Scots actor Solly McLeod on rapid rise with Lord Of The Rings star Viggo Mortensen

Solly McLeod smiles almost disbelievingly when he is asked to reflect on the past few years.

The rising star, who turned 24 last week, has barely had a break since he joined an acting class just one month before Covid shut the world down. If that sounds like the worst timing to start a career in entertainment, Solly’s CV proves otherwise.

He has been in television behemoths Outlander and House Of The Dragon, took the title role in ITVX’s Tom Jones mini-series, and stars opposite three-time Oscar nominee Viggo Mortensen in the upcoming western, The Dead Don’t Hurt.

That movie is one of two films featuring Solly – the other is tense police thriller Jericho Ridge – showing at the Glasgow Film Festival.

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The in-demand young actor will be in attendance at the festival for The Dead Don’t Hurt, alongside Mortensen, and it marks a homecoming for Solly.

He said: “I started a weekend acting course in February 2020. I had my first session and then lockdown hit, so I was training online and submitting material to their showcases, which is how I got my agent in November that year. I was incredibly lucky – a total anomaly for someone who started their career during lockdown. Everyone says there’s no work and then I’m like, ‘Well, actually, it’s OK…’

“It’s been more or less non-stop. I never expected to be where I am and working with the people I’m working with this early on in my career. I’m feeling very proud of myself.”

Solly’s lifelong love of performance

Solly was born into the entertainment industry – his parents are folk musicians Rory McLeod and Aimee Leonard – so he always had a sense of performing. “I knew from when I was about eight that it was what I wanted to do,” Solly said.

At that time, he was at primary school in Orkney. He added: “My mum was born in Birmingham but my nan remarried – to an Orcadian – when my mum was young and they moved up there. I was born in Galashiels and we lived in the Borders for the first few years of my life, before moving to Orkney, where my brother was born.”

Solly moved to London when he was 10. “My slight Scottish accent was beaten out of me within about two weeks of going to school – I had to change it quickly,” he laughed. “I love London and it’s the best place for what I’m doing, but it’s lovely to have Orkney to go back to. It’s such a special place and has such energy. I try to go back between jobs to reset and see my grandparents and mates from school.”

Not that time off has been in abundance since becoming an actor. He did four back-to-back jobs with just a day off between each one, flying around the world to film. He made Jericho Ridge, in which he plays a slightly dim but heroic deputy sheriff, in Kosovo, which doubled for Washington state.

“We filmed in January and February, doing night shoots filming action scenes. It was freezing – minus 15 – and we were wearing cotton police shirts. But it was great fun, a lovely group of people and Kosovo is a gorgeous place.”

He was in Berlin for a film festival when his American agent called to ask if he’d heard of Viggo Mortensen. “Of course I have, he’s one of my favourites,” Solly replied. The Lord Of The Rings star asked the talent agency if they had any young guys on their books who weren’t too well-known already. They immediately thought of Solly.

“They sent him my headshot and auditions I’d done for other projects, and then he called me,” Solly said. “He told me he had a script he wanted me to read, and he thought I’d be great for one of the characters. When I read it, the character was so much bigger than I expected. I thought it was crazy he’d come to me of all people with it. We had a couple of Zoom calls, reading through the script. It didn’t feel like an audition but I guess it was.

“It was like that thing you hear people say on talk shows, ‘Someone called me and I got the job’. And you think, no way does that ever happen. But it did. It was surreal.”

Facing off with Viggo

Solly plays Weston Jeffries, the bad guy who faces off with Mortensen.

“I’d done a little bit of horse riding for Tom Jones, but I needed to learn how to ride western-style. I found a place in London and thought it was going well. Then Viggo asked to see footage and he said, ‘Oh, OK.’

“When we got to Mexico, where we filmed, the horse master, Rex Pearson, who’s been around a long time, told me I didn’t know what I was doing. We did hours of intensive training and they ended up happy. It’s brilliant to say I can ride a horse, and I’ve done another job since where I got to ride.”

Solly is looking forward to coming to Glasgow for a Q&A following the screening of The Dead Don’t Hurt.

“It’s a joy to have the UK premiere of the film in Scotland, where I’m from. My family are coming down from Orkney. I’m nervous but it’ll be great, and I’m buzzing to see the film on the big screen.”

The Dead Don’t Hurt, March 3-4, Jericho Ridge, March 9-10, Glasgow Film Festival