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Many actors will have experienced a long wait for their dream part, working their way through the stage and screen ranks before their ideal script drops on their doormat.
Tom Hardy, however, is not one of them.
The British actor, who has become a Hollywood favourite after appearing in a string of blockbusters, is to play his ultimate fictional character on television this month, after getting his father to write the script for him.
Hardy, whose father Edward “Chips” Hardy worked as a comedy script writer, has previously told how he hoped to play an amalgam of “every classical character in one”, encompassing the key traits of of Bill Sykes, Sherlock Holmes, Hannibal Lecter and Heathcliff.
His father’s handiwork, Taboo, is now set to broadcast on the BBC this year.
“I wanted to play Bill Sykes, Sherlock Holmes and Hannibal Lecter, in one.”
Taboo has been a long time coming – BBC One’s wild and ambitious new period thriller will arrive on our screens some seven years after originating, as a spark of an idea, in the the mind of its star Tom Hardy.
Along with his father, Edward ‘Chips’ Hardy, Oscar nominee Tom conceived of a character – originally known as ‘Osborne’ – who has been to the ends of the earth and comes back irrevocably changed.
“It came about from doing [BBC One’s 2007 miniseries] Oliver Twist and playing Bill Sykes,” Tom tells us. “To be bluntly honest, I wanted to play Bill Sykes, Sherlock Holmes, Hannibal Lecter, Heathcliff, Marlow [from Heart of Darkness]… just every classical character in one.”
Tom Hardy, the actor famous for playing Bane, Charles Bronson, the Krays and a whole host of other downright terrifying roles, is going to be reading the children of the UK a bedtime story on New Year’s Eve.
The 39-year-old Londoner might not seem like an obvious choice, but Hardy does have some experience of reading bedtime stories and not scaring the bejesus out of his audience: he’s got two kids.
Hardy, who was joined by his dog Woodstock for filming, is going to read ‘You Must Bring a Hat’ by Simon Philip and Kate Hindley. It’s a story about a boy who is invited to a party where, you guessed it, he must bring a hat.
If you and/or your little ones like what they see, there’s good news. Hardy will be back on the show in the new year reading more bedtime stories.
Hardy will be on CBeebies Bedtime Stories on New Year’s Eve at 6.50pm.
