Ashes to Ashes - The Finale
Call off the Hunt! Philip Glenister is firing up the Quattro for the final time in the time-slip police show.
The doors to the south London film studio fly open and the maverick cop Gene Hunt, his face like thunder, comes striding down the corridor, scattering uniformed PCs in his wake. “The bulldozers have arrived,” he snarls. “They’ve torn down Luigi’s wine bar — bastards!”
This isn’t part of the script, but Philip Glenister, 47, who plays the iconic cop, is still in character, bemoaning the dismantling of the Ashes to Ashes set on the last week of filming the final episodes — particularly his beloved Luigi’s, Hunt’s unofficial office and drinking den.
This series will be the very last time we’ll see Hunt, who burst onto our screens in the groundbreaking time-slip cop show Life on Mars in 2006, startling viewers with his old-school methods and some eminently quotable and deliciously foul-mouthed tirades (see right). Ashes, the follow-up show, with the policewoman Alex Drake (Keeley Hawes) thrown back to the 1980s to work beside Hunt, eclipsed Mars, pulling in seven million viewers and cementing Hunt’s reputation as one of the best-loved cops on the box.
Glenister is the first to admit that it’s been a plum role for him as the bend-the- rules-until-they-snap CID man. “It’s a gift. It’s the freedom of the character to be able to say to whoever says ‘You can’t say that’, and you say, ‘You can, bugger off please.’”
Did he watch the recent US version of Life on Mars starring Harvey Keitel?
“I thought I ought to have a look. It was this episode where they had been called to an Irish bar that had been blown up, and the bar was called Glenister’s [laughs].
It was really odd: all these characters are going ‘This bar is iconic, Glenister’s!’
I called the wife in and said, ‘Cracked it, cracked America!’” Cracking America aside, what does post-Hunt life hold for him? “It will be interesting to see what sort of scripts come in,” he says ruefully.
Part of the success of Ashes has been the interplay between Hunt and the haughty, fish-out-of-water Drake — but Keeley Hawes had a rough ride when she first appeared. Some critics weren’t kind about her stepping into John Simm’s shoes, and the public took some convincing too: “I had a woman in a nice bar in Soho say to me ‘You can’t talk to Gene Hunt like that! I’m going to smash your face in!’ People are really quite alarming.”
This time round it is the actor Daniel Mays who risks the wrath of fans, as the new character Jim Keats, a pen- pushing cop brought in to investigate the team and wind up Hunt. He is the key to explaining why Drake has travelled back in time and Mays, the Essex-born actor who recently starred in the comedy Plus One and the Red Riding trilogy, realises that there is a weight of expectation on his character. “I have struggled to sleep,” he admits. “I’ve never had that problem before. I took a few sleeping tablets. It’s very risky and bold what they’ve done with the ending and hopefully what I’m doing as an actor.”
“Some of Danny’s scenes in the last episode are some of the most difficult things an actor has to do,” Hawes says. So what happens at the end? Surely she can give us a hint? Not a chance. “Episode eight is really heartbreaking and it does tie up all of the stories so it is quite satisfying in that way.”
“I hope we’ve delivered,” Glenister says about the intriguing finale, whose details are being jealously guarded. “You never know — and the writers can take the flack if it all goes tits up!”
But this can’t be the end of Hunt can it? Surely, Glenister would be tempted to do another spin-off if it came along? “No,” he says firmly. “This is it — it’s a real tough call because it’s been such a fantastic part to play.”
What will he miss most about being Gene Hunt? “These little babies,” he says, swinging his scuffed cowboy boots onto the table, for all the world like his cop alter ego. “And Luigi’s, of course.”
The doors to the south London film studio fly open and the maverick cop Gene Hunt, his face like thunder, comes striding down the corridor, scattering uniformed PCs in his wake. “The bulldozers have arrived,” he snarls. “They’ve torn down Luigi’s wine bar — bastards!”
This isn’t part of the script, but Philip Glenister, 47, who plays the iconic cop, is still in character, bemoaning the dismantling of the Ashes to Ashes set on the last week of filming the final episodes — particularly his beloved Luigi’s, Hunt’s unofficial office and drinking den.
This series will be the very last time we’ll see Hunt, who burst onto our screens in the groundbreaking time-slip cop show Life on Mars in 2006, startling viewers with his old-school methods and some eminently quotable and deliciously foul-mouthed tirades (see right). Ashes, the follow-up show, with the policewoman Alex Drake (Keeley Hawes) thrown back to the 1980s to work beside Hunt, eclipsed Mars, pulling in seven million viewers and cementing Hunt’s reputation as one of the best-loved cops on the box.
Glenister is the first to admit that it’s been a plum role for him as the bend-the- rules-until-they-snap CID man. “It’s a gift. It’s the freedom of the character to be able to say to whoever says ‘You can’t say that’, and you say, ‘You can, bugger off please.’”
Did he watch the recent US version of Life on Mars starring Harvey Keitel?
“I thought I ought to have a look. It was this episode where they had been called to an Irish bar that had been blown up, and the bar was called Glenister’s [laughs].
It was really odd: all these characters are going ‘This bar is iconic, Glenister’s!’
I called the wife in and said, ‘Cracked it, cracked America!’” Cracking America aside, what does post-Hunt life hold for him? “It will be interesting to see what sort of scripts come in,” he says ruefully.
Part of the success of Ashes has been the interplay between Hunt and the haughty, fish-out-of-water Drake — but Keeley Hawes had a rough ride when she first appeared. Some critics weren’t kind about her stepping into John Simm’s shoes, and the public took some convincing too: “I had a woman in a nice bar in Soho say to me ‘You can’t talk to Gene Hunt like that! I’m going to smash your face in!’ People are really quite alarming.”
This time round it is the actor Daniel Mays who risks the wrath of fans, as the new character Jim Keats, a pen- pushing cop brought in to investigate the team and wind up Hunt. He is the key to explaining why Drake has travelled back in time and Mays, the Essex-born actor who recently starred in the comedy Plus One and the Red Riding trilogy, realises that there is a weight of expectation on his character. “I have struggled to sleep,” he admits. “I’ve never had that problem before. I took a few sleeping tablets. It’s very risky and bold what they’ve done with the ending and hopefully what I’m doing as an actor.”
“Some of Danny’s scenes in the last episode are some of the most difficult things an actor has to do,” Hawes says. So what happens at the end? Surely she can give us a hint? Not a chance. “Episode eight is really heartbreaking and it does tie up all of the stories so it is quite satisfying in that way.”
“I hope we’ve delivered,” Glenister says about the intriguing finale, whose details are being jealously guarded. “You never know — and the writers can take the flack if it all goes tits up!”
But this can’t be the end of Hunt can it? Surely, Glenister would be tempted to do another spin-off if it came along? “No,” he says firmly. “This is it — it’s a real tough call because it’s been such a fantastic part to play.”
What will he miss most about being Gene Hunt? “These little babies,” he says, swinging his scuffed cowboy boots onto the table, for all the world like his cop alter ego. “And Luigi’s, of course.”
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