Kelly Macdonald on playing the darkness in The Victim

Trainspotting and Brave star Kelly Macdonald has a habit when she’s been out of work for too long. That’s when she knows she’s “desperate”.

Someone get this woman another job.

Kelly Macdonald, the Scottish talented star of Trainspotting, Boardwalk Empire, No Country for Old Men and State of Play, is at risk of pulling out a jigsaw puzzle.

“When I get a jigsaw puzzle out, that’s when I knew I was in trouble,” Macdonald told news.com.au. “Nothing against jigsaws! But if I was doing it because it was a desperate act of needing something to do, that’s when I knew it was bad.

“The past few years have been pretty unusual in that I’ve gone from job to job. I’ll be working on one thing and know what my next job will be. Having said that, I have a desert in front of me.

“I always believe that the right thing is around the corner, so I’m sure I’m going to get a job and it’s going to be amazing!”

While she’s waiting for her next gig, Macdonald has been busy promoting her latest series, a four-part drama series called The Victim, starting tonight on BBC First. It’s one those roles that Macdonald would say was the “right thing”.

A grieving mother isn’t necessarily ‘the victim’

In The Victim, Macdonald’s character, Anna, is ostensibly the title character. Anna is a mother whose young son was murdered by another child 14 years earlier. The murderer was released under an alias when he turned 18 and Anna has never felt her boy got justice.

The series kicks off when a man named Craig Myers (James Harkness) is attacked at his front door by a masked person. Craig, it eventuates, was named in an online post as the now-grown up and pseudonym-ed killer of Anna’s son — and Anna was the one who posted his identity. But it’s not clear if Craig is that person.

So who’s the real victim in this scenario? The grieving mother denied justice or the man who may have nothing to do with it?

Those questions, and the malleable ethics of balancing the rights of crime victims, upholding the legal system and the perils of mistaken identity are at the heart of The Victim.

“The storyline is pretty dark and I was worried that people wouldn’t want to end their evening with something so depressing,” Macdonald said. “But it’s far more interesting than that. The characters are incredibly well drawn.

Madconald stars in The Victim alongside James Harkness and John Hannah

“With Anna, it’s not just about her fighting for what she believes is justice, it becomes about what she was doing in the process to her family and the damage she was causing, and the domino affect has had this group of people.”

Macdonald said she was keen to play Anna because she “selfishly wanted to get my teeth into a strong female part.

“Because in the past, I have played characters that were good guys, or honest, or sensitive,” she said. “And Anna is just so angry. You’re on her side at points because she is vulnerable in a lot of ways. But she’s also a real pain in the arse and does these things you can’t condone.

“In her grief, she thinks she’s got the right to behave in certain ways that are pretty socially unacceptable. I was excited to play out some of those scenes.”

While a part of The Victim’s story — small boy murdered by another child — has parallels to the Jamie Bulger case, Macdonald separates fact from fiction.

“It’s very much its own thing. It’s a piece of fiction and it would be shameful to drag someone else’s real grief into a TV drama.”

She didn’t consult or research (“Hell no, that would be such a violation”) and works more instinctively — what’s on the page on the day — and said that the set was actually quite lighthearted.

“Generally, the darker the project I’m on, the more lighthearted the atmosphere on set tends to be, so it was pretty jolly.”

Trainspotting was Macdonald’s big break

Macdonald got her start after going to open auditions for Trainspotting and winning the role of Diane, the schoolgirl who becomes involved with Ewan McGregor’s Renton. She reprised the role in 2017 in Danny Boyle’s sequel T2 Trainspotting.

Over a 20-plus-years career, Macdonald has worked with the likes of the Coen brothers (No Country For Old Men), Robert Altman (Gosford Park) and Joe Wright (Anna Karenina), and spent five years on Boardwalk Empire.

“I think (Boardwalk) finished at the right time. I’m really glad I got to do it but it was a long haul and it was unusual for me to play the same character.

“I was pretty desperate to play a different character. I had done the odd film and things, little bits and bobs in my downtime, but it was good to say goodbye to Margaret. She was amazing but that was plenty!”

Kelly Macdonald was the voice of Merida (AP Photo/Disney/Pixar)

And then there was the leading voice role in Brave, a Disney movie centred on a rebellious Scottish princess. For that, she was asked to make some strange noises she never imagined would be a direction.

“You never think about someone on a horse, ducking a little branch, you don’t think that actor has been asked to make that specific noise. The most unusual noises were all horse-related!”

The Victim premieres tonight on BBC First on Foxtel and Fetch at 8.30pm

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