Robin Hood and Maid Marian have never been seen like this before. It’s not just the fact “he’s an Aussie and I’m a Scouser,” says star Lauren McQueen, but the way in which MGM’s new Robin Hood is rendered as an Outlander-style period romance, with added contemporary grit.
“I feel like we’ve seen Maid Marian always as Robin Hood’s love interest,” says McQueen. “In this series she really has her own individual journey which I found really appealing. She’s not carried by the men in the show, she’s got her own kind of journey, ambitions, struggles, and we find out who the real Maid Marian is.”
The new series stars Jack Patten — the Aussie — as “Rob”, a Saxon outlaw battling against the Normans, including Sean Bean’s Sheriff of Nottingham and Steve Waddington’s Earl of Huntingdon, who is Marian’s father, and a violent one at that.
“We see he’s been really abusive and cruel to her since childhood,” she says. “When we first meet Rob and Marian, we see them as children and for me it was seeing Marian come from this sheltered, abusive childhood to finding her identity. She grows into this woman of confidence, especially when she meets Queen Eleanor [Connie Nielsen] and admires her independence and her power.”
Liverpool born and bred, McQueen is perfect for the role, having featured previously in Outlander: Blood of My Blood but also having shot to fame in Hollyoaks, where she gained acclaim — two British Soap Awards — for her work on heavy storylines around her character Lily Drinkwell.
“The self-harm storyline was a huge learning curve for me and did help me prepare for another emotional role, where I’m dealing with that kind of trauma.”
Not that the show isn’t a spectacular, action-packed romp too. In fact, England has never looked so good. Mainly because it was shot in Serbia. “We shot in the forests just outside Belgrade, it needed that sun and brightness to it… it was six months in the summer and such a great experience.”
Bean was “really down-to-earth, a funny guy”, but a horse she had to ride was less so: “In one of the takes it just decided to reverse its way out of the shot and started walking out of the forest while I was on it. They didn’t even know I was gone, everyone was still involved in the filming.”
When McQueen does make it into shot, it’s clear she is an actor to slot in beside the likes of James Nelson-Joyce and Stephen Graham in a wave of exceptional working-class talent from Liverpool. She does acting workshops with kids back home and says, “I think it’s great for young people to see people from the city doing really well, it makes it feels more reachable.”
Robin Hood is out now on MGM+
