‘Alice & Jack’ co-star Aisling Bea rewrites the rules on supporting character: ‘Quiet, heroic moment’

nypost.com:

Bea (“This Way Up,” “Living With Yourself”) plays Lynn, the short-lived wife of Jack (Domhnall Gleeson), whose 15-year on-again/off-again romance with Alice (Andrea Riseborough) provides the central conceit of “Alice & Jack,” a twisty dramedy premiering March 17 on Masterpiece on PBS.“I think I sort of knew what [series creator] Victor [Levin] was getting at and … one of my passions with my writing and my acting is what is sometimes seen as a ‘side character,'” Bea, 39, told The Post. “Maybe the less dynamic characters that don’t get written about … you imagine them having a whole movie or TV show of their own.”The series opens with Alice and Jack meeting at a bar and hitting it off.

Alice is a successful financial analyst dealing with a childhood trauma, Jack a shy scientist who works in a lab researching rare illnesses.As their story unfolds, Alice and Jack embark on a 15-year checkered journey that forms the crux of the six-episode series by turns that are dramatic, funny, romantic and heartbreaking.Lynn enters the picture when she meets Jack during one of his yearslong rebounds from Alice.

She gets pregnant and accepts Jack’s marriage proposal, unaware of his deep past with Alice.Together, Lynn and Jack have a daughter, Cecilia, and all seems good in Lynn’s world … until Alice, once again, reappears in Jack’s life, and he admits to his wife that he’s thought about Alice “100 percent of every day” that they’ve been married.That’s all Lynn has to hear.

She kicks Jack out — ending their marriage then and there.“I don’t think she thinks she’s too good for Jack but she serves more than the situation,” said Bea. “I don’t know if I’ve seen many of these characters, women who don’t get to be the lead role having a quiet,.