Of the many disgraced MI5 operatives that the Park has assigned to Slough House on Apple TV’s Slow Horses, only three have remained under the “guidance” of Gary Oldman’s Jackson Lamb for all six seasons.
TV Fanatic recently had the privilege of speaking to two of these legacy agents: Christopher Chung, who plays tech specialist Roddy Ho; and Saskia Reeves, who portrays the Slough House administrator, Catherine Standish.
Dive into our exclusives below!
Christopher Chung as Roddy Ho
As one of the Slough House agents who has been there from the beginning of the series, how do you feel Slow Horses Season 6 might be a turning point for Roddy Ho?
Christopher Chung: Every season is a little bit of a turning point. With all the characters, there’s such minute growth within each, which is why people will continue to tune back in; why the audience keeps coming back to see them because they know what to expect.
There’s not huge amounts of character development or change that happens except maybe for River. He goes through the biggest emotional journey throughout the past six seasons.
There are some set pieces within Season 6 that do inherently change Ho and his belief system. That’s quite illustrated as you get towards the end of the season. That was a really nice thing to explore because I haven’t been able to do that kind of work in the previous seasons.
Getting Inside Roddy’s Head
Roddy’s personality is uniquely consistent. As a person and an actor, where did you find your access points to portraying the character?
My first thing with any character that I develop is making sure that I don’t place any judgment on who they are because it completely disconnects you from a path into that character.
For me, it was more about understanding why he is the way he is and what was his upbringing and what kind of personality. Is he slightly on the spectrum? How does he view the world? Why does he view the world that way?
So, really interrogating and questioning his worldview and justifying it for him was the first thing that I looked for when I got the part.
Those things I haven’t really spoken about publicly because I think some things with characters and my process I like to keep for myself because I don’t like people to start picking it apart.
I hold those things very closely when I’m working, and now, because I’ve played him for six seasons, they’re just kind of within the DNA of me, so I know exactly: if this is the situation he’s in, this is exactly how he’s going to respond.
The Slough House Bond
Where do Roddy’s loyalties lie?
To himself. [laughs] No, I was thinking about this the other day.
With all of the Slow Horses, though they might grate on one another and wind each other up, there is this unspoken bond between all of them, where they know that they would put their necks out on the line for one another if need be.
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That’s quite evident when people start to drop off. It does hit them in ways that they don’t expect ’cause they don’t outwardly show affection or admiration for one another.
But actually, because they’re all in the same predicament of being in Slough House, having been cast aside from the Park, they have a shared bond in that.
So, when one of them goes, or one of them is in trouble, there is a call to action there.
Roddy in Action
On Slow Horses Season 6 Episode 2, “Daddy Issues,” Jackson Lamb orders Blake’s Grave for the first time since Slow Horses Season 1. It’s the fastest Roddy’s ever responded to an order. Was this because of the order, or because the order came from Lamb?
It is the order. But also, obviously, it’s coming from Lamb. First and foremost, these Slow Horses, they’re spies. They operate from a code of conduct, and there are certain things that they know, when they’re said, mean business, and that is one of them.
“Blake’s Grave” [means] any of us could be in danger right now. Immediately, the stakes are risen high. It’s a real nice shift because to see Roddy shift away from his nonchalant, obnoxious self to being like, “Okay, it’s business now.”
He can be the spy that you have to be in that situation. He can do that. That was quite interesting to play.
Roddy on Paper
When exploring Roddy’s character, did you go back to the source material and read Mick Herron’s books?
Oh, yeah. I’ve read them all. They’re such a great blueprint for the world.
And because of the way Mick writes Roddy specifically, it’s very much an internal monologue, which is so useful as an actor because you’re getting first-hand source material for the inside workings of a character’s head and their worldview.
I did a lot of deep-diving into Mick’s writing when I first got the job. I read the first four books. And then I started reading them as the seasons progressed because I didn’t want to pre-empt anything else. I’ve definitely done a lot of time with Mick’s writing.
If there are Moscow Rules and London Rules, what are Roddy’s Rules?
[laughs] That’s a good one! Roddy’s Rules are: “Live fast. Don’t die young.”
Saskia Reeves as Catherine Standish
As a legacy Slow Horse, how do you see Catherine’s journey through the six seasons of the series so far?
Saskia Reeves: It’s an interesting question because I do think about these things.
So in [Season] 1, she’s trying to get to the bottom of what happened.
