The suspects
The actors who made British crime drama what it is
Every face below has appeared in at least one case file on this site. Click through for the full profile, the filmography, and the arguments.
01Adrian Dunbar
1980s–2020s
Adrian Dunbar holds still and lets the room do the talking, which makes men in authority feel like people rather than turns.
02Aidan Gillen
1990s–2020s
Aidan Gillen is the quietest dangerous man on television: John Boy in Love/Hate, Frank Kinsella in Kin, menace delivered as intimacy.
03Alec Guinness
1940s–1980s
Alec Guinness gave British television its definitive George Smiley: two BBC serials, a mole hunt conducted by a stooping man in a bad coat.
04Barry Foster
1970s–1990s
Barry Foster’s best work was the rumbustious charisma he brought to Van der Valk, a long-running lead that used his physicality and sardonic humour to anchor procedural realism.
05Benedict Cumberbatch
2000s–2020s
Benedict Cumberbatch’s strength is a precision that suits complicated, clever characters, from Sherlock Holmes to Patrick…
06Chris Ellison
1980s–2000s
Christopher Ellison's strength was a rare, authoritative presence that lent credibility to British television’s procedural landscape.
07Ciarán Hinds
1990s–2020s
Ciarán Hinds plays ambition and menace in the same murmur; Langton in Above Suspicion is the genre's best difficult boss.
08David Burke
1960s–2010s
David Burke’s defining achievement remains his Dr.
09David Hayman
1980s–2020s
David Hayman’s defining strength lies in his capacity for raw, uncompromising intensity, particularly evident in his commanding lead performance in A Sense of…
10David Jason
1970s–2010s
Sir David Jason’s defining achievement lies in his rare ability to fuse grotesque caricature with genuine pathos.
11David Suchet
1980s–2020s
David Suchet’s defining achievement, his Hercule Poirot, set a technical benchmark for literary adaptation.
12David Yip
1970s–2020s
David Yip’s lead role in The Chinese Detective made him a pioneer in British television history.
13Dennis Waterman
1960s–2020s
Dennis Waterman played the tough-guy lead with an instinctive grasp of working-class authenticity, an earthy charisma that distinguished him from more…
14Derek Thompson
1970s–2020s
Derek Thompson played the Troubles from both sides — the IRA gunman in Harry's Game, the institutions in Blue Lights — with Charlie Fairhead between.
15Diane Keen
1960s–2020s
She was Laura Dickens in The Sandbaggers and Bianca Hamilton in Sweeney!, the sitcom queen who crossed into crime drama and stayed there for four decades.
16Don Henderson
1960s–1990s
Don Henderson brought a rare authenticity to British crime drama, his gravelly gravitas grounded in real police experience.
17Edward Hardwicke
1970s–2000s
As Dr. Watson for a generation, his performance provided a necessary anchor of human warmth to Jeremy Brett’s mercurial Holmes. His solidity and…
18Francesca Annis
1960s–2000s
Francesca Annis possesses an enduring, aristocratic poise that made her the casting default for complex Edwardian women and 1990s crime matriarchs.
19George Baker
1940s–2000s
George Baker’s authoritative vocal command and classical poise secured his place in British drama, yet the shadow of his defining role often obscured his…
20George Cole
1940s–2000s
George Cole’s defining skill was the sly transactionalism he brought to roles like Arthur Daley, a character who felt less like a caricature and more like a working system of self-interest.
21Gillian Anderson
1990s–2020s
Gillian Anderson plays the smartest person in the room and never raises her voice to prove it; Stella Gibson made the case hers.
22Gordon Jackson
1940s–1990s
He spent thirty years as one of Britain’s most reliable film actors, became a household name as a butler, and then, at 54, turned himself into the hardest man in British television.
23Harriet Walter
1980s–2020s
Harriet Walter is the genre's senior woman in the room: Harriet Vane, DCI Natalie Chandler, a judge, an assassin — institutions made believable.
24Helen Mirren
1960s–2020s
Helen Mirren’s strength lies in her forensic precision. She gives even familiar parts a lived-in authority.
25Ian Hogg
1980s–2000s
Ian Hogg’s presence suited British crime drama, giving routine procedural scripts more weight than they had on the page.
26Ian McShane
1960s–2020s
McShane's defining authority is his velvet-and-iron charisma, a screen presence that elevates even derivative projects.
27Idris Elba
1990s–2020s
Idris Elba plays big men who are barely holding it together, and he never lets you look away.
28Jack Shepherd
1970s–1990s
Jack Shepherd possessed a rare scholarly gravitas, setting him apart from contemporaries who gravitated toward television’s more rugged leading men.
29Jamie Dornan
2010s–2020s
Jamie Dornan plays the hidden self: Paul Spector's domestic calm remains the benchmark for the charming predator on British television.
30Jeremy Brett
1950s–1990s
Jeremy Brett’s Sherlock Holmes remains a touchstone for its ferocious psychological precision.
31Jill Gascoine
1950s–2000s
Jill Gascoine was the first woman to head a British police drama, as DI Maggie Forbes in The Gentle Touch.
32Jimmy Nail
1980s–2020s
Jimmy Nail’s defining strength is the authenticity he brings, a quality that made Spender’s melancholy detective and Jed Shepperd’s dogged factory worker…
33Joan Hickson
1950s–1990s
Joan Hickson’s fidelity to Agatha Christie’s conception was total.
34John Nettles
1970s–2010s
From Jim Bergerac to Tom Barnaby, he led two long-running British detective series. Then he put away the leather jacket and wrote the history of the Channel Islands occupation.
