Scott, 58, isn’t afraid to speak his mind when it comes to everything from the looming threat of artificial intelligence and protecting arts funding to his love for Scotland and plans to devote the next chapter of his career to championing homegrown talent (more of all that in a moment).
It is early November when Scott pops up on Zoom from Austria (where is working on an unspecified project). We’re here to talk about Vigil, the hit BBC thriller set to return to our screens for a second series next weekend.
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The debut run centred on the disappearance of a fishing trawler and a death on board a Trident nuclear submarine. This time around the action will switch to aerial warfare as DCI Amy Silva and DS Kirsten Longacre investigate unexplained fatalities at a fictional Royal Air Force base in Scotland.
Suranne Jones and Rose Leslie reprise their roles as Silva and Longacre respectively, with Gary Lewis returning as Detective Superintendent Colin Robertson. The ensemble cast of guest stars includes Scott alongside Romola Garai, Amir El-Masry, David Elliot and Chris Jenks.
As we begin, there is the tricky quagmire of avoiding potentially juicy spoilers. Scott grins. “Oh, it’s alright, I will tell you the whole f****** thing,” he says. “I will tell you whodunnit, why they did it and what is going to happen next …”
He’s kidding, of course. Scott – whose prolific CV includes Deep Impact, Mission: Impossible II and Desperate Housewives to name but a few – clearly relished his role in Vigil playing the smooth-talking and insidious Marcus Grainger, a high-ranking officer in the Royal Air Force.
Dougray Scott in Crime (Image: ITV)
“Marcus is an incredibly intelligent and very good facilitator between the British government, the Air Force and foreign countries,” says Scott, when asked to describe the character.
“He is responsible for arms sales, communication and building relationships between the British government and the foreign powers in geopolitical areas that are very important in terms of stability within the world.
“He is very high up – an air vice-marshal. He is experienced and good at what he does. He doesn’t get flustered. He is in a very volatile situation but is someone who is very confident about how to relate to these people.
“I’m nothing like him,” adds Scott, with a laugh. “He has personality traits that I just don’t have. It was interesting because sometimes when you play someone who is so different from you, it is easier to jump into the writer’s rhythm. I really enjoyed playing him.”
Part of what attracted Scott to the role, he says, is seeing life from a different perspective. “There is no point in me sitting down with someone who thinks exactly the same way I do. I can talk for hours and say, ‘This is right and that is wrong’ and you go, ‘Yes, absolutely 100 per cent’.
“At the end of that conversation, you feel emboldened and empowered, but actually, there’s as many people out there who think exactly the opposite to you. You have to try to see the world through different people’s eyes.
Dougray Scott with his wife Claire Forlani (Image: PA)
“It is like what is happening just now in Israel and Gaza, you have to see things from different perspectives, and you have to really think about it and put yourself in the shoes of someone else and see their life.
“There is no point in just looking for articles or listening to people who think exactly the same way as you because then you are not enlightened or educated.”
Vigil shines a spotlight on the fascinating, and often terrifying, intricacies of drone warfare – or Remotely Piloted Aircraft Systems (RPAS) as they are referred to in the show – when a weapons test goes badly awry, resulting in multiple casualties on Scottish soil.
Scott’s on-screen alter ego is a major player in that arena. “All this AI stuff, the drones and technology, what they can do, how they can change the battlefield, he thinks it is magnificent and he is like a pig in s*** in that world,” he says.
It serves as a pertinent reminder that there is a darker side to advancing technology, particularly in areas such as weapons and artificial intelligence.
“The world is changing incredibly quickly,” says Scott. “I think everybody needs to take a big, deep breath and hit the pause button in terms of what the implications are for AI.”
He recognises that there can be myriad benefits. “AI is probably going to be useful for certain things such as surgery, medicine, understanding the physiological make-up of the human body and how to address things like cancer. If it is used for these good things, that is great.”
Yet, Scott remains cautious about the wider impact, not least when it comes to the arts. “The potential is not always for the greater good. It can be incredibly damaging and harmful to creativity, originality, copyright and ingenuity for artists all over the world.
“Pretty soon, what happens is you vanilla-ise, where everything becomes generalised. It is not an original voice. You are getting a little snippet of everyone and what you end up with is blah. Acceptable but blah. That is the danger we are facing.”
