Daniel Mays 'underestimated' impact of dark Believe Me role
Believe Me star Daniel Mays plays convicted serial sex offender John Worboys in the intense new ITV drama.
Daniel Mays "underestimated" how much his dark Believe Me role would "take its toll".
The 48-year-old Line of Duty actor plays convicted serial sex offender John Worboys, who became known as the 'black cab rapist' after using his job as a licensed taxi driver to prey on women.
In 2009, Worboys was convicted for crimes against 12 women - including sexual assault and drugging with intent - between 2008 and 2008
In 2019, he was convicted for attacks on four more women, and police believe that over 13 years as a taxi driver, he could have attacked more than 100 passengers.
Speaking about the new ITV drama, Mays told media in a recent press conference: "It was a huge thing to take on. But alongside that, I could recognise the acting challenge as well.
"You're being asked to sort of humanise someone who is evil essentially and it's about delving beneath those headlines and trying to play him in as three dimensional way as possible, and that actually was very... I underestimated how difficult that was going to be.
"I thought, 'I've got 26 years experience as a professional actor' but I'm not going to lie to you, it did, at times, take its toll.
"It was a difficult thing and an unsettling thing to portray and very isolating by its very nature."
The series is focused on his victims, and survivors, and the search for justice, but also follows Worboys.
He would pretend to have won money at the casino or the lottery, and insist on giving his victims a glass of champagne to celebrate, as he couldn't drink behind the wheel.
He laced the drink with sedatives, and sexually assaulted his victims, many of whom had no memory of the incidents.
Mays previously told ITV: "It was so hard because when you play evil characters, you always try to find some redeeming qualities in them.
"It’s like, 'Where can I hang my hat as such and humanise him?' But there were no qualities about him like that whatsoever.
"And when you really go into his past and his backstory, you know, he was drugging people way before he was a black cab driver.
"He was a 'Peeping Tom'. So, this was a narcissistic, dangerous individual."
Believe Me airs on ITV from May 10, and all four episodes will be available on ITVX.
