ITV's Payback: Meet the star-studded cast, including Happy Valley and Grantchester stars

Promising plenty of high-stakes drama, Payback is the compelling new crime thriller coming to ITV. Set to premiere on Wednesday 4 October, the six-part series follows Lexie Noble, and the danger that follows her after husband, Jared, is brutally killed. 

Confronted with the revelation that Jared had been laundering money from notorious crime lord, Cal Morris, Lexie is forced into working with Cal, while evading the police. Boasting a stellar cast, Morven Christie, Peter Mullan, Prasanna Puwanarajah and Derek Riddell are among the star-studded line-up, and each and every one of them have a phenomenal list of credits under their belts…

What is ITV's Payback about?

The official synopsis for Payback teases: "A compelling character-led series, Payback follows Lexie Noble, played by Morven Christie (The Bay, The A Word, Ordeal by Innocence), as she becomes entangled in a perilous police operation to topple a notorious crime lord, Cal Morris, played by Peter Mullan (The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power, The Underground Railroad, Ozark). 

"With an idyllic family lifestyle in the suburbs of Edinburgh, Lexie is unaware her husband, Jared, has been laundering Cal Morris' illegal earnings on a vast scale. Jared's every move is being monitored by financial investigators DC Jibran Khan (Prasanna Puwanarajah) and DCI Adam Guthrie (Derek Riddell), who are determined to use the Noble family to bring Cal Morris to justice. 

"A partner in Jared's business, Lexie is forced into working for Cal, at the same time as the police net inexorably tightens. Soon Lexie finds herself walking a treacherous tightrope between Cal and the police in which her safety, and even her life, are in grave danger."

Meet the cast of ITV's Payback

Morven Christie

Morven Christie is no stranger to television. Famed for her portrayal of Amanda Hopkins in Grantchester (2014-17), and DS Lisa Armstrong in The Bay (2019-21), the Scottish actress has worked with ITV on a number of occasions. More recently, fans may also have spotted Morven in Netflix's supernatural detective thriller, Lockwood & Co. (2023) in which she played Penelope Fittes. 

Speaking about the character of Lexie in Payback, Morven said: "In this family that she's built with Jared she has this idealistic, beautiful, loving home life, but outside of that she's really quite closed-off to the world. She doesn't really trust people, so when this starts to happen at the beginning of the show she plummets back into this survivalist, trust-no-one mode. 

"She's quite a difficult person for Jared's friends to jump in and look after because she doesn't want help. She doesn't want to be looked after. She's really self-reliant."

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READ: Happy Valley stars reunite for new ITV thriller – and it sounds brilliant

Peter Mullan 

Actor and filmmaker Peter Mullan has starred in a number of cult classic movies, including Braveheart (1995), Trainspotting (1996), Young Adam (2003), the final two Harry Potter films (2010–11), and War Horse (2011).

Boasting an equally impressive list of TV credits, you may recognize Peter from Top of the Lake (2013), Ozark (2017-18), Westworld (2018-20) and The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power (2022). A pro at playing the villain, Payback will see Peter as notorious crime lord, Cal Morris.

Prasanna Puwanarajah

Prasanna Puwanarajah is taking the TV world by storm. After landing roles in hit series like Doctor Foster (2017), Patrick Melrose (2018), World on Fire (2019), and Line of Duty (2021), the actor lent his talents to The Crown's fifth season last year. Appearing as Martin Bashir, the former British journalist who conducted the infamous Panorama interview with Princess Diana, Prasanna certainly made an impression. 

Now, he's stepping into the shoes of DC Jibran Khan, a financial investigator in the Scottish police force. Determined to bring down criminal Cal Morris, Jibran and his colleague, DCI Adam Guthrie, have a tough case on their hands. 

Derek Riddell as DCI Adam Guthrie

It's our Catherine's ex, David Cawood, from Happy Valley! While actor Derek Riddell is typically recognized for his role in the hit police drama, he's also appeared in Hard Sun (2018), Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald (2018), Gentleman Jack (2019) and Shetland (2019). 

This time round, he'll be playing DCI Adam Guthrie, a detective chief inspector in the financial branch of the force. Offering some insight into the character, Derek told ITV: "I would say he's a slightly old-school detective and he is viewed in that way by some of his younger colleagues. 

"He finds having to go after Cal Morris a bit tedious, having to get him through financial means rather than just normal policing. I think he finds the use of technology and delving into this guy's financial dealings a bit tiresome. But he realises that this is the way that he's going to capture this guy that he's been after for a long, long time." 

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