35John Thaw
1960s–2000s
John Thaw’s defining strength was a formidable subtlety, a precision that underpinned both the bullish swagger of Jack Regan and the cerebral melancholy of…
36Keeley Hawes
1990s–2020s
Keeley Hawes has proven herself an indispensable figure in modern British television through commanding performances in acclaimed series such as Line of Duty…
37Kelly Reilly
1990s–2020s
Kelly Reilly acts openness — Anna Travis learns the job on screen, and the camera never leaves her face in Eden Lake.
38Ken Stott
1970s–2020s
Ken Stott’s defining strength was a volatile, earthy intensity that set him apart from the more patrician leads of his era.
39Kevin Whately
1970s–2020s
Kevin Whately’s biggest mark on British crime drama is the quiet decency of Detective Sergeant Lewis, a patient, grounded foil whose work in…
40Lesley Sharp
1980s–2020s
Lesley Sharp’s defining strength is a forensic intensity that grounds complex female roles in unshowy realism.
41Lewis Collins
1970s–2000s
He was Bodie of CI5, the ex-paratrooper hardman who gave British television its own action hero. The role’s shadow followed him to his death, aged 67.
42Mark McManus
1960s–1990s
Mark McManus was the blue-collar authority figure of British television, whose rugged physicality and gravel-voiced sincerity grounded procedural…
43Martin Freeman
1990s–2020s
Martin Freeman’s defining strength is his precise modulation of quiet exasperation, a trait that anchors the emotional realism of The Responder.
44Martin Shaw
1960s–2020s
Martin Shaw’s defining strength is a granite gravitas that lent credibility to every morally compromised authority figure he inhabited, from the cynical Doyle…
45Matthew Macfadyen
1990s–2020s
Matthew Macfadyen excels as the quietly devastating supporting player, providing the still, molten centre to sprawling ensemble dramas.
46Michael Brandon
1960s–2020s
Michael Brandon’s transatlantic presence hinges on a rugged yet vulnerable masculinity, best realised as the eponymous U.S. liaison in Dempsey and Makepeace.
47Michael Kitchen
1970s–2010s
Michael Kitchen wins scenes by waiting longer than the other man; Christopher Foyle made the quiet pause the whole method.
48Neil Pearson
1980s–2020s
Neil Pearson remains a distinctive figure in British drama, valued for a nimble intelligence that cuts through genre conventions.
49Nick Berry
1980s–2000s
Nick Berry possessed the quintessential leading-man charm of the 1990s, a reassuring presence that propelled Heartbeat to mainstream success.
50Nicola Walker
1990s–2020s
Nicola Walker’s defining skill is conveying deep intelligence beneath a shield of emotional restraint.
51Patrick Malahide
1970s–2010s
Malahide's strength is playing authority figures, from the roguish warmth of Minder’s ‘Cheerful Charlie’ to the grim menace of Balon Greyjoy.
52Ray Lonnen
1950s–2010s
Raymond Lonnen’s defining strength was his unshowy precision; in ‘The Sandbaggers’, his Willie Caine set the standard for weary professionalism.
53Richard Griffiths
1970s–2010s
Richard Griffiths spent years on the classical stage before British television cast him as DI Henry Crabbe in Pie in the Sky.
54Robbie Coltrane
1970s–2020s
Robbie Coltrane's defining strength was an intelligence worn lightly. As Fitz in Cracker he made a detective's brilliance inseparable from his self-destruction.
55Robert Carlyle
1990s–2020s
Robert Carlyle’s defining strength is a raw, transformative intensity that can render even genre material compelling.
56Robson Green
1980s–2020s
Robson Green’s defining screen strength is a coiled, working-class intensity.
57Roger Allam
1970s–2020s
Roger Allam’s defining authority is his gravitas, a trait that has anchored long-running dramas and punctured political satire with equal force.
58Roy Marsden
1960s–2020s
Roy Marsden carved his niche through an unwavering commitment to introspection and authority, qualities that defined his signature portrayal of Commander Adam…
59Rupert Penry-Jones
1990s–2020s
He was Adam Carter in Spooks, the MI5 section chief who held the Grid for four series — then showed, as Chandler in Whitechapel and Reader in Silk, what happens when authority starts to crack.
60Sarah Lancashire
1980s–2020s
Sarah Lancashire’s defining strength is an emotional unvarnishedness that elevates material from conventional drama to forensic character study.
61Shaun Evans
2000s–2020s
Shaun Evans’s career is a study in disciplined restraint.
62Siobhan Redmond
1980s–2020s
Tartan wit is her hallmark, yet Siobhan Redmond's brilliance in British crime drama lies in how she grounds acerbic humour with unshowy emotional clarity.
63Stephanie Turner
1967–2010
Stephanie Turner provided the procedural authenticity that British crime drama often lacked.
64Suranne Jones
1990s–2020s
Suranne Jones has established herself as a commanding anchor for contemporary British drama.
65Tim Pigott Smith
1970s–2010s
Tim Pigott-Smith’s granite composure and clipped authority made him the industry’s first choice for institutional power.
66Trevor Eve
1970s–2020s
He quit Shoestring and unwittingly created Bergerac; he stayed with Waking the Dead for 92 episodes.
67Vicky McClure
2000s–2020s
Vicky McClure possesses a commanding yet grounded screen presence that distinguishes her within contemporary British crime drama.
68Warren Clarke
1990s–2000s
Warren Clarke was a commanding screen presence whose burly frame and hangdog expression elevated supposedly robust character parts into memorably complex…