“It’s like getting to see these brilliant racehorses, you just watch them in the paddock essentially and see how they twitch and and move,” is how Jack Lowden refers to his fellow actors, “thoroughbred thespians,” as we aptly nicknamed him for this issue. Reprising his role as a disgraced MI5 agent in season two of the Apple TV+ show, Slow Horses, Lowden reflects on how movements such as #MeToo and continually revealed instances of misogyny in the filming industry have potentially lead to an increase of male characters which are not so magisterial: “I don’t know if it’s a direct repercussion of it, but a lot of parts that I know that come my way as a man, they are a lot more reckless than they probably were 10 years ago where the guy had all the answers.” This is something certainly true of his role as River Cartwright in the aforementioned series, a character who perhaps distances him from his previous portrayals in the likes of War & Peace (2016) or Mary Queen of Scots (2018): “I think the whole point of being an actor is to play every part under the sun and to show every different level of yourself but it’s nice to get the opportunity to go into as much detail as you can with something like this and to see where it goes,” he says earnestly. Photographer: @josephsinclair Stylist: @holly_macnaghten Grooming: @carlosferraz_ at @carolhayesmanagement Talent: @jack.lowden Suit and shirt: @amiparis Neckscarf: @neem_londoner