Stephen Graham may have been nominated for seven television Baftas, but that doesn’t mean everyone in the industry knows who he is.
As the actor revealed on the new episode of The Graham Norton Show, he was recently mistaken for someone else on the set of his latest drama, The Walk-In.
In the ITV series based on a true story, Graham plays Matthew Collins, a far-right activist turned antifascist campaigner and journalist.
Despite Graham being the lead actor in the show, one co-star didn’t know who he was.
“One of the supporting artists thought I was someone else and said, ‘You are doing really well for yourself,’” recalled Graham.
“And I thought she was being really kind. But then she said, ‘I never thought it would happen to you after Big Brother’ – she thought I was Craig!”
Graham seemed to be referring to Craig Phillips, a bricklayer who won the first series of Big Brother in 2000.
The Walk-In received rave reviews from critics, with The Independent’s Nick Hilton writing in his four-star review: “Is there a better actor working in British television, right now, than Stephen Graham?
“…It is a role that suits Graham down to a tee: he has always had a stocky, pugilistic physique softened by kind, searching eyes.
“Here, he is totally convincing as a man who was once at the frontline of British racism, but now stalks around an office wearing reading glasses and pastel-coloured Oxford shirts.”
Graham can next be seen in the musical film Matilda, playing Mr Wormwood, alongside Emma Thompson as Miss Trunchbull, Lashana Lynch as Miss Honey, and Alisha Weir as Matilda.
