'It's not always the right time to empty the chamber'

Tom Pelphrey, sublime in 'Ozark', tells Ellie Harrison about the surprising aspect of new series 'Task' that kept him up at night, the times he's taken acting too far, and raising a child

- Ellie Harrison

When the third season of Ozark arrived in March 2020, plunging locked-down audiences back into the blistering, bloodspattered lives of the Byrde family, the thriller was already well established as one of Netflix's biggest ever hits.

Critics couldn't get enough of this normal family who broke bad, and the show, pitch-black and visually sumptuous, was an awards darling from the off. Then, Tom Pelphrey entered the scene as Ben, the bipolar brother of Laura Linney's Wendy. The actor was a relative unknown, but he portrayed Ben's inner turmoil with such staggering realism that Ozark was elevated from a brilliant series to a full-on streaming phenomenon.

“Everybody and their mother just kept promising me that I would be nominated for everything,” says Pelphrey, letting out a big whoop of laughter. But he wasn't.

That year, Emmys announcement day coincided with Pelphrey's birthday (for what it's worth, nestled in the middle of summer: 28 July). No nominations came. Though something else did arrive at the door. “I guess Netflix was so sure that I would get nominated for an Emmy, so I had a gigantic package from them congratulating me,” the 43-year-old says with a chuckle. While fans were up in arms about the snub, Pelphrey didn't mind - the experience of working on the show was more valuable to him than any award.

But a year later, Pelphrey did get shortlisted for appearing in flashback scenes in the show's fourth and final season. Cracking up, he does an impression of an apologetic imaginary Emmys member. “Hey, listen. We heard about the Netflix box. That must have been awkward. Let's just get you in here. Then we can say we did it.” Well, the Emmys might come calling again for his next role, another tightly wound and incredibly violent thriller, set by a series of beautiful lakes. Task is the new Philadelphia-based Sky drama from