David Attenborough's great-nephew gets explosive role in brand new drama

Daily Mirror

5 hours ago

A new addictive series is coming to U&Drama and one name in the line-up might have a familiar ring to it. Sir David Attenborough's great-nephew Will takes on a surprising role.
David Attenborough has retired from public life but another member of his family is keeping his legacy in the spotlight.
David, 99, has most recently starred in a powerful documentary to raise the alarm bells for our oceans. Now, Sir David Attenborough 's great-nephew Will Attenborough stars in a new show on U&Drama, titled Outrageous, alongside Bessie Carter, James Purefoy, Anna Chancellor and Joshua Sasse.
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In the six-part series, Will, 33, plays a fictional character named Joss, crafted from several real figures. 'It was originally going to be Evelyn Waugh, then writer Sarah Williams thought it'd be interesting to make him Jewish, but not very openly,' Will says. 'He's also gay, but that's never really talked about in the show.'
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Joss forms a bond with main character Nancy, played by Bessie Carter, particularly in scenes that reflect the wider political chaos of the time. One scene in Buckinghamshire stands out to Will in particular.
'They're talking about the far-right,' he remembers, 'And we were filming while riots were actually happening around the country last summer. It was a reminder: 'These things don't happen in isolation. There's a culture behind it. History is being repeated.''
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Actress Bessie Carter made her name as the scheming Prudence Featherington in Bridgerton. Now, she's taking centre stage in Outrageous, a drama with bite, built on truth, and unafraid to rattle the bones of British history.
Adapted from Mary S. Lovell's novel The Mitford Girls, the six-part series set in the 1930s sees Bessie play Nancy Mitford - the eldest of six aristocratic siblings who each challenged, defied or catastrophically clashed with the values of their time. 'I knew a weird amount about them already,' Bessie says, 'I've been strangely connected to Nancy for ages.'
That connection turns out to be more than just artistic. Bessie, who is the daughter of actors Jim Carter and Imedla Staunton, voiced the audiobook of Nancy's The Pursuit of Love and later discovered they shared some eerie life overlaps.
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'I found out I went to the same school as her for the same amount of time, only three years. During the war she worked at St Mary's Hospital, which is where I was born,' Bessie says. 'She lived in Maida Vale, 10 minutes from where I used to live. It's a series of really odd coincidences.'
That synchronicity only deepened Bessie's instinct for Nancy. In Outrageous, Nancy is the anchor - a writer determined to make sense of the crumbling world around her, and to carve a new one through sharp prose and even sharper choices.
Her sisters, however, take wildly different paths. 'They want to find their own rules because there's so much to fight against in that house. They grew up with a bit of a dictator as a father,' says Bessie, 'Nancy is fearless as a writer, but the others veer off into other directions perhaps because they lack real purpose in life.'
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Enter Joanna Vanderham as Diana, Nancy's closest sister - and political opposite. At first, Diana is the glamorous wife of London's richest man.
But after a bitter divorce, she finds solace in Oswald Mosley, founder of the British Union of Fascists. The series traces her transformation and the painful wedge it drives between her and Nancy.
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'Diana and Nancy are best friends to begin with, but the story follows the breakdown of their relationship,' Joanna says, 'You realise how problematic fascism is through Nancy's eyes because you see what it does to Diana. Politics cause the fracture between them. Neither can see it from the other's perspective.'
To make matters worse, Diana's relationship with Oswald is nothing short of hectic. 'He's had numerous affairs, but she stood by him,' Joanna says.
'When she says, 'He's the one I'm going to spend the rest of my life with,' she makes that happen.' Joanna adds: 'The Mitfords are known for their sense of humour but Diana starts losing that. She can't poke fun at herself anymore. She becomes a bit uptight and keeps her emotions very private.'
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Yet she remains outspoken about her views - which became increasingly difficult for Joanna to portray on-screen. 'I had a line the other day and was like, 'This is just horrible to say and to think,'' Joanna recalls. 'The biggest acting demand is to say that with conviction and to not feel physically revolted by it.'
To ground her own performance, Bessie leaned on the sisters' extensive real-life correspondence. 'One book I found really useful was The Mitford: Letters Between Six Sisters. They wrote over 17,000 letters between them,' Bessie says, 'This book obviously doesn't contain nearly as many as that, but it's already as thick as a brick.'
Outrageous doesn't shy away from the more uncomfortable chapters. Shannon Watson plays Unity Mitford, infamous for her obsession with Adolf Hitler and her open antisemitism. Zoe Brough also joins the cast as Jessica Mitford, who became a staunch communist.
The ideological gulf between the sisters mirrors the chaos of the era. 'We see the pressure these political divides put on Nancy,' says Bessie. 'Do you stay true to your family because they are blood…or do you stay true to yourself and your beliefs? I found all that so interesting.'
Outrageous airs on U and U&Drama from Thursday, June 19th.