Gwilym Lee has tackled two British institutions: playing Sir Brian May in Queen biopic Bohemian Rhapsody and Midsomer Murders. Now, the actor is taking on his third in the shape of BBC drama SAS Rogue Heroes.
In the show’s much anticipated second season, the 41-year-old portrays Lieutenant Colonel Bill Stirling. And he has more in common with him than may meet the eye, he reveals to Metro over Zoom before Christmas.
Gwilym has a real-life connection to the military through his maternal and paternal grandfather. The former was in the Merchant Navy during the Second World War, while the latter, affectionately called Grampy, was an engineer in the RAF.
It was Grampy who told Gwilym a story that ‘rang bells’ with the acts of subterfuge and deceit actioned by British army officer Dudley Clarke, played by Dominic West in SAS Rogue Heroes.
He recalls: ‘When Grampy was in France, they used to bolster the appearance of the aircraft on the airstrip by building wooden aeroplanes because they used to see these German spy planes go over.
‘So, they started building wooden planes to make it appear like they had more hardware than they did, and the Germans flew over, saw them and the next day dropped bombs on the wooden planes.
‘This was exactly the kind of stuff that Dudley Clarke was doing: all these little acts of war that you’re just not fully aware of.’
Clarke is still considered one of the greatest masters of military deception for hoodwinking the Nazis, including making them believe non-existent troops were a threat. Gwilym’s character Bill Stirling also leaves behind an impressive legacy. He has been called the ‘real genius’ behind the SAS.
Stirling ‘never really involved himself too much in the actual action’, as Gwylim puts it, but was an officer who straddled a role between being a politician and a soldier, operating very much behind the scenes.
That means that unlike some of his co-stars, Gwilym was not required to re-enact battles on the front line. He admits, half-jokingly, that he found this ‘frustrating’ as an actor.
Gwilym says: ‘He turns up when the dust is settled and gives orders for the next operation – which is a bit gutting and frustrating from my point of view because I wanted to be on the front line with boys, firing guns and having explosions go off. But I was always one step behind the action.
‘The character’s frustration echoes mine because Bill feels quite impotent throughout the first half of the season – desperate to get into action, desperate for the SAS to have their first mission, and feeling quite frustrated at his lack of action. I managed to play that out in my own experience as well.’
The first season of SAS Rogue Heroes followed how the Special Forces unit, the SAS, was formed under extraordinary circumstances in the darkest days of World War Two. The deep-penetration commando unit still exists today although its exact operations are strictly confidential. It is, though, involved in counter-terrorism, hostage rescue, direct action and covert reconnaissance.
It starred the likes of Sex Education star Connor Swindells as maverick SAS founder Sir David Stirling and was a triumph for the BBC – earning a 100% score on Rotten Tomatoes. Gwilym admits he felt a sense of pressure as a new cast member in season two.
‘You definitely feel a responsibility,’ he says. ‘I was a huge fan of the first series, so I didn’t want to be responsible for a lack of quality or anything like that.
‘I wanted to continue telling this brilliant story to such a high standard in a way that matches the bar set in the first season.’
Gwilym also jokes that ‘life imitated art’ as he had a much easier ride on season 2 than some of his co-stars, who contended with tougher filming conditions in the show’s first instalment.
He says: ‘All of us new recruits came in not having served our hard times in the desert of Morocco, where they shot the first season, There was incredible heat and sand and all those difficult obstacles. We cruised in and shot in beautiful resorts in Croatia – and that was a little bit jammy, to be honest with you.
‘But it fitted the character of Bill and the nature of him having to come in and try and prove himself to these battle-hardened men, and try to stamp his authority a little bit and make his presence felt.
‘The cast is an amazing bunch that, despite the fact that there are some big alpha presences such was the nature of the story and the nature of the characters, they were all incredibly welcoming, generous and open-hearted in their approach to work.’
SAS Rogue Heroes series two is available in full on BBC iPlayer and airs on BBC One from 9pm tonight.
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