Ashley Jensen is currently filming series eight of Shetland
By John Johnston
BBC News, Shetland
Ashley Jensen, the new star of the hit crime drama Shetland, had never been to the islands before she arrived for filming in April.
The Scottish actress said she was “blown away” by what she found when she arrived.
“The view I had when I came into land was just like nothing I’d ever seen before,” she says in her first interview from the set of the show.
“I think I was a bit dumbfounded.”
“I’m a bit of a talker but it shut me up. I just soaked in this landscape.”
For the first seven series of the TV series, the lead detective was DI Jimmy Perez, played by Douglas Henshall, but the Glasgow-born actor quit the role last year.
Filming on series eight began in April
In the new series, currently being filmed, Jensen plays DI Ruth Calder, a native Shetlander who reluctantly returns to the isles after 20 years working for the Met Police in London.
The 53-year-old, who was born in Annan in Dumfriesshire, got her big break when she starred alongside Ricky Gervais in Extras in 2005.
She went on to appear regularly in US TV series Ugly Betty before returning to the UK with roles in shows such as Agatha Raisin and Catastrophe.
In 2019 she reunited with Gervais in the Netflix comedy series After Life.
She says taking over from Henshall on Shetland is “big boots to fill”.
“I almost can’t think about it too much because I would get the fear,” she says.
“I’ve tried to look at it as a new project for me and its a new world because people predominately know me for a lot of comedy that I’ve done.”
Image source, Mark Mainz
Douglas Henshall has played DI Jimmy Perez since 2013
Long-term fans of the show have become accustomed to DI Perez’s famous peacoat.
So what has Jensen’s DI Calder picked for Shetland’s wintry weather?
“I think it’s important for TV detectives to have what I call a silhouette,” she says, referencing both Henshall and the main character in the TV detective series Vera, which is also written by Ann Cleeves.
“You can see Vera in a shadow in a silhouette miles away and you know it was her,” Jensen says.
She says DI Calder has returned to Shetland from London so she is very urban.
“She’s very much more sophisticated than the weather here would allow,” Jensen says.
“There’s a lot more cashmere involved because I said to my costume designer I’m a wee bit feeble in the cold.
“So at the moment there’s lots of cashmere and it’s quite long and sleek.”
Jensen (left) is recording series eight of Shetland on the islands
While Jensen replaces Henshall in the lead role, Shetland favourite Alison O’Donnell, who plays DI Alison “Tosh” McIntosh, remains a mainstay.
Jensen says the two of them “get on like a house on fire” and are like “two naughty school girls”.
She says both actresses are very small and they find it amusing to arrest lots of 6ft tall men.
The last series of Shetland averaged 7.2 million viewers in the UK and it is popular around the world.
Since it first aired in 2013 thousands of tourists, many from cruise ships, have been to Shetland on the trail of the murders and to see Jimmy Perez’s fictional home at the Lodberries in Lerwick.
Jimmy Perez’s fictional home in Lerwick
Shirley Mey, from Florida, is a big fan and says she loved seeing the area.
“I think when they shoot things here they do as much exteriors on site and that’s what I really like about it,” she says.
“We’ll miss Jimmy Perez, but I’m glad it will continue.”
Richard and Elizabeth Eastwick, from New Jersey, also enjoy the crime drama.
“Jimmy Perez embodies the role so well that it’s going to be hard to adapt to somebody else doing it,” Richard says.
“We always have to guess who the villain is. I’m always wrong.”
Visit Scotland’s manager for Shetland, Steve Mathieson, says the impact has been fantastic for tourism.
He says surveys show 38% of leisure tourists who visit were influenced by a TV series and 87% of that figure said it was the Shetland series.
So does Jensen think there will be a ninth series?
She says: “I would certainly come back, but I’ve got to get some more Shetland jumpers.”
Shetland series eight will air on BBC One later in the year.
