Dirty Dance

But Dance, 66, says his character in the latest adaptation of former MP Chris Mullin’s book A Very British Coup is not cut from the same cloth as the recently resigned Andrew Mitchell.

“I don’t think he’s the kind of man to ride on his bicycle through the gates and abuse policemen, that’s for sure,” says Dance.

The actor, who made his name in the 1980s serial The Jewel In The Crown and recently played Lord Tywin Lannister in Game Of Thrones, plays Downing Street official John Hodder.

He’s a shady character who helps manoeuvre colleague Tom Dawkins (played by Gabriel Byrne) into the top job when the Prime Minister’s plane crashes in mysterious circumstances.

“John is very much a kind of father figure to him, and there’s not much going on that he doesn’t know about,” says Dance.

“He’s always there, hovering around, offering advice and making sure Tom doesn’t put a foot wrong, and he doesn’t mince his words.”

The conspiracy drama, which kicks off as a nuclear explosion destroys a Teesside school – and many of its pupils – doesn’t pull any punches, and explores such pressing issues as state surveillance, terrorism and corporate responsibility.

Dance, for one, hopes it’ll make viewers ask questions about what is going on.

“I’m always intrigued,” he says, “whether there’s much we do that Big Brother doesn’t know about.

“I suspect what came out of the Leveson Inquiry about people’s phones being hacked by tabloid newspapers is pretty small fry compared to what goes on at GCHQ (Government Communications Headquarters).”

The actor makes no bones about his own political views, which he describes as extremely left-of-centre.

“I don’t really like what’s going on at the moment. The wrong people are having to pay for what the right people did, and the recent debacle with the railway franchise? It takes your breath away, really,” he says.

Though Byrne’s character in Secret State is a politician with principles who believes in open government, Dance reveals that he believes there are no such credible characters in our current House.

Is there absolutely no one he admires?

“Not really, darling, no,” he says. “They don’t inspire one very much, any of them, and I think it’s a great shame. If there was a lot more to Boris than rather amusing bluster, he might be a likely candidate, but he’s just very good entertainment value at the moment.”

Dance is not often asked to do comedy.

“In this business, you are what you’re seen to be. If you’re seen to be austere or villainous, that’s what you tend to be offered, and we have bills to pay, so we tend to say yes, unless there’s money in the bank to say no,” he says.

However, he has done a short comedy film for C4 called Bad Grandad, playing a a retired rock ’n’ roll tour manager.

“It was so far removed from what I’m normally asked to do, so I couldn’t say no, and I had a hoot doing it,” he says.

NEXT, he is filming two Australian films and is also hoping to finance two films of his own.

Dance went behind the camera for 2004’s Ladies In Lavender, which brought together Maggie Smith and Judi Dench, and of which he is immensely proud.

“It was a film with no dramatic car chases, no enormous stunts, no rumpy pumpy,” he recalls. “It sat on the circuit for a few weeks, it was one of the few films that made money for the British Film Institute and is a stocking-filler for everybody’s maiden aunt and grandmother.”

He will be back in Belfast next year to film the next series of Game Of Thrones and has no plans to slow down.

“I used to share an agent with the late John Gielgud and in his 90s he was phoning our agent and saying, ‘Hello, Johnny Gielgud here, any work?”