Spooks' Richard Armitage: I almost gave up acting

Spooks' Richard Armitage: I almost gave up acting
Spooks' Richard Armitage: I almost gave up acting (Image credit: BBC / Kudos)

Spooks star Richard Armitage has revealed that he almost gave up on his acting career due to his lack of success. The Robin Hood actor admitted that he tries not to turn down work as he doesn’t know if he will be left jobless in the future. He told the Daily Record: "I've become one of those actors who find it difficult to say no when things are offered. I think if I had come out of drama school and been an instant Hollywood superstar I would be taking long, leisurely holidays. "But I always feel somehow it's going to be taken away from me so I work when I can. When you struggled with work as I did when I left drama school you make hay when the sun shines. "There was a time when I thought, and my agent thought, it wasn't going to happen for me. We both sat down and I actually said I don't know if I can stay in this state. The interesting roles have only come since I got into my 30s. But I didn't know that was going to happen. Richard added: "I'm a bit of an all or nothing kind of guy. To be honest, I had no blind faith in myself. I don't think I could have stayed around as a jobbing actor. I would probably have quit. Who knows?” *Spooks returns to BBC One on Wednesday, November 4*

Patrick McLennan

Patrick McLennan is a London-based journalist and documentary maker who has worked as a writer, sub-editor, digital editor and TV producer in the UK and New Zealand. His CV includes spells as a news producer at the BBC and TVNZ, as well as web editor for Time Inc UK. He has produced TV news and entertainment features on personalities as diverse as Nick Cave, Tom Hardy, Clive James, Jodie Marsh and Kevin Bacon and he co-produced and directed The Ponds, which has screened in UK cinemas, BBC Four and is currently available on Netflix. 


An entertainment writer with a diverse taste in TV and film, he lists Seinfeld, The Sopranos, The Chase, The Thick of It and Detectorists among his favourite shows, but steers well clear of most sci-fi.