As the actor’s hi-tech conspiracy thriller returns for a third series, she spills the beans on her worst stunt injury – and why the police are now ‘dressing like the cops on the telly’
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ou’ll never wheel your suitcase through an airport in the same way again. Hit techno-conspiracy drama The Capture makes its long-awaited comeback with a chilling, thrilling opening sequence at Heathrow Terminal 5. When a hostile Russian asset lands in the UK, he hacks CCTV cameras and uses real-time image manipulation to bypass border controls and passport checks. He’s travelling under a deepfake avatar – and let’s just say he’s not in London to visit M&M’s World or see the Paddington musical.
Written and created by former documentary-maker Ben Chanan, The Capture’s ripped-from-the-headlines mix of government AI usage, state-sponsored cyber-attacks, dark web data analytics and deepfake doppelgangers will make you fear for the future. The show’s star Holliday Grainger compares it to “a longform Black Mirror”.
“Each series explores technology that feels just one step ahead of reality,” says the Manchester-born 37-year-old. “In the era of AI, it feels more and more timely. Ben does a lot of research and we have advisers who inform us about the latest developments. Not just from the Met and counter-terror but military consultants as well. They’re banks of information and a lot more open than you’d expect because it’s all off the record. The chill is the bluntness with which they say it. They’re not revealing their most classified secrets, just their run-of-the mill, day-to-day work. That’s the scariest bit. You think, if this is the stuff you’re allowed to tell me – about weapons of mass destruction or averting world war three – what are the real secrets?”
