Damian Lewis: Top of the cops

He made his name playing soldiers with problems and led detectives. Why succeeds Damian Lewis left so unsatisfied? Heroism and discuss family life with Maddy Costa

subtlety and moderation are the characteristics Damian Lewis as an actor. His ability to convey inner thoughts of a character with just a flicker of an eyebrow is even more impressive when you discover what is animated in real life. When we met at a club membership of chi-chi "in West London, with a pint of coffee through the work of your system, natural energy and comically amplified. The focus of the hull Jamie Oliver, Prince Charles, who speaks of his guilt for not doing more theater, the lure of playing cops and soldiers, and the joys of domestic life, alternating between horror supreme self-confidence and authentic in what he believed to be due to its own solipsism.

Part of this stems from its internal rotation 40 years fighting this year. This, he said, encouraged "a new found seriousness is what I do," and the desire to "explore the element of showing off to act." His latest film, stolen, that passes screened on BBC1 on Sunday, is visible the work of a man to muzzle his ego. Stolen has three children who were victims in the UK, Anthony Lewis plays Carter, Detective Inspector tries to follow his trail . Although Carter is at the center of the narrative, the character range is limited. "There must be demonstrative and unshowy," said Lewis. "The focus should be on children."

I caught this part was the political dimension of history and the promise of the director, Justin Chadwick (who made The Other Boleyn Girl), the finished film is visually. In general, Lewis said he enjoys working on television, despite the low wages because "narrative is everything. I like the accuracy of the story, and it is through the characters. "Stolen was an opposite experience: that is proud of the film due to the way it looks - not a poetic quality, the camera work rising above the bog standard drama of problems

However, the public might think that Lewis is a bit lost in the flight. Carter is not the complexity of his most famous roles: the Second World War hero Major Richard Winters, the fighting in Europe in Band of Brothers, reptile, possessive Soames in the 2002 remake of the Forsyte Saga, William Keane a manic search for the disappearance of their daughter in the Steven Soderbergh produced according to Keane;. or Charlie Crews, the deliciously eccentric, quasi-Buddhist detective to rebuild their lives after 12 years in prison in television series Life

Lewis is about to start filming another series of U. S. TV, the country in which he plays a Marine sergeant believed dead for eight years and uncovered a terrorist cell in Iraq. This means that it will work in North Carolina for the next seven months, traveling as much as possible to his family in London, Lewis was married to actor Helen McCrory, and have two children, three and four. The comfort, he says, is the possibility that the show will be "exciting subversive" in its exploration of the state of post-traumatic stress, particularly the debate about Islam. Lewis character "voluntarily assumed the Muslim faith has found a good, positive and beautiful aspects of the Muslim faith who can say that 90% of Americans do not know exist."

There is some irony in the prevalence of police and soldiers in the CV of Lewis. As a student at Eton, he could not join the school cadet force: "I refused because the last thing in the world who wanted to be a soldier." The explanation lies rather in his preference for bad character. "You get to play the hero, who meets a purely selfish - but you have to play someone who is imperfect, is real and what is interesting in areas where this type of personality is high -. Theater of war is an obvious example. "

"I was not humble enough"

• question of who were his heroes when I was younger, Lewis squirming with embarrassment. "It's terrible to admit, but I was too into my own path to allow perhaps no influence. Even taking into account the notion that it might be trying to imitate someone means someone else put on the stage, and I'm not. sure he was humble enough that I'm much more likely to have heroes now, people look at me a lot "Quote from David Attenborough, Richard Branson, Roger Federer, Ranulph Fiennes.:. All, says Lewis, "people who seek perfection and are able to reach a kind of perfection, with a monastic quest that exclusion of any other"

How

monastic quest for a perfect square, to be the father of two young children? "It's impossible," he says instantly. "It is hoped that their desire to participate at home in the things that men never, never been involved in, or is expected to participate, to do this and do it well, has his own heroism." It twists again. "What I say is nonsense, of course, is not heroic, but naturally selfish men who want to go out and do their own thing, be good at home - the care of their children on their own, to make the bed . living in them with three meals and the house looked like a piece -.. which gives great confidence to do this is real competition "

mid demands of domestic life, Lewis has worked through a crisis of faith in his career. "I am very lucky," he said. "It's going very well - but how do you keep pushing how to continue to apply his mind?" It is worrying that the law is more "intellectually creative or exciting", which is to return to "old tricks and habits." "Acting can be a narrow and isolated, as only examine their role in particular."