Will all nine books be explored by the Slow Horses showrunner when adapting the series?
It’s been described as “the show where Gary Oldman farts.” At least that’s what showrunner Will Smith tells THR about his Apple TV+ series Slow Horses. The spy thriller that’s got more than a sprinkle of wry, acidulous humor was nominated for nine Emmys this year, including outstanding drama series and outstanding lead actor for the venerated Oldman.
Oldman plays Jackson Lamb, a crotchety and bedraggled MI5 agent in charge of a collection of rejected and disgraced agents operating out of Slough House, a division of the U.K. security agency for lost toys. The series is based on the popular collection of books by novelist Mick Herron, with each season following a single installment.
Through three seasons, with a fourth set to drop Sept. 4, Slow Horses has amassed a somewhat cult following. It’s a passionate fan base, Smith says, and he hopes the awards recognition at this point in the series brings more viewers into what he says has been the exact show the cast and crew set out to make on day one.
Slow Horses feels as if it’s been exactly what it wanted to be from the beginning. Do you feel like anything changed to where “OK, now we’re ready for recognition”?
No, I don’t, really. We get a tremendous amount from the books. But just to be totally honest, and trying to be as self-effacing as possible, from the moment I first saw it on the monitors, it was like watching the show. All the right people have come together at the right time. Everyone is making the same show. Everybody is dialed in to what the thing is. And before it’s all been put together and they’ve done the effects and the music and everything — just the raw material that you get — it’s just so watchable. So I feel it landed from the beginning. To me, I’ve just been like “OK, nobody change anything.” We’re on a tightrope, just keep walking.
For a spy thriller, your show is not very self-serious, and it’s funny, albeit wry. How do you think about Slow Horses and genre?
I think of it as a drama with funny moments. I like to have comedy within a drama because it helps with the realism. I just think these things are on a spectrum, and if you take comedy out completely, it lacks a dimension for me. Then I start to feel like I’m watching a TV show rather than watching people.
How much of Mick Herron’s books end up onscreen? Are your characters different from Mick’s?
The books tend to give us four acts’ worth of material, and then we’re always building out and building on from there. We try to be true to the spirit of the book and the characters. Mick always comes into the room at the beginning and the end of the process, and I’ll tell him what we’re changing and why. We always get his blessing, and he’s super supportive of everything. For instance, Freddie Fox was so, so good in [seasons] one and two; in the book, [his character] Spider, after being shot at the end of book two, he’s just in a coma and then he dies off the page. I was like, “Look, he’s so good, could we bring him back and kill him properly?” And Mick was completely up for that. So, yeah, it’s dramatizing stuff in a different way.
There are nine books. Do you think you’ll want to continue through all nine?
Yeah. I think Mick is writing the ninth now, but we’ll have to see what happens. Depends on what Apple wants and what the appetite is, but I definitely have the kind of leave-them-wanting-more rather than the outstay-your-welcome instinct … But the world of the show is there to be mined. Mick has written a terrific book called The Secret Hours, which is a sort of sidebar book that fills in the backstory of Lamb, and he brings in all these other existing characters. It’s a wonderful book that I think there’s definitely an opportunity to do a shorter-run [series] or a film or something. I know Gary wants to keep going for as long as he’s asked. He loves playing the character.
This story first appeared in an August stand-alone issue of The Hollywood Reporter magazine. To receive the magazine, click here to subscribe.