What is lovely about playing her is that in [Season] 1, she’s the only character where you get flashbacks. She’s the only one where you saw her home. She’s the only one where you got some idea of her personal life.
The others, it’s hinted at. And then, as we go on into the stories, we start to see where people live.
In [Season] 2, we find out where Louisa lives. And then we find out where Roddy lives and so on.
But Catherine in [Season] 1, she wants to get to the bottom of what’s going on. What went on. She was thrown a lifeline by Lamb to work at Slough House, and she took it.
This is backstory stuff, but he offered her a job, and the understanding is, “If you stay sober. You can stay working for me as long as you stay sober.”
And so, this idea of him offering her drinks all the time is him going, “You okay? You still on the wagon?” His idea of a laugh most people find really cruel, but I understand it. I understand why he does it to her.
Catherine’s Path
And in [Season] 2, she tries to be useful. The longer she stays sober, the more useful she wants to be.
In [Season] 3, she gets kidnapped. At the end of [Season] 3, she thinks she can’t bear the lies and the deceit and the mistrust and the shenanigans and the skullduggery from the people at the top, in the Park, MI-5, and she quits.
Lamb tells her that Charles — although he shot himself and he gave him the gun — was a traitor. That was deeply disturbing to her. So she quits.
And then in [Season] 4, you realize that she has no life outside of Slough House. I remember Will Smith saying to me once, “What do you think she does? Should we have stuff in her flat?”
And I thought about it. There’s a line in the book that Mick Herron wrote which is: Lamb comes into her flat, and he looks at the calendar on her wall, and there’s nothing there.
And he makes a joke like, “I see you’re busy.” In other words, she’s not busy. And I took that to mean she can’t stop thinking about Slough House. She can’t stop watching the news, reading the newspapers, thinking about the politics of the country.
Slough House Lifer
She should be there [at Slough House], being useful. It’s easier, it’s better to be at work and sober than to be at home and sober. And so she gets drawn back into the job.
And [Season] 5. We lose Marcus in [Season] 4, and she’s very worried about Shirley.
I always think of Catherine more as a good cop to Lamb’s bad cop. Some people call her a mother hen, but I don’t think she has very strong mothering instincts.
She just cares about people’s mental state and, as a reformed addict, she knows what that’s like. She’s very worried for Shirley.
Then [in Season] 6, things fall apart very quickly, but things just go in and in and in and in. People die. Things go wrong. The people at the top are terrible. She struggles with her relationship with her job. A lot.
But, ultimately, she’s committed. And she recommits, and she recommits. I wouldn’t say she forgives Lamb entirely, but she understands why he would’ve had to do something like that. He would’ve been made to do something like that. That’s part of the job.
He didn’t tell her. Okay, he lied to her, but as he said, “We’re spies. We lie. That’s what we do.” She knows that. Deep, deep down, she knows that.
Inside Looking Out
On Slow Horses Season 6 Episode 3, “Resurrection,” she’s the only one who knows where Louisa now lives and works. When she and Shirley find Louisa, do you think Catherine feels envious that Louisa is thriving after leaving Slough House?
No, but Shirley definitely is. Catherine has come to some self-acceptance that she is where she is because she has made this mess herself.
She was a drunk. And she didn’t advance the way she wanted.
She was so drunk, she didn’t realize that Charles Partner would’ve used her as his fall guy if anything had gone wrong. She trusted this man, adored this man.
As a side story, I remember when the lovely actor came to play Charles Partner. We did those flashback scenes where he’s in his flat, and [Catherine] comes in. She’s younger, and she’s got his suit. She’s looking after him.
We were talking, myself and the other actor, and we were improvising a bit, just playing around with these characters.
And we both came to the realization at the same time that Charles Partner might be gay, and Catherine might be the only person who knows. It’s their secret. It was such a lovely, private detail in their relationship.
I just thought, “That’s really nice. I don’t have to share it. And I don’t have to get anyone’s approval with that story. It’s just a nice little detail for me in my imagination.”
And the other actor, who was playing him, agreed. He said, “Yeah, I think so, too.”
So her heartbreak (of many) is that Charles actually used her, and that’s a terrible feeling. But it’s part of the problem when you work for MI5. You become a very unpleasant person. She knows that.
And I think probably she’s relieved for Louisa — rather than envious — that she’s gone.
Seasons 1-5 of Slow Horses are available to stream on Apple TV.
New episodes of Slow Horses Season 6 drop every Wednesday until October 21.
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