[spoilers] Departure of Grid Members?

[nothingisasitseems]

I believe the following actors were written out of Spooks as they decided not to renew their contracts:

Matthew Macfadyen (Tom)
Keeley Hawes (Zoe)
Rupert Penry-Jones (Adam)
Hermione Norris (Ros) twice
Richard Armitage (Lucas)
Sophia Myles (Beth)

Does anyone know if the following were written out at the "whim" of Kudos or whether it was their own decision?

David Oyelow (Danny)
Shauna McDonald (Sam)
Rory McGregor (Colin)
Raza Jaffrey (Zafar)
Olga Sosnovska (Fiona)
Nicola Walker (Ruth) - departure at end of Season 5
Alex Lenipekun (Ben)
Gemma Jones (Connie)
Miranda Raison (Jo)
Hugh Simon (Malcolm)
Shazad Latif (Tariq)

[Carly]

Nicola left in Series 5 to have her baby didn't she?

And I'm sure Miranda Raison was an unamicable one, because I can remember reading an article she did with her mum in which she thanked her for her helping her when she got told she was out of Spooks. And I think there was some press about it at the time too.

[loladom]

I believe Olga left of her own accord due to being pregnant as did NW in S5. I'm sure I recall David saying in an interview he'd chosen to go, he had something else in the pipeline, can't remember what. Shauna just disappeared didn't she, she wasn't even given an exit other than some mention about being devastated. The others, I don't know. That's the nature of show biz I suppose!

[JHyde]

RPJ did an interview on season 6 extras where he said that everybody bar one left of their own accord, on their own terms. I am sure that Hugh Simon and Gemma Jones did too and as has already been pointed out Nicola certainly did, as did David and Olga.

I am surprised to hear that Miranda's leaving might not have been amicable. I don't remember reading anything like that at the time and I couldn't find anything on a quick google search. She worked on the show across five seasons and if there was bad blood I am sure we would have heard about it at the time. Then again, she did spill the beans on a GMTV interview about her leaving which pissed a lot of people off.

[MrsHat]

Hermione left to have her baby as well, first time round

[JHyde]

There were plenty of articles with Hermione about why she left for good. None of it bad at all. And yes, she left the first time around because she was pregnant - something Keeley started and seemed to happen a lot!

[loladom]

For such a small cast, there were a lot of pregnancies eh? Case of take care which chair you sit on ^^

Slightly off topic, but MM and KH also met and fell in love on the spooks set (both of them married at the time). Now I'm not judging, just saying that Spooks means something entirely different to the viewers than it does the cast. It's their job and their lives. I don't think the public ever really know what influences casting decisions from either POV of production company or cast. Often the PR/press info is about face saving, or what they think the viewer wants to hear and never about the truth. The actor needs to work again in a very small pond. Peter Firth (the legend himself) once said - listen to what a producer tells you and believe the opposite. Or words to that effect. Show biz is far more of a game than spying, IMO!

[nothingisasitseems]

(02-11-2011 05:08 PM)JHyde Wrote:  RPJ did an interview on season 6 extras where he said that everybody bar one left of their own accord, on their own terms. I am sure that Hugh Simon and Gemma Jones did too and as has already been pointed out Nicola certainly did, as did David and Olga.

I am surprised to hear that Miranda's leaving might not have been amicable. I don't remember reading anything like that at the time and I couldn't find anything on a quick google search. She worked on the show across five seasons and if there was bad blood I am sure we would have heard about it at the time. Then again, she did spill the beans on a GMTV interview about her leaving which pissed a lot of people off.

Thanks for the heads up.

I have the DVDs but rarely bother with the extras so I'll have to look up that RPJ interview.

Hmm, I wonder who the one was? This would have been before Miranda Raison.

It does seem that Kudos didn't just decide to axe characters indiscriminately.

Thanks everyone for the replies.

[A Cousin]

(03-11-2011 02:14 PM)nothingisasitseems Wrote:  Hmm, I wonder who the one was? This would have been before Miranda Raison.

I believe that JHyde is referring to Lisa Faulkner as Helen Flynn. In fact, on the S1 audio commentaries, it is mentioned that 1.2 was originally slotted for somewhere later in the series, but they made the decision to move it to the second episode slot once the full series was written because it would be more powerful there. I believe they also mention that they had to write her out of subsequent episodes after making that decision.