Vigil was filmed between Scotland and Morocco, the latter standing in for an air base in the fictional Middle East country of Wudyan. Between this and Scott’s long-running role as troubled Edinburgh police detective Ray Lennox in ITVX drama Crime, he has worked in Scotland a fair bit this past year.
“That was deliberate,” he says. “Obviously, I am not filming in Scotland just now – I am in Vienna. I have been in Poland and Spain. Ultimately, I want to do more projects in Scotland. Which is why I set up Buccaneer Scotland to develop and produce Scottish dramas, whether it be film or television.
“I love being in Scotland more than any other country in the world. I feel so at home. It was where I spent the first 17 or 18 years of my life. The next stage of my career, I will be spending a lot more time in Scotland, whether it is acting or producing and developing. That is what I want to do. It is exciting to me.”
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When Scott co-founded Buccaneer Scotland in 2021, one of the things he talked about was his desire to “tell Scottish stories”. What does that mean to him? Are we talking about the contemporary era or historical sagas?
“Every aspect. For example, we are developing a story of Bible John just now for the BBC. I will tell you what that means to me. My mum and dad met at the Barrowlands in the 1950s. That era. Even in the 1960s, Glasgow was still suffering from the post-war effects.
“As a city it was very underfunded. The effects were palpable. It was tough. My dad was in a corporation flat with his brother, my mum and my big brother – that is why they ended up moving to Fife to get a council house.
“Whenever I read about that particular period, I see my parents come vividly to life. We spent so much time in Glasgow as kids because my cousins, aunts and uncles, all my mum and dad’s friends were there. So, I kind of know Glasgow as well as I know Fife, possibly more so.”
Scott has a knack for delivering his answers in long, tumbling streams of consciousness. He is a natural raconteur. Once he starts talking, you never quite know where his latest meandering thread will take you.
What isn’t in doubt, are the things that are most important to Scott, particularly when he speaks about the affinity he feels with Scottish literature and storytelling.
“The idiosyncrasies of the writers and the stories we tell are slightly from an underdog point of view,” he says. “Our hearts are battle-weary. We are adept at fighting well above our station.
“There is an attractiveness to that which kind of mirrors my own journey in some respects. I always felt nothing came that easy. I have had a privileged and good life, but back then, coming out of that area of Scotland and trying to do what I ended up doing wasn’t easy.
William McIlvanney
“When I read these great Scottish writers – whether it is Robert Louis Stevenson, William McIlvanney, Robin Jenkins or Irvine Welsh – there is an energy within that writing. It is always about reaching for something and having to battle through the obstacles and break walls down and f****** barriers.”
Among the projects that Buccaneer Scotland has in the pipeline to adapt for TV are the novels Luckenbooth and The Panopticon by Jenni Fagan. “Extraordinary stories. I am lucky enough to be attached to them,” says Scott.
He aspires to explore tales from throughout Scottish history, traversing the rich tapestry of culture and language. “These projects are an education for me. Also, it just makes great f****** drama,” he says.
“We have such an abundance of extraordinary talent in Scotland that I don’t need to go to the other side of the world. As much as I love Arthur Miller, John Irving, F Scott Fitzgerald and all these great American writers, we have such talent here.”
His earlier point about his parents moving from Glasgow to Glenrothes is interesting. The development of the New Towns across Scotland in the post-war years, through to the 1960s and early 1970s, saw many people end up with a dual sense of identity.
Scott nods in agreement. “Even my accent, I remember people saying, ‘You’re from Glasgow …’ and I was like, ‘I’m not, I was brought up in Fife.’ I have a bit of a hybrid accent. My dad was from Barrhead. My mum was from Kelvindale.
“My mother spoke like that” – he morphs into a posh Glasgow accent – “and it did not go down well on the council estates of Glenrothes, let me tell you. She had a flamboyance to her where she would wear high heels, long gloves, a bobble hat and a leopardskin coat. It was just different from everyone else.
“My dad was from Barrhead” – Scott seamlessly mimics his father’s gruff, no-nonsense tone – “and he used to talk like that, ‘Son, no. Absolutely not …’ It was an interesting upbringing. And I spent so much of my childhood in Glasgow.”
