As with any good detective series, Bookish features a stellar guest cast, with a whole new set of supporting actors popping up throughout season 2.
One who appears in multiple episodes this time around is Simon Callow, who previously worked with Bookish creator and star Mark Gatiss on Doctor Who, playing Charles Dickens in the first episode he wrote, The Unquiet Dead.
Now, speaking exclusively with Radio Times, Gatiss has provided more details on Callow’s new Bookish character, and revealed his links to a key character from season 1 – Tim McInnery’s D.
“Simon plays E,” Gatiss revealed. “Tim McInnerny played D, and Simon also has an eye patch, but on the other eye. And we find out a bit more about what’s been going on during the war with what Book did and what he owes to this mysterious branch of the government.
“So yeah, Simon is a sort of authority figure, constantly trying to draw me back in and call in lots of favours.”
Gatiss continued: “There’s a line I really like when he has a confrontation with Trottie, and she says, ‘How did you lose your eye? Did someone poke you with a very, very sharp stick?’ And he says, ‘What makes you think I lost an eye?’ One day – never – it will be explained.”
Other guest stars set to appear in Bookish season 2 include Jason Watkins (McDonald & Dodds), Miranda Richardson (Blackadder), Claire Skinner (Outnumbered) and Youssef Kerkour, as well as Gatiss’s former Sherlock co-star, Rupert Graves.
Graves plays Colonel Reggie Winters, and while speaking with Radio Times, Trottie star Polly Walker explained how his storyline impacts her character.
Walker said: “She goes for a seance and meets a guy there and keeps bumping into him and begins this friendship, and it develops into a relationship, as it were.
“And it forces her to question, is she entirely content with the arrangement that she has going with Book? So she has to do a lot of soul searching, and maybe she wants to end it all with Book?”
Bookish season 2 starts at 8pm on Wednesday 26 August on U&Alibi.
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