It’s being silly that saves me: Suranne Jones

You couldn’t imagine Doctor Foster enjoying this scene – sitting in a down-at-heel north London church hall, with toys scattered all over the floor, roaring along to Humpty Dumpty with a group of toddlers and not a glass of wine in sight.

But Suranne Jones, who has picked up a slew of awards for playing the overwrought GP, felt right at home, even more so than her little boy, who’s almost two. ‘I’m sure my son was thinking, “Mum, stop singing, you’re embarrassing”, but I was enjoying the music class more than him,’ she laughs. ‘Life is about balance. When I’m not working I like to have fun.’

Suranne, 39, treasures special times like this, when she can squeeze them in. Like many working mothers, she admits finding that balance isn’t easy; particularly when you’re one of the most in-demand stars in Britain. ‘I know I’m in a lucky position,’ she says. ‘I’m so thrilled to be doing well and that people want to employ me. It’s important to show my boy that I’m working. But I want to be home for bath time. I miss my son.

‘I don’t know if it’s possible to have the perfect balance. Like many, many mums – and dads – I feel guilty but in our house we cherish the times we’re all together – when we go to the park and have Sunday lunch.’

When the Oldham-born actress is at home – she lives in a leafy north London suburb with her son (whose name she hasn’t revealed) and Lawrence Akers, the writer husband she married three years ago after a whirlwind romance – she is plain Sarah Akers. 

Suranne is her stage name, as there was already a Sarah Anne Jones, her birthname, in the acting world. Unstarry Sarah (she never liked the Anne part) likes taking her son to Tesco because he tires himself out running up and down the aisles; she slicks her hair back when she’s too tired to wash it and wears sunglasses to cover the bags under her eyes.

It’s a far cry from her latest character, the immaculate, working-class-girl-made-good Claire in the tense new drama Save Me. We first met to discuss Save Me – written by Lennie James, star of the first series of Line Of Duty – a year ago, on the decidedly unglamorous Dagenham trading estate set. Suranne was dressed in designer clothes. 

‘I don’t normally ask but I’d like to take all of these clothes home,’ she laughed. ‘For Doctor Foster I only bought some of her jewellery from the costume sale, it was more about remembering the character, but when I went out with the costume designer to get clothes for Claire I was in my element in Selfridges and Fenwick.

‘Claire is wealthy but hasn’t brushed off where she’s from; she still likes a bit of bling. What’s interesting about her is I often play working-class or middle-class people but rarely a working-class woman who’s moved up in the world.’

Suranne  stars as Claire alongside Lennie James (pictured) as Nelly, in search of their missing daughter

Suranne is warm and friendly, very different to many of her characters. She wasn’t meant to be in Dagenham that day, she had planned to take time off for a family holiday following her mother’s death, which came after a difficult eight-year deterioration with dementia.

But then the script for Save Me landed on her doormat. ‘I was halfway through Doctor Foster and my agent said, “You must look at this.” I thought, “Oh no, I don’t want to work.” I had taken six months off when my baby was born and Doctor Foster was such a big thing to go back to, from being a mum to full-time work. I wanted to go back to being a mum for a bit. But then I read it.’

Save Me is vaguely autobiographical, about the south London that the scriptwriter and lead actor Lennie James grew up in, and the man he may have become without acting. In it Lennie, who also has a role in hit US series The Walking Dead, plays charming wastrel Nelly Rowe, whose fling with Claire 14 years earlier resulted in a pregnancy. 

Nelly was not part of the lives of Claire or their daughter Jody. She went on to marry a man who did well in the record business while Nelly is still sleeping on friends’ sofas and charming the ladies. But when Jody goes missing and police suspect Nelly of her kidnapping, he and Claire reunite to try to find their daughter.

‘I read the script and it was so different,’ Suranne told me. ‘The scenes were quite hard to read because people are talking over each other and that fascinated me because that’s how people talk in real life. Then Lennie wrote to me and said, “Come on, this will be a great experience.” You want to do the best work you can, and the story was so original that I couldn’t turn it down.