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This reminds him of another point. “I have nearly finished this documentary about Scottish football and the birth of Scottish football. Well, basically, that Scotland invented football, not England – which is true.
“I have been doing that in between what I am filming here, so a lot of travelling. But it’s been great to go back in time and see the birth of our national game.”
Does a certain Hibernian FC get a mention in this documentary, due to air on BBC Scotland early next year? Scott’s face lights up at the mention of his beloved team. “Yes, because I re-enacted Sir David Gray’s goal when Liam Henderson took the corner [to win the 2016 Scottish Cup Final].
David Gray scores the winner in the 2016 Scottish Cup Final (Image: SNS)
“I don’t know if they will keep it in the documentary, but I was saying, ‘That is where I was sitting with my son and my friends.’ [Former Hibs player] Paul Kane was there as well. It was a euphoric moment and I re-lived it, took the corner and headed the ball in the net …”
We return to chatting about Vigil. The big-name series is the definition of appointment TV, being shown on BBC One in a Sunday night primetime slot. It harks back to a nostalgic way of watching telly. Does Scott miss that?
“I do and that is an interesting point because we did used to make it an event,” he muses. ‘”Got to be in on Friday night, got to be in on Wednesday night, got to be in on Tuesday night because X show is going to be on.’ Then you would discuss it.
“They did that with Succession where they didn’t put it all out at once, which has kind of been the model for the streaming services.”
The first experience Scott had with people binge-watching his work came when he did the 2013 Netflix horror series Hemlock Grove.
“I remember people coming up to me and saying, ‘Oh my God, it’s amazing. You get to watch the whole thing and I didn’t stop.’ And I was thinking, ‘I don’t know if that is good? Watching television for 10 hours without taking a break …'”
Rather, he reckons, viewers need “time to reflect and contemplate and let the characters sink in”. Or as Scott puts it: “It is like football matches – you don’t play the whole season out in one day.”
He speaks fondly about the time-honoured rituals of television viewing and the role it plays in forging connections within society.
“I think artists are an incredibly important part of that,” he asserts. “It is something that this f****** government just don’t understand. You will make people do maths?
“F*** off, I’m not doing maths. I hate maths. I don’t understand it. I’m f****** partly dyslexic and numbers are like trying to understand Chinese for me in the first sitting. I just don’t understand it. It just doesn’t make any sense to me. My brain doesn’t compute it.
“And yet, you are going to make people suffer until they are 18,” he continues, referring to the UK Government’s proposal to make all school pupils in England study maths until that age.
“No. F*** off Sunak and your brigade. You can understand how I don’t like the Conservative Party very much.”
It is hardly a revelation that a working-class boy from Fife might take issue with Tory policy. Unsurprisingly, Scott has never shied away from wearing his heart on his sleeve when it comes to politics or social injustice.
We move on to talking about what comes next in terms of career goals. “I have always wanted to do different things,” he says. “I like that challenge.”
Scott briefly circles back. “Now I am thinking, was I too hard on Sunak? No, I wasn’t. Anyway …” A chuckle. “That was a joke. I like to challenge and be challenged and to try and do things I haven’t done before.
“Ultimately, my passion is to tell a story and to try my hardest to bring stories to people in a way that they connect with, that means something to them and makes them feel less alone, which is what I always felt when I read Arthur Miller’s Death of a Salesman.”
Scott marvels at the strong connection he felt to the fictional Loman family in 1940s Brooklyn. “It makes the world smaller and makes you understand that there are more similarities between people than there are differences,” he says.
“Although culturally, we can have massive differences, different stories and a different history that, ultimately, should lead to a separation of sorts, it doesn’t mean to say that we still don’t have a connection.”
The actor is warming to his theme now. “For example, the [Scottish] independence thing. There is not a xenophobic bone in my body. I love England. I love the people. I love being in England.
“I just happen to think that Scotland would be better with its own government and the autonomous act of separation in that respect. I think that is in our DNA.
“Whether it is painting or writing or acting or dancing or opera, art is a great egalitarian entity that connects us all and is an emotional binder that you just cannot and must not ever do without.
“It should be championed. All these art funding cuts are detrimental to the health of a nation. It is a death knell. You have to stop chipping away at cultural investment – it is imperative.”
