Ö÷²¥´óÐã

Everyone's favourite copper, brash but loveable DCI Gene Hunt, is back policing the streets of Eighties London. Actor Philip Glenister, recently seen as demon slayer Rupert Galvin in Demons and donning breeches as Mr Carter in Cranford, explains why he still relishes playing the politically incorrect Mancunian.

"We wouldn't have a series if Gene Hunt suddenly became politically correct!" laughs Philip,"we'd have to wrap it up."

It's true that over the last four years the public have taken the character of Gene Hunt to their hearts and Philip attributes this to Hunt's ideals.

"In this series of Ashes To Ashes Gene is still out there being a maverick, but what I always say about him is that, while he bends the rules, he never breaks them. He merely manipulates and stretches them a bit! If anything he is a decent and honest copper and he'll usually only collar unsavoury characters. I love the western connotation with Hunt; he is exactly like a Sheriff and sees himself very much in that guise. However, the problem is that he is out of his depth in the Eighties metropolis of London and the bottom line is he is a Seventies copper at heart."

In this second series of Ashes To Ashes the action moves on a year from 1981 to 1982 and the CID team face tough times.

"Alex becomes much more part of the team," explains Philip. "But there is a police corruption theme running throughout the series so it does feel darker than series one; the corruption breeds a lack of trust and coherence which is unbalancing for everybody. However, viewers can still expect moments of high campness and there are some great one-liners!"

Central to the police corruption theme is Gene's new boss, Detective Superintendent "Supermac" Mackintosh, who arrives in the first episode determined to restore the reputation of the police in the eyes of the media and public.

"Supermac is a highly-respected Superintendent who has been in the police force for a long time," says Philip. "He trained at Hendon and has come up through the police ranks which gained him a lot of respect from his colleagues on the force. Supermac enters CID and basically says that the police needs to regroup and be accountable. I think Gene agrees with him up to a point but then certain events lead him to question Supermac's motives."

Gene and Alex's relationship also continues to be fiery with a hint of simmering sexual tension beneath the surface. Does Philip think they would work as a couple?

"If you just had a show based on 'will they won't they' it wouldn't be that interesting; hopefully their relationship is a bit more complex than that," he replies. "It's the moment things spill over from a professional capacity to a personal one when complications set in and you start to question whether they would work as a couple. I think Gene is an enigma and I play him with ambiguity rather than having a preconceived idea of whether Gene fancies Alex or not. There are moments when he teases her and she teases him but Gene will never give anything away!"

Philip admits that the long hours on set did take their toll but he clearly enjoyed working with the cast and production team who he shared plenty of laughs with.

"Shooting eight episodes took six months so it was a long shoot but a great bunch of people work on the show which is one of the joys of the job," he explains. "There were so many funny incidents, we laughed a lot – particularly Keeley and Dean who are real gigglers. In fact they are the troublemakers! Dean's laugh is like an animal's and Keeley will just crack up out of nowhere. She's pretty amazing because she can also cry on cue for scenes; her range of emotion is incredibly impressive."

Of course an interview about Gene Hunt wouldn't be complete without asking about the love of his life, the Quattro. Philip chuckles as he recounts his experiences of driving what many people consider an antique.

"The stunt guys could just whizz past the cameras and do handbrake turns. I then had to get in the car for the interior shots and there would be two cameras stuck to the front and one on the side. I'd have to make sure I didn't drive too close to the curb otherwise I would have taken one out on a lamppost.

"The camera stuck to the windshield also meant I couldn't see anything out the front and the heavy equipment combined with actors, who had spent five-and-a-half months eating location food and syrup sponge, left the poor old Quattro scratching along the floor!

"I always enjoy the driving stuff, though, especially throwing around a car which isn't my own," adds Philip. "We had two Quattros this time round so we weren't stuck if one broke down. In fact we did have a couple of instances with the Quattro while filming this series, both involving the stunt men and not the cast I hasten to add! First a stunt guy smashed one of the car's front lights when we were filming a chase scene and the two cars clipped each other. The second incident involved a scare when the Quattro had to hit one of the stuntmen. Unfortunately when the Quattro actually struck him he accidentally smashed the windscreen. Luckily he was alright."