Imelda Staunton plays Mrs Sucksby
The filthy back streets of Victorian London that form the backdrop to Fingersmith are a far cry from the bright lights and red carpet of Tinsel Town.
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But British Oscar contender Imelda Staunton had no problem swapping glamour for grime to play Mrs Sucksby in ´óÏó´«Ã½ ONE's new drama.
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In fact, she says, she felt perfectly at home.
Despite leaving last month's Academy Awards empty-handed, the Vera Drake star stole the headlines with her Best Actress nomination for her role as an illegal abortionist in Mike Leigh's masterpiece.
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Now, as Mrs Sucksby, the matriarch in a household of petty thieves and charlatans, she is set to steal a whole lot more.
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"I have to say, after Vera Drake, I thought I'll never get anything like that again – so to get Mrs Sucksby, another really good part, is just fantastic," says the 49-year-old North London actress.
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Staunton describes Sarah Waters' 1860s thriller as "a real page-turner" that should keep viewers hooked.
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"The characters are survivors. It's all very rough and ready – the darkness of their lives and the desperateness of their lives.
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"They'll do anything – literally – to get what they need. All of them are in the underbelly of society and that appealed to me.
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"It felt very natural, I felt very at home... Now what does that say?" she laughs.
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She lives in London with her partner, actor Jim Carter, and their 11-year-old daughter Bessie - who is, she says, more interested in athletics than dramatics.
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Staunton is one of our most accomplished stage actresses and has been a mainstay of British drama and independent film for almost 30 years.
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A graduate of Rada, one of Staunton's earliest screen appearances was in the critically acclaimed Dennis Potter series The Singing Detective.
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Her lengthy CV also features stage roles in Alan Ayckbourn's A Chorus Of Disapproval and Stephen Sondheim's musical Into The Woods, both of which earned her Olivier Awards; big screen outings in Shakespeare In Love, Ang Lee's Sense And Sensibility and the Hollywood version of Much Ado About Nothing; a stint with a big band; and even a clinch with Mel Gibson, when she provided the voice of brassy Northern bird, Bunty, in the smash-hit animation Chicken Run.
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But it was 2004's Vera Drake that really turned the spotlight on Staunton.
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Though she lost out on the Oscar to Million Dollar Baby's Hilary Swank, the film earned her a clutch of gongs, including the coveted Bafta, New York and LA Film Critics' Awards and the Venice Film Festival award for Best Actress.
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To the delight of the Fingersmith cast, Staunton picked up the latter midway through filming – though the drama's costume designer almost fainted when Staunton declared that she was going to pick up a frock for the ceremony on the way to the airport.
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"I had to fly out that weekend and I had nothing to wear, so I was just going to pick something up in the morning. The costume designer went into shock; she said, 'You can't do that!' and went straight out and chose me some outfits to try on!
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"Then I came back on the Monday and they all gave me a round of applause on set. It was grand," she says.
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Later this year, audiences will see Staunton back on the big screen in a children's film, Nanny McPhee, written by and starring her friend Emma Thompson, in which she does a turn as "Very Grumpy Cook Below Stairs".
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