This Is England legend talks his new Sheridan Smith drama: "I worked my arse off for The Cage"

This article first appeared in Radio Times magazine.

You did a two-hour audition for the role of Matty in The Cage. Surely, that isn’t how long they all last?

Normally you get 15 minutes to half an hour, if you’re lucky. But I’ve known [director] Al McKay since we worked together on This Is England, so we’d had a chat about the intricacies of the character beforehand, which helped me figure out who Matty was. I take every audition seriously – I make sure I’m off-book [don’t need a script], make sure I understand the character – but I worked my arse off for The Cage. So in the audition itself, I got to play, to try stuff, to mess around. It was my favourite ever audition and when I left, I knew I’d done my best.

Have you ever done an audition in which you felt you didn’t do your best – but were offered the part anyway?

Yeah, and I don’t understand how – and that always gives me anxiety on the first few weeks of the project, like they’ve got it wrong.

That sounds like a case of imposter syndrome. Is that something you feel?

I definitely have my days of insecurity and times when I’m like, “How the f*** has this happened? How am I here? How am I working with these amazing people?” Because I didn’t go to drama school, sometimes I do feel out of my depth and there have been times over the years when I’ve felt I don’t fit in. But I just have to forget about all that and get on with the job at hand.

How have you stayed grounded?

Being from where I’m from [Socha grew up in Derby] and having lived the life I’ve lived. I wasn’t a child actor. I was a late teen actor, so I know a life outside of work and I have a grounding there. And I live a very normal life in which I’m not Michael Socha the actor. Don’t get me wrong – I love my work. But I also really enjoy my own life outside of work. I don’t identify as An Actor. I identify as me. I’ve got other responsibilities.

Your breakthrough role was in Shane Meadows’s This Is England. What was your biggest revelation from that time?

I couldn’t believe that the crew got paid. I thought it was a hobby, something people did for fun. I didn’t know that people made money out of it and paid their bills from it.

Your CV since – Chernobyl, Showtrial, What It Feels like for a Girl, and further Shane Meadows projects – suggests excellent taste in scripts.

My agent has good taste. As an actor, I’m very lucky that I get to express myself. I get to play the range of ups and downs and express emotions that in real life you can’t necessarily get away with. So we’ve got to harbour it, control it, and just forget about it.

Is acting, if not therapy, then certainly therapeutic?

I’m always scared of saying that sort of s**t but I think it is. If, to play the truth of a character, I have to rely on some aspects of my own personality or I have to examine something in my past, I’ll do it. As a result, I delve into things I don’t necessarily want to. But I do, I deal with them and I release.

But all art is therapy. The other week I went to the Tracey Emin exhibition [at Tate Modern in London] and it’s incredible. And it’s the same thing – it’s gotta come out. As an artist, you have to be able to release and get whatever’s in your head out of your head. If you don’t, I don’t know what happens…

Have you ever played a character you’ve grown sick of?

In a therapeutic sense, once I’ve got to a level where I’ve expelled all the darkness within or whatever, there are certain characters I’ve needed a break from. Again, another cliché, but I’m an actor: I try and feel the actual emotions of each character, and sometimes that can give me a headache. Sometimes it can be stressful and it drains me. It makes me feel like a w****r when I say that’s what happens. But I get spent.

How do you recharge?

I would say I’m really into hiking, but every person’s into bloody hiking these days. I did the Camino de Santiago and I’ve walked England coast to coast, west to east. But the other day, I went on a hike with my mate Badger and we both agreed that we’re done with it. So we have to find a new obsession. I like keeping fit. I like boxing. I like kickboxing and watching movies and going to museums and art exhibitions. I like walking. I don’t like hiking any more.

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The Cage begins Sunday 26 April at 9pm on BBC One.

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