**Warning: Contains spoilers for Netflix's Run Away episodes 1 and 2**
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The action-packed first episode of Run Away ends with Ingrid Greene (Minnie Driver) being shot. In the story, based on Harlan Coben’s novel, she and her husband Simon (James Nesbitt) decide to investigate the last place that their missing daughter Paige (Ellie de Lange) was living, without the police knowing.
She was living with her boyfriend Aaron, and both were addicted to drugs, but Aaron was recently found murdered in the flat. A man in the building called Cornelius Faber (Lucian Msamati), who knew them both, tries to help Ingrid and Simon by introducing them to Paige and Aaron’s drug dealer Rocco, who operates out of the basement in the building next door. Aaron also worked for him.
Simon is desperate and offers Rocco £10,000 for any information about the whereabouts of Paige, but before he can respond, one of Rocco’s associates, Luther, appears and shoots Ingrid.
“I haven't done anything like this before, and I’ve never had someone point a [fake] gun at me before in a show or a movie. It was horrible – I didn’t like it at all,” Driver tells Radio Times exclusively.
“It's just make-believe, but nonetheless, it's really strange having to act being shot and your body doesn't know that you're not going through the trauma of being frightened. I’m surprised I haven’t read more interviews with actors saying it’s really awful having a gun pointed at you. I don't know how people make all those big action movies, because it’s really scary.”
Lucian Msamati as Cornelius Faber in Run Away. Ben Blackall/Netflix
In episode 2, Ingrid is rushed to the hospital where she works as a paediatrician and it’s revealed that the bullet did a lot of damage.
Driver adds: “I love the prosthetics and how brilliant that is – the mechanisms they use for gun wounds, blood and the pumps and all of that, because it's super creative – but the actuality of miming being shot by a bullet is horrible. The stunt guy is saying, ‘Well, this is actually what happens to your body when you get shot. This is what it would look like.' I didn't find it fun at all.
“The amazing thing about being an actor is you get to dip into these scenarios and explore it, and then you can duck out and go, ‘Wow, that was wild, and this is how much it took out of me, but yes, it was worth it, because it’s amazing storytelling,’ or ‘No, I never want to do that again.’”
Laura Rutkowski is a Commissioning Editor at Radio Times magazine, where she looks after the View From My Sofa slot, and the "What it's like to…" column, which spotlights behind-the-scenes roles within the TV and film industry. She loves finding out how productions are made and enjoys covering a wide variety of genres. Laura is half-American and half-British and joined Radio Times in 2022. She has a degree in Psychology and a Master's in Magazine Journalism.
