Ray Stevenson was married to fellow actor Ruth Gemmell from 1997 to 2005. Stevenson died on Sunday while working on a movie in Italy, his publicist said. He was 58. Gemmell, 55, stars as Lady Violet Bridgerton on Netflix’s Bridgerton and its prequel series, Queen Charlotte: A Bridgerton Story.
Gemmell and Stevenson married in London in 1997. They met two years earlier while making the ITV series Band of Gold. The show centered on prostitutes who worked in the red-light district of Bradford. Gemmell appeared in only the first season as Gina Dixon. Stevenson played Steve Dickson in the first two seasons. Band of Gold was created by Kay Mellor and was nominated for Best Drama Serieal at the 1996 BAFTA Awards. Future Game of Thrones star Lena Headey had a supporting role in the second and third seasons.
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Stevenson looked back fondly on the making of Band of Gold during a 2015 interview with AV Club. “I met my first wife doing that [Ruth Gemmell]. I loved Lena Headey,” Stevenson said. “I had a handlebar mustache if I remember correctly. I don’t know what on earth possessed me to go for that. [Laughs.] I think I went to Bradford, and we saw these guys with their ‘staches. But it was fun working with Cathy Tyson, a wonderful actress.”
“Yeah, it was all about prostitutes on Lumb Lane,” Stevenson continued. “Lumb Lane was infamous for it, and it wasn’t that long prior to that that they’d had the Peter Sutcliffe thing, this guy up there who went ’round murdering prostitutes and what have you, so it was just bringing that out. It was a nice social piece, and it was great to do. Early days.”
Gemmell was born in Bristol and starred alongside Colin Firth in the 1997 romantic comedy Fever Pitch, which was later remade in the U.S. with Jimmy Fallon and Drew Barrymore in 2005. She primarily works on the stage and on television. Her credits include EastEnders, Waking the Dead, Holby City, Utopia, Midsomer Murders, Home Fires, and Doctors. She is best known around the world today as Lady Violet Bridgerton, the matriarch of the family in Netflix’s hit Bridgerton. She reprised the role in Queen Charlotte: A Bridgerton Story. Gemmell has not publicly discussed her personal life.
Before Bridgerton, Gemmell was better known for playing “really crap mothers,” as Gemmell described her characters in a new interview with Shondaland’s website. “I quite like evil characters,” she said. “They are quite good fun [to play]. I’ve been a mass murderer several times. I’ve died quite a lot; I don’t mind dying. I quite like killing people. [But now] I’m a really good mom, and I can’t tell you how exciting that is.”
In Queen Charlotte, Gemmell shares scenes with Lady Danbury, played by Adjoa Andoh again. She believes the two have a stronger friendship by the end of the first season, even though they still keep secrets between themselves.
“The thing is about all these vulnerabilities that you show – admittedly, I haven’t given birth – but whether it’s the feeling of grief, of being sidelined, of not finding love, of feeling lonely, they’re all things that we recognize,” Gemmell said. “And in exploring these sorts of things in Violet, we’re sucked into more of the character. [But] I’ve never found her one-dimensional.”