‘The interesting thing for these two characters is they don’t really know each other. She’s left their south London estate but he drags her back into that world. She’s got the beautiful house and all her new money, but then you put Nelly into the equation and it’s like a bomb of history has blown up.

‘I talked to my husband and he said, “You’re going to do this, aren’t you?” and I said, “Yes.” So we postponed the holiday until after I finished the job.’

For actors, success isn’t just down to talent, it’s also down to choosing good roles. And Suranne chooses her parts very well. Save Me, which will be on Sky Atlantic, is the most nail-biting thriller for some time. When we talk again after she’s finished filming, Suranne says working on the series was cathartic and helped her with grief. 

‘It was a really difficult time for me,’ she says. ‘Going to work and telling stories like this is therapeutic in a bizarre way because you can find a connection to share. I came out of it feeling like something had shifted, something had happened. Healing.’

Meanwhile, the successful return of Doctor Foster was something she’d hoped for – but was never certain of. ‘You watch amazing shows like Sherlock and Broadchurch go stellar, with people really getting behind them, and I never expected it would happen to me,’ she says. ‘The second series of Doctor Foster was like a contemporary western with all its showdowns. When I watch it, I have to admit it does make me laugh because it’s so outrageous.’ She tried to keep things balanced while making that series, insisting it wasn’t all angst and vows of revenge. 

Suranne said she listens to pop music including Britney Spears and Little Mix to shake off her traumatic roles

‘Me and the girls on the show did an exercise challenge for charity,’ she says. ‘We’d go off for “plank squad” meetings – we were meant to hold our bodies in a plank position for five minutes a day – but really it was an excuse to gossip. The older I get, the more I feel the need to lighten things up.’

To shake off her traumatic roles, she listens to pop music. ‘I like dancing to Britney Spears or Little Mix. And a baby relaxing in your arms brings you down to earth. I’m too tired to think about my roles when I get home.’

She finally had her time off at the end of last year but even then spent five weeks in Los Angeles meeting Hollywood movers and shakers – she hopes to work there as a producer.

She has long wanted to get behind the camera and has been mentored by one of the best in the business, Nicola Shindler, who is behind hits like Last Tango In Halifax, Happy Valley and Trust Me. After working together on Scott & Bailey, the detective show that Suranne helped create and starred in, she realised she wanted to produce, partly to tell female stories in a world still dominated by men.

 ‘I had lots of dinners with studio people and writers in LA,’ she says. ‘I’m really interested in developing some shows and I might take time off to do it. I’ve already worked on a few things that haven’t made it onto the screen yet. I’ve been writing with my husband too and that’s been interesting, it’s been fun. It’s great to still be learning at 39.’

At the recent National Television Awards, where she won Best Drama Performance for Doctor Foster – adding to her Bafta and NTA for the first series – she wore a 50/50 badge calling for equality for women in pay and representation on screen. ‘It’s about better roles, three-dimensional characters – showing women in a full and inspiring way,’ she says.

Suranne is currently starring in Frozen in the West End, as another mother of a missing child, and is due to start filming BBC1 costume drama Gentleman Jack, playing Yorkshire landowner Anne Lister.

The role will reunite her with award-winning writer Sally Wainwright, who she worked with on Scott & Bailey, Unforgiven and Dead Clever. It tells the real story of Anne, an heiress and lesbian who in 1832, after years of travel, returns to her Halifax ancestral home, Shibden Hall. Refusing to abide by conventions, she does business, climbs mountains, and becomes determined to marry another woman.

This flood of work is a far cry from Suranne’s early days when, after a casting director called her ‘a bit fat and a bit nothing’, she fretted about ever making it as an actress before landing the role of Karen McDonald in Coronation Street in 2004. ‘I’m touching as much wood as I can,’ she tells me, laughing.

And what about the future? ‘I want to be doing interesting work that makes me happy,’ she says. ‘But I also want to go to singalongs with my son. I’ve realised it’s important to take time out as well as work really hard.’

Save Me, 28 February, Sky Atlantic.