‘It feels like a good time to be Scottish and to be an actor’: Life according to Strictly star, Joe McFadden

The actor chats about his successes from Taggart to Miss Marple via Strictly.

You’re in the stage version of Agatha Christie’s The Mirror Crack’d. What can you tell us about it?

I play film director Jason Rudd, who is married to Hollywood star Marina Gregg – played by Sophie Ward – and we move to this sleepy town of St Mary Mead, which they think will be sedate and laidback.

But we have a party and someone is murdered and the rest of the play is about trying to figure out who murdered her. It’s set in the ’60s, when the village and the world were changing.

Who plays Miss Marple?

Susie Blake (Coronation Street, Mrs Brown’s Boys) is an amazing Marple. She brings a real warmth, as well as fun and comedy. It’s a character people know so well but she brings a new element to it.

Are you a fan of whodunnits?

I absorbed them as a child because my mum was obsessed with murder-mysteries – Murder She Wrote, Taggart, Poirot, Morse. There was always someone on TV trying to solve something in my house growing up, so it is very much part of my conscience.

The tour ends in Aberdeen. Are you looking forward to coming home to Scotland?

It’s lovely to bring a show to Scotland because the audiences are always so vocal. It’s cool that our only Scottish date is the final date of the tour. I’m looking forward to seeing what the cast thinks of the city, because it’s such a terrific place.

Have you worked in Aberdeen before?

I went for the first time before doing a play with Dawn Steele and Graham McTavish from Outlander at the Royal Court, which Richard Wilson directed.

It was set in the high-rise flats in the city and I’d never been, so Richard took myself, Dawn and Graham up for the weekend, because it was important to know the area and its characters. There’s nowhere else like it in the world, even just in the way it looks with all that granite.

What was it like being directed by Richard Wilson?

He’s brilliant, one of my favourites. He reminds me of our director in this play, Philip Franks, as they both have a brilliant vision and good taste.

Since winning Strictly Come Dancing in 2017, you’ve done mostly stage work. Is that by design?

I suppose doing something like Strictly, I’ve been offered more tours, such as Priscilla. But I don’t have a grand plan of which jobs I want to do. Also, it’s nice to be in a company again. I was in Priscilla when we went into lockdown and this is the first job I’ve done after lockdown. It’s exactly what I needed.

You made your professional debut 35 years ago in Taggart, aged 12, and successfully made the transition from child star to adult actor. Not everyone manages that – what do you put your success down to?

So much of it is luck – you can be the best actor in the world and not get the breaks. You know, doing something like High Road, then I was lucky to do Small Faces, then The Crow Road, and then an agent in London showed an interest.

It’s luck but it’s also bravery of having the guts to go where the work is. It’s a big decision to move away aged 20, so maybe the secret is having the guts to go where the work is but also to just keep doing it, because you need to have thick skin. I’ve been super lucky, touchwood, and long may it continue.

What’s next?

I’m up for some really exciting things and there’s loads of stuff happening in Scotland, like Karen Pirie, Shetland and Rebus returning. It feels like a good time to be Scottish and to be an actor, so fingers crossed I’ll be involved in some of those projects.

Joe McFadden stars in The Mirror Crack’d, His Majesty’s Theatre, Aberdeen, until Saturday.