By now, you might be a couple of episodes deep into Prime Video’s latest thriller By now, you might be a couple of episodes deep into Prime Video’s latest thriller, The Assassin. And if that’s the case, you likely have a few questions along the lines of: “What am I watching?”, “What is going on?” and, most importantly, “What is an actor like Keeley Hawes doing in this slop?”
Hawes is one of Britain’s finest actors – so while she is as magnetic as ever as retired hitwoman Julie, it is rather strange to see her in a sub-par James Bond rip-off. Away from The Assassin, Hawes’s inclusion in a cast list is usually a mark of quality, a sign that this drama will be above par.
Take Bodyguard, the 2018 heart-thumping political thriller, which became the most watched BBC drama in a decade. Before that, she appeared in Line of Duty, another of Britain’s most revered – and most watched – series. Both performances earned her Bafta nominations.
Her ability to bring humanity and warmth to morally grey – and sometimes even hateful – characters is second to none. A Hawes performance is all about restraint, grounding her performances with a calm authority that assures us we’re in good hands. Whether she’s playing a bent copper, a power-hungry MP or a widowed mother living in sun-soaked Corfu, Hawes’s women are fully-realised, multi-dimensional and believable.
So, forget The Assassin – these are the seven Keeley Hawes performances that prove she’s one of our best:
Line of Duty series two and three (2014 – 2016)
We first meet Detective Inspector Lindsay Denton in series two of the BBC’s smash hit police procedural, when she becomes the sole survivor of an ambush while transporting a witness. Turns out, she was the one who had leaked the location of the safe house and lied about having orders to move the witness – in the name of exposing police corruption, mind.
Denton is quintessential Hawes: a tough, morally opaque woman with questionable decision-making skills, but ultimately good intentions. No wonder the character earned the actor the nickname “Steely Keeley”. Love her or hate her (and many do), there’s no denying that she’s one of the most compelling and enthralling characters Line of Duty has ever had.
Streaming on BBC iPlayer and Netflix
It’s a Sin (2021)
Even when playing a side character, Hawes has the power to draw all the attention towards her. As Valerie Tozer, the mother of Olly Alexander’s tragic main character Ritchie, she is cast as the villain of Russell T Davies’s Aids drama – a dowdy, uppity, stick-in-the-mud whose obsession with keeping up appearances made her blind to her son’s struggles.
But Hawes’s sympathetic performance turns Valerie from just an uncaring mother to a victim of her own domestic prison. The final episode – in which Valerie takes a dying Ritchie home and isolates him from his friends – sees Hawes portray every stage of grief with extraordinary intimacy, making it one of her finest, most underrated performances to date.
Streaming on Channel 4 and Disney+
Bodyguard (2018)
Arguably, the series that made Hawes – and her co-star Richard Madden – into the respected television actors they are today, Bodyguard’s popularity cannot be understated. Over 10 million of us tuned in to the finale, and it’s still the BBC’s second most-watched drama of all time – behind only the climax of Line of Duty’s sixth series.
Hawes plays Tory Home Secretary Julia Montague, whose controversial politics and ruthless ambition to become Prime Minister have made her the target of some rather dangerous people. Enter bodyguard David Budd (Madden), who is tasked with protecting Montague, despite disagreeing with everything she stands for.
Hawes could have made Montague a callous, loathsome politician, but, as ever, she put the work in to make sure she was a three-dimensional person with real motivations for her somewhat questionable leadership. She reportedly met with then-home secretary Amber Rudd, presumably to get some insight into how being a Conservative woman in the public eye really felt. Rudd, in turn, said that Hawes’s depiction was “pretty accurate” – though admitted that the sex scenes were “a little far-fetched”.
Streaming on Netflix
Ashes to Ashes (2008 – 2010)
Heading up a spin-off series is no easy task – especially when the show you’re following is as brilliant as Life on Mars. Hawes plays DI Alex Drake, who is shot dead in 2008, only to wake up in 1981 London. Is she dead? Is she alive? Turns out, neither. But I won’t spoil it.
Despite the sci-fi elements of the series (which only get more surreal as the story progresses), Hawes does what she does best with Alex and makes her a believable, vulnerable character. At the centre of her strife is the fact that she’s left her daughter, Molly, behind in 2008 and is understandably desperate to get back to her. But even while grieving, Alex is a competent, clever detective. She regularly holds her own against Philip Glenister’s gruff DCI Gene Hunt – and has the best 80s perm British TV has ever seen.
Streaming on Now
The Missing series two (2016)
Hawes has a knack for commanding attention even when she’s not carrying the main storyline. In the second series of The Missing, she is Gemma Webster, a distraught mother whose daughter makes a surprise return years after being abducted.
With such an emotionally charged storyline, Hawes would have had carte blanche to dial up the melodrama, but Gemma holds her anguish close to her chest. Surprisingly, she isn’t over the moon to welcome her daughter back into the family fold and has suspicions over where she had really been. Hawes plays this inner turmoil with her signature, expert subtlety – once again, refusing to overegg Gemma’s pain. A masterclass in restraint.
Streaming on BBC iPlayer and Disney+
The Durrells (2016 – 2019)
Louisa Durrell is quite unlike any other Keeley Hawes character. She is charming, funny, and exudes warmth, without any dark secrets or unthinkable trauma to hide. Her life isn’t all smiles and rainbows, of course – she’s a widow who has been left to look after her four eccentric children all alone. But there’s only so much inner turmoil one can bring to a cosy Sunday night drama – particularly one set in sunny Corfu.
The brilliance of Hawes in The Durrells is how she never lets the series slip into saccharine mawkishness. For all her maternal loveliness, Louisa has a sharp wit and a very British sarcasm about her – let’s just say, you’d definitely want her on your side in an argument.
Streaming on Netflix and Disney+
Miss Austen (2025)
The woman who burned a trove of Jane Austen’s personal letters is no doubt seen as the bad guy in some historical circles. But Hawes plays the author’s sister, Cassandra, with unbridled sympathy and re-frames her destruction of historical documents as an act of sororal love. In any case, how was she to know that the letters would become so important?
Just like Jane, Cassandra is portrayed as a woman ahead of her time, a frustration that Hawes handles with her usual emotional dexterity. Despite playing such a huge role in Jane’s story, Cassandra is a largely forgotten historical figure and those who do remember her have cast her as a villain – Hawes’s vivid, humane performance goes some way to changing that.
Streaming on BBC iPlayer
