Actor Martin Clunes has revealed he initially felt “sympathy” for Huw Edwards, believing the newsreader was being “outed in the newspapers,” before the true nature of the allegations emerged, leading him to conclude it was “a whole different ballgame.” Clunes, 64, is set to portray Edwards in the upcoming Channel 5 drama, Power: The Downfall Of Huw Edwards.
The drama will delve into the events surrounding Edwards, who admitted accessing indecent images of children as young as seven. Clunes recounted the initial confusion surrounding the scandal, which saw numerous BBC presenters deny involvement before Edwards was eventually named.
“It was weird at the time because they wouldn’t name him, so lots of BBC presenters kept saying it wasn’t them, and it caught fire, and then it was a surprise when Huw Edwards was named,” Clunes explained. He added, “You felt sympathy for him at first, because it just seemed like a person in the public eye was being outed in the newspapers, and I can say from personal experience that newspapers only want to be nasty about people in the public eye. But then they found messages on his telephone, and that was a whole different ball game.”
Preparing for the challenging role, Clunes spoke about moving beyond Edwards’s public persona. “I was familiar with Huw Edwards the newsreader, and how he presented himself when he was reading the news,” he said. “But I’ve seen other actors make the mistake of just inhabiting that projected face of a famous person or politician – I knew that we needed the other side of him too.”
The Doc Martin star noted the difficulty in finding archive footage of Edwards outside his newsreading duties, but observed a distinct difference. “I noticed from looking at that archive that he was different when he wasn’t reading the news, and I wanted to make that distinction. If you listen to his rhythms, he’s far more Welsh when he’s not newsreading.” Clunes emphasised his approach to character portrayal: “I certainly don’t think you should ever be judging a character you’re playing, you just have to find ways to get into character. I’m not attracted to men, but I’m attracted to women, so I know what it feels like to be attracted. Then sometimes with acting you just have to jump off the cliff and hope you land well – you don’t want everything to feel measured and calculated.”
Edwards, once one of the BBC’s highest-paid newsreaders, was a familiar face on News At Ten for decades, delivering major stories including the death of Queen Elizabeth II. His downfall began in July 2023 following a report by The Sun alleging a “top BBC star” had paid a teenager for sexual images. Days later, his wife publicly named him. He was charged in June 2024 after a Metropolitan Police investigation and pleaded guilty in July 2024 to making indecent images of children, admitting to possessing 41 photographs on WhatsApp, including seven of the most serious type.
The drama, directed by Bafta and Emmy-winning Michael Samuels, will also feature Welsh actor Osian Morgan as Ryan, a character contacted by Edwards in the film. Power: The Downfall Of Huw Edwards is scheduled to air on Tuesday, March 24, at 9pm on Channel 5.
