Billie Piper on toxic masculinity, raising teens, and playing complex characters: ‘I’ve been a woman on the edge – I’m not afraid of it!’
As part of a Bafta TV special, the nominated actor talks carving out a niche playing people at breaking point, the ‘dreamy’ romcom she’s currently writing, and what she really thought of that Prince Andrew interview
“I’ve had so many coffees, I feel hysterical,” says Billie Piper. The 42-year-old actor has set up camp in a caff in Camden, London, while she finishes the final draft of a romcom she’s working on – a follow-up to her 2021 directorial debut, Rare Beasts. Piper shot to fame at 15 as a pop star, then transitioned into acting, becoming a household name as Rose Tyler in Doctor Who. Since then, she’s carved out a niche playing women at breaking point (like Suzie Pickles in I Hate Suzie). Now, she’s ready to do less acting and more work behind the scenes. Not that her on-screen career is slowing down – she just bagged her fifth Bafta nomination, for playing journalist Sam McAlister in Scoop, the dramatisation of the BBC Newsnight interview with Prince Andrew about Jeffrey Epstein. She will also appear in the Netflix mega-hit and Addams family spin-off, Wednesday, later this year.
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I volunteered at a Maine detention center for 10 years. Then the Trump administration cut its programs – because we made space for women like Ashley
Every Monday for over a decade, I left my home on Peaks Island, Maine, boarded a ferry to town then drove inland to the Maine correctional center to lead a creative writing class for incarcerated women.
After a 30-minute drive, I park my car, walk to the facility, leave my cellphone and keys with the front desk guard, walk through a metal detector and several sets of sliding doors until I reach the women’s unit. My classroom is a tiny space, bare bones, with plastic chairs, cinderblock walls and fluorescent lights.