Emily Watson: ‘You have to be a bit of an idiot to be an actor’

The actor on making a ‘cracker’ of a film with Cillian Murphy, the new female-led Dune TV series, and knowing when to give people the shark eyes

The British actor Emily Watson made one of the outstanding film debuts when she starred in Lars Von Trier’s Breaking the Waves in 1996, aged 29. She was Oscar-nominated for that role, then again two years later for playing the cellist Jacqueline du Pré in Hilary and Jackie. She is known for her fierce, fearless performances: she won a Bafta for her part as a social worker in Appropriate Adult, ITV’s 2011 Fred West drama, and received Emmy and Golden Globe nods for the Sky Atlantic miniseries Chernobyl. Watson is 57 and lives in south London with her husband and two children.

When you got an Oscar nomination for your first film, did you find it a lot to take in?
I was very, very green and I was just going where I was told. I don’t think I ever had an instinct for it; you either have or you haven’t. I think I’m good at what I do because I’m an idiot. You have to be a bit of an idiot to be an actor.