Thomas Walter, who founded The Times newspaper in 1785. The family helmed the company until the 20th-century. Walter rejected a place at Oxford University to try her hand at acting, only to be rejected by five drama schools before eventually being accepted at London Academy of Music and Art. Her career started with fringe theatre before she began a long-standing, fruitful relationship with the Royal Shakespeare Company. She's still an avid fan of Shakespeare and wishes he were here to make a series of works about the world we live in today. "I'd ask him to include 50 per cent women at least," she says.

Des Willie

One constant that she has noticed through her career is how little our perceptions have changed in how women are perceived. The reason, she says, that we are so shocked by the behaviour of Villanelle is that we still believe it is a female duty to be nice.

Our cultural heritage is to be the people who are caring and nurturing, she says. That goes back to primitive cavemen. This idea is so deeply embedded in our culture that it wont change with just a few decades of feminism. Its part of our equipment and rightly so, I want to be a caring person. I just want women to be allowed to be controversial, difficult, unpleasant and rude. I want them to be allowed to be the things we all are, as well as being caring and kind. Give me a nurturing woman over an aggressive man any day, but we also ought to be permitted to have the dark side ourselves acknowledged.

She says this mentality is particularly obvious in politics where the double standards between men and women are so patently stark.

I want women to be allowed to be the things we all are, as well as being caring and kind

Theres a deep-rooted feeling of I dont like Hillary Clinton or somebody. She is only behaving how a politician should behave, but because its in a female form people think, I dont like her, Im not going to vote for her. That definitely still exists and its hard to get rid of, but its so important that we do. If were to have real equality, if were really going to have our voice in the public arena and run companies and organisations and make laws if women are going to get to 50/50 which is what were all aiming for, then we have to accept that not all women are going to be nice.

Walter was due to star alongside Ben Affleck, Matt Damon and her Killing Eve castmate Jodie Comer, in Ridley Scotts historical drama film The Last Duel, which has been postponed due to the pandemic. She isnt too worried about the impact that the virus will have on the film industry, but the theatre business gives her more cause for concern. UK venues have been shut since late March and all West End performances cancelled until at least 31 May.

Mike MarslandGetty Images

Its essential to our nature to share stories and to act them out, says Walter firmly. Live performance will take on a different form in terms of where its performed and the scale of how its performed. Were so theatrical in Britain, but weve always had to persuade and argue our case to governments ever since I started my career. They call it subsidising the arts, but I call investing in the arts. We pay back three times what the governments invest in terms of people who come to Britain just to see theatre, opera or ballet, or the sales we make through TV, film and music. Yet, its never recognised as a source of revenue. It makes me quite prickly.

For now, Walter is focusing on the BBCs remake of Alan Bennetts critically acclaimed and multi-award-winning Talking Heads monologues, which will air in the next coming months. She will star in Soldiering On, which explores grief and our very British way of dealing (or not dealing) with it.

Jill KenningtonGetty Images

As a nation, up until when Diana died and everyone said wed changed hugely, weve projected an image which said, we dont make a fuss, we just get on with it, its self-indulgent to be introspective. I grew up with those attitudes, but I didnt go along with them thats probably why I became an actress, she laughs. We didnt get hysterical or overexcited all those things were seen as very uncool and very un-British and thats done an awful lot of damage to people inside. Theres a lot of mental illness as a result. Im not saying other countries dont have that, but they have them for different reasons.

In September, Walter will turn 70. Growing older has helped her to go easier on herself and to appreciate what she has. People are easier in my company now, she adds. Before they might have felt competitive or more critical, now they think the old dears 70, what can she do? Im part joking.

Of course, shes joking. Few could underestimate Harriet Walter, given her body of work and twinkly-eyed dark humour. She wont toast her birthday with a large-scale celebration (Big parties are for other people, theyre never that enjoyable for the person themselves), but she is considering a few smaller ideas pandemic depending. I might have a series of little parties that have different groups that would enjoy different things, picnic in a park for one lot, dinner round a dining table for another, she ponders. Maybe Ill just sit at home and think, thank god I got through with that one, on with the show.

Killing Eve is available to watch on BBC One now

In need of some at-home inspiration? Sign up to our free weekly newsletter for skincare and self-care, the latest cultural hits to read and download, and the little luxuries that make staying in so much more satisfying.

SIGN UP

The rest is here:
Killing Eve's Harriet Walter: "Women should be allowed to be controversial, difficult and rude" - harpersbazaar.com

Reviewed and Recommended by Erik Baquero