Vera - The Crow Trap - 10:00 pm Sunday, June 7 on ITV3

Brenda Blethyn (Actor) .. DCI Vera Stanhope

Born: February 20, 1946 in Kent

Best Known For: Secrets & Lies.

Early-life: Born Brenda Anne Bottle on February 20, 1946, in Ramsgate, Kent. She's the youngest of nine children of a parlour maid and a chauffeur. Money was tight when she was growing up. After excelling at maths at school, she worked as a secretary and bookkeeper in a bank. But she was always obsessed with films and acting and, at the age of 27, after divorcing her first husband, she gave up her day job and used her savings to fund a drama course at Guildford. She didn't tell her parents, and thought she would go back to her old career if things didn't work out.

Career: Blethyn gained early experience with two small theatre groups before joining the National Theatre in 1975. Her TV debut was in a 1979 episode of Tales of the Unexpected, and a year later she had a lead role in Mike Leigh's small-screen project Gloria. In 1990 she made her first film, The Witches, following that up with A River Runs Through It. Despite roles in Outside Edge and The Buddha of Suburbia, she didn't become a household name until her Oscar-nominated role in Leigh's Secrets & Lies. Since then she's starred in Girls' Night, Saving Grace, Pride & Prejudice, Atonement, London River, and gained another Oscar nomination for Little Voice. She returned to the small screen in 2011 playing the title role in ITV's detective series Vera.

Quote: 'I don't have ambition. My expectations are low.'

Trivia: Blethyn was awarded an OBE for services to drama in the 2003 New Year Honours List.

David Leon (Actor) .. DS Joe Ashworth

Best Known For: Vera.

Early-life: David Jeremy Leon was born in 1980 in Newcastle upon Tyne to Ann and Anthony. As a teenager, Leon was on the books of Blackburn Rovers, but they released him when he was 19. He turned to acting and successfully auditioned for the National Youth Theatre. He dropped out of drama school to shoot the film Alexander (2004) with Oliver Stone in Morocco. In 2006, he had a main role in the film These Foolish Things (2006).

Career: Leon went on to star in the miniseries The Wild West, RocknRolla (2008) and Walking with the Enemy (2013). Between 2011 and 2014, he starred alongside Brenda Blethyn in ITV drama Vera, playing DS Joe Ashworth.

Quote: 'You can't get away with enjoying acting in a working-class environment.'

Trivia: Leon's short film Orthodox was accepted into several international film festivals. He completed a feature length version of Orthodox in 2015.

Wunmi Mosaku (Actor) .. DC Holly Lawson

Born: July 31, 1986 in Zaria, Nigeria

Best Known For: Playing Gloria Taylor in Damilola, Our Loved Boy.

Early-life: Oluwunmi Olapeju Mosaku was born on July 31, 1986 in Zaria, Nigeria. She moved with her family to Manchester, England, where she was educated at Trinity Church of England High School and Xaverian Sixth Form College and sang in the Manchester Girls Choir for 11 years. Wunmi graduated from the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art in 2007.

Career: Mosaku's professional acting career began with various roles on the stage. Some of her early TV roles include appearances in Doctors and The Bill. She was cast as Joy in the BBC Two mini-series Moses Jones and then went on to appear in such TV series as Silent Witness, The Body Farm and Vera. Mosaku also appeared in the films Philomena (2013), Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice (2016) and Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (2016). She played Gloria Taylor in the TV film Damilola, Our Loved Boy (2016). Her other recent TV credits include Guerilla and Fearless.

Quote: 'I don't pick roles because of a strong woman - most of the time, with the good characters, there's a certain vulnerability there. I pick roles because they're good stories that are being told.'

Trivia: She won the BAFTA Award for Best Supporting Actress for her performance in Damilola, Our Loved Boy.

Paul Ritter (Actor) .. Billy Cartwright

Jon Morrison (Actor) .. DC Kenny Lockhart

Elizabeth Carling (Actor) .. Bev Macdonald

Born: October 20, 1967 in Middlesbrough

Best Known For: Playing Selena in Casualty

Early-life: Born in Middlesbrough in 1967. She has two older siblings and a twin sister called Laura. She enjoyed drama from an early age and after leaving school attended Billingham Technical College to study an arts foundation course and an A Level in Theatre Studies. At 18, she moved to London to join the National Youth Theatre, before heading back to Newcastle, where she appeared in numerous stage productions.

Career: After appearing in touring productions of The Rocky Horror Show and The Hunchback of Notre Dame, Carling got her big TV break in 1989 when she landed the role of Laura Marsh in Boon. She followed that with appearances in Crocodile Shoes and Men Behaving Badly, and in 1997 replaced Dervla Kirwan as cockney barmaid Phoebe in the sitcom Good Night Sweetheart. She also starred in Border Cafe and Barbara before making a brief appearance in Casualty in 2003. A year later she became a regular on the medical drama when she accepted the role of Selena.

Quote: On medical terms: 'You try to learn them as well as you can but it's like learning Swahili. It's not English and it doesn't come tripping off the tongue.'

Trivia: Away from acting, Carling is a trained singer and released a big band album, Goodnight Sweetheart, in 1999.

Amy Cudden (Actor) .. Grace Bishop

Daniel Flynn (Actor) .. Godfrey Waugh

Jane Holman (Actor) .. Bella Furness

John Lynch (Actor) .. Edmund Fulwell

Jack McBride (Actor) .. Dougie Furness

Daniela Nardini (Actor) .. Anne Preece

Born: April 26, 1968 in Largs, Scotland

Best Known For: Portraying self-destructive Anna in This Life.

Early-life: Daniela Nardini was born on April 26, 1968 in Largs, Scotland, the only-daughter of an Italian ice-cream selling family. She has described her childhood as happy, but tragedy struck when she was 16 and her elder brother Pietro died in a car accident in Italy. Her original ambition was to be a doctor, but she was later bitten by the acting bug and studied at the Royal Scottish Academy Of Music And Drama. One of her earliest acting jobs involved dressing up as a Tetley tea man and being driven around Edinburgh on a float.

Career: Nardini worked in the theatre for several years before achieving overnight fame with the success of the TV series This Life in 1996. Since then, she has appeared in several TV dramas, including Big Women, Rough Treatment, Undercover Heart, Love In The 21st Century and Sirens. On the big screen, she has starred in Elephant Juice and Festival. Her extensive stage career includes an appearance in A Streetcar Named Desire in 2009 at the Donmar Warehouse in London. She reprised the role of Anna in the 10th anniversary reunion episode of This Life, called This Life +10.

Quote: 'I wouldn't like an actor for a boyfriend, because if he was doing love scenes I'd get jealous. I'd be asking: 'What was she like?''

Trivia: She won a Scottish Bafta in 2009 for her role in comedy drama New Town.

Skyla Pearce (Actor) .. May Waugh

Richard Short (Actor) .. Neville Furness

Susie Trayling (Actor) .. Barbara Waugh

Mia Wyles (Actor) .. Jessie Ashworth

Stephen Brady (Writer)

Farren Blackburn (Director)

Elaine Collins (Producer)

Sam Williams (Editor)

Kate Bartlett (Executive producer)

Kate Lewis (Executive producer)

Vera: The Crow Trap

10:00 pm - 11:50 pm, Sunday, June 7 on ITV3 (10)

About this Broadcast

The Crow Trap
Season 1, Episode 3

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