Steve Coogan has been pictured looking worlds away from his legendary character Alan Partridge in his new role as a no-nonsense customs officer.
The actor stars in Netflix‘s new crime thriller Legends, created by The Gold’s Neil Forsyth, which follows officers as they try to infiltrate themselves with drug smugglers.
Steve, 60, who is best known for playing tactless and inept broadcasting character Alan, will portray a tough customs officer.
He joins the likes of Tom Burke, Hayley Squires, Jasmin Blackborow, Charlotte Richie and Tom Hughes in the six-part drama, which hits screens on May 7.
It follows the group of ordinary British Customs officers after they are given a top-secret mission: to infiltrate the country’s most notorious criminal drugs gang to take them down from the inside.
Based on a real-life criminal investigation, the story is set in the early 1990s, as her Majesty’s Customs and Excise face a losing battle with smugglers.
Steve Coogan has been pictured looking worlds away from his legendary character Alan Partridge in his new role as a no-nonsense customs officer
The actor stars in Netflix’s new crime thriller Legends, created by The Gold’s Neil Forsyth, which follows officers as they try to infiltrate themselves with drug smugglers
The solution was to place a small, specialist team of customs employees undercover within the very gangs who were bringing drugs across the border.
The group were normal men and women, not trained as spies, and plucked from ordinary lives around the UK to be put on a basic training regime and tasked with taking on new identities in the criminal underworld.
The identities given to those involved in the plot were called ‘legends’.
Creator Neil teased of the action: ‘I’m very excited to be able to tell this incredible story, along with everyone at Tannadice Pictures.
‘I think Legends is a fascinating, gripping, unknown British story that deserves to be told in full. I’m delighted that Netflix agreed.’
A first look trailer sees Steve as the customs boss, dishing out the ‘legend’ identities to the band of ordinary people going undercover in the drugs gangs.
‘Your legend is the identities we use when we work under cover,’ he is heard telling the group.
‘Your legend has to be part of you. One wrong word, one wrong decision, and you’re a goner.’
‘It will be the greatest challenge of your lives, taking on a level danger and risk unimaginable,’ another character is heard telling the group.
‘We’re not the police, we’re not the spooks, we can do things they can’t,’ Steve is then heard saying to the group as the operation begins. ‘It’s just us.’
Charlotte Ritchie and Tom Burke also star in the new Netflix drama series
‘So we do this with all the danger that comes with it, and if we die doing it then no-one ever knows that we did it at all?’ one of the recruits asks, to which Steve’s character replies: ‘Some people are cut out for it, and some people aren’t.’
‘A war has started,’ Steve’s voice is heard, over a series of shots of high-intensity fights and gun-wielding meet ups.
Steve was last seen playing character Alan Partridge last year, as he celebrated the opening of his very own sound bath at the Hampton Court Palace Garden Festival.
A far cry from the straight-laced tone of the inept broadcaster, Alan was on hand to present the opening of his own space, struggling to keep cool in the hot weather.
The garden reflected the inept presenter’s ‘meticulous approach to design, aesthetics, and materials’ and is described as being ‘a tribute to structure, to durability, and to personal resonance.’
The RHS invited visitors ‘to experience a space that is both purposeful and forward-looking.’
It’s no surprise that the garden comes with a unique comedic twist, and the character’s observations about his creation are channelled through sound waves.
Designers Joe and Laura said: ‘We have had a test-run of the garden during the pre-build stage, and the moment we heard Alan’s voice come through the sculptural speakers – everything made sense, in a very funny, very Alan sort of way.’
Steve Coogan has played Alan Partridge for four decades
Alan appeared to be up to his usual antics as he was photographed speaking into a seemingly non-existent mic and fanning himself with headphones on.
The designers admitted: ‘We developed the idea that Alan would want to showcase his broadcasting mastery… ‘
Steve later admitted he’s contemplated killing off Alan Partridge after playing the hapless broadcaster for more than 30 years.
The actor became a household name through his portrayal of Partridge, the perennially tactless TV personality he originally created while working with Armando Iannucci and Chris Morris on 1991 radio show On The Hour.
He revived the character for his new How Are You? It’s Alan (Patridge), a new BBC mockumentary about Britain’s mental health crisis.
But he admitted he frequently considers putting an end to the legendary character.
Steve told The Mirror: ‘Part of me wants to kill him off by deliberately jumping the shark in a really bad way – like making a film where I fight Alan Partridge and kill him but he kills me or something like that.
‘Don’t end with dignity on a high – just drive it off a cliff.’
Coogan has portrayed Partridge over an astonishing four decades, with the character featuring in an assortment of TV shows and specials, documentaries, films and – more recently – his very own podcast, From The Oasthouse.
But the actor admits he was alarmed when he absentmindedly starting dressing in the character’s notoriously conservative clothes off-set – including one of his shirts.
Steve Coogan admits he’s contemplated killing off Alan Partridge after playing the hapless broadcaster for more than 30 years
He recalled: ‘It wasn’t just a similar shirt – it was literally the same shirt, the same manufacturer in the same size.
‘I looked at it hanging up and thought, “I guess it’s happened.”
Speaking last February, the actor admitted the character he originally brought to life for 1991 radio show On The Hour – a spoof current affairs series hosted by the fictional Partridge – soon felt like an albatross around his neck.
Appearing on Nick Grimshaw and Angela Hartnett’s Dish from Waitrose Podcast, he said: ‘There was a time when I felt saddled with it. So, when I do Partridge, I do it through choice. Not because I have to.
‘I’m doing some stuff at the moment, and it does make me laugh, so… I make notes in my phone.
‘I think, I have a funny idea, I’m on the train and I’m chuckling to myself. I will laugh at myself as a Partridge comes into my head, and put it in my phone, on my own.
‘Or I’ll look in a shop window and think about, I might say, “oh, what would Alan say about that. I’m still doing it now thirty years later, so it’s like a condition now.’
Coogan’s career defining character has earned him no less than six awards – the most recent coming in 2017 at the TV BAFTAs, where Alan Partridge’s Scissored Isle secured Best Male Comedy Performance for the actor.
More accolades could follow with the release of his latest Partridge series, which sees the hapless presenter ‘jumping on the mental health bandwagon.’
‘He knows that he can get back on TV if he talks about something important,’ said Coogan. ‘We’re editing it now, so…’
Despite his intimate connection to the character, Coogan says even he struggles to comprehend Partridge’s notorious lack of tact and completely oblivious approach to political correctness.
More accolades could follow with the release of another Partridge led series at a yet to be specified date, with Coogan having completed work on a new project that sees the hapless presenter ‘jumping on the mental health bandwagon’
He said: ‘For me to try and describe it is so risqué some of the stuff, I can’t even describe, you have to just listen to it.
‘But there’s some stuff, you know there is some stuff that’s so wrong that it makes me laugh, because there’s some things he says that no one could say, and I certainly couldn’t say.
‘But because you, the audience know who he is and that he’s sort of ill-informed but is trying his best. He’s not an evil person. He’s just a fool. But sometimes the fool says things that people secretly agree with. So, that’s quite enjoyable that having that little bit of catharsis.
‘And also, you can satirise, sort of… I mean, if I want to sort of take the mick out of someone I don’t like, I just make Alan say that they’re his best friend.’
Legends will be available to stream on Netflix from May 7
