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This interview ties in with episode 2

Successful lawyer Siobhan seemingly had the perfect marriage to the handsome, kind and caring Hari. However, she was unable to resist an office fling with her colleague, Dominic, and as a result fell pregnant. Siobhan was forced to confess all to her husband, who eventually agreed to stand by her.

Hari and Siobhan are now proud parents to baby Elsa, and have managed to sort out a relatively 'normal' family life.

But, despite appearances, their family unit isn't has strong as it may seem. Siobhan's marital relations are strained to say the least and Siobhan takes reckless actions to satisfy her urges in the hope that it will ultimately save her marriage.

Orla Brady tells all about the return of Mistresses, her amazing wardrobe and what it's like filming sex scenes!

What's happened with Siobhan in the year since Mistresses was last on screen?

We left Siobhan when she had just been taken back by her husband Hari in spite of being pregnant by another man. She has since had her baby, a healthy girl called Elsa and now, having finished her maternity leave, she has gone back to work.

Hari and Siobhan have decided that it is better if he quits work for a while to look after Elsa for the first year as Siobhan is the higher earner and remains engaged and interested by her work, if somewhat less determined to achieve.

They feel they are getting along fine; Hari has fully accepted Elsa as his daughter and they all seem to be getting along well.

However, there is an undercurrent in the family; uneasiness between them that will not go away. I think it is something that they are afraid to discuss for fear of it all unravelling if they do.

How does Dominic fit into Siobhan, Hari and Elsa's lives?

Dominic has come back to work for the Duggan & Co law firm having had friendly but distant contact with Siobhan during the year in between.

Although he would still hope there might be something between them, both of them steer well clear of this subject as Siobhan is racked with guilt about what their affair did to Hari.

In spite of being a bit hopeless with the whole notion of babies, Dominic does want to involve himself in Elsa's life and there is a tentative babysitting arrangement emerging.

How does Siobhan cope with the strain on her marriage?

She is not coping very well as you will see! She has a strong need to get away from what she is feeling by doing something extreme.

What was it like filming your many sex scenes?!

Filming love scenes always seems preposterous. Usually by the time you get there you feel so nervous/uncomfortable/fat etc that there is only one way to cope with it and that is by finding it quite funny!

In this instance I worked with the same crew on series one so that made it better as we all know each other and get along well. Also, I trusted my director and knew that my ass wasn't going to end up on screen in his shots, so all in all it was fine!

Siobhan wears amazing clothes. Do you like your wardrobe and do you get any say in what you wear on screen?

I don't think she is all that different from other business women in how she dresses (although I did get to wear Vivienne Westwood, which was cool).

I think British women dress well and in an individual way rather than being slavish followers of what is in fashion. I took my inspiration from women I saw going to work looking comfortable and stylish.

We have a great costume designer, Sue Thomson, who has a good eye for each character in terms of their look, but also importantly remembers where the characters are dramatically in the story.

There was a lot of give and take and listening to each other; a really lovely way to work and a great experience for all of us.

Has it been fun being re-united with Sarah, Sharon and Shelley to work on the second series?

The best fun. Although we all had such a laugh last year, it kind of really kicked off during this series as we all know each other so much better by now.

Someone made the fatal mistake of letting us share a house; our producers found a really nice house in Bristol with a really great pub just around the corner that served food. I say mistake, but in fact it was great for us as we could drop in and have cups of tea and chats and glasses of wine.

It did result in a lot of tiredness though... you know how you can't go to bed when you are sitting up having a glass of wine and chatting? That happened a bit too much and then we had to get up at 5am looking a bit worse for wear!

What was the best thing about filming Mistresses?

The girls don't get to do a lot of scenes together and when we do it feels like a party. Also I live in LA so I really enjoy spending time in England on my days off, just cycling around Bristol and going up to London to see some plays.

What do you think makes Mistresses so appealing to watch?

The only thing I am aware of is that my story seems to have happened to a lot of women as people have told me as much!

I think maybe it is relieving for women to see other women make really crap decisions at every turn. Ah yes, we watch telly to know we are not alone!

What response do you get from people in the street?

Always lovely. I have not yet been hand-bagged by a Raza Jaffrey fan although I'm sure any day now...