Get to Know the Cast of The Great Escaper
The Great Escaper, a tender and powerfully moving new drama starring Michael Caine and Glenda Jackson, is packed with talented actors delivering stunning performances. Learn some fun facts about the star-studded cast, including who descends from a family of actors, who would bring a Shakespeare play to a desert island, and which familiar faces you may have seen on MASTERPIECE before.
Then, fall in love with the show when you watch it now on MASTERPIECE on PBS. General streaming for The Great Escaper is available until Dec 7, 2025 [EST]. Or, you can watch the show anytime with PBS Passport, an added member benefit.
Michael Caine
The Character: Bernie Jordan
The Actor: The beloved and legendary Michael Caine’s career has spanned a remarkable seven decades. He began pursuing his acting career after his discharge from the British Army in 1953, and has since delivered Academy Award-winning performances in Hannah and Her Sisters and The Cider House Rules, and won a BAFTA and Golden Globe award for his role in Educating Rita. Caine has appeared in fan-favorite films like Christopher Nolan’s The Dark Knight, The Last Witch Hunter alongside Vin Diesel, and as Scrooge in The Muppet Christmas Carol.
Fun Fact: Did you know that Michael Caine’s name was not always “Michael Caine”? Born as Maurice Micklewhite, the actor decided to adopt a stage name in 1954. At the time, he had been using the name Michael Scott. But, when the young actor saw the poster for the Humphrey Bogart film The Caine Mutiny, he was inspired to adopt the surname Caine. It wasn’t until 2016 that he made his name change official — and we can’t imagine him any other way.
Glenda Jackson
The Character: Rene Jordan
The Actor: Glenda Jackson, the treasured actor who passed away in 2023 at the age of 87 is fondly remembered today for her long and storied career. Jackson is one of few actors to achieve the “Triple Crown of Acting,” having won two Academy Awards, three Emmy Awards and a Tony Award. Jackson’s role in the 1969 film Women in Love led to her first Academy Award win, followed by Emmy-winning performances in two MASTERPIECE shows: Elizabeth R and Elizabeth is Missing. But, she doesn’t just dazzle on screen. On stage, she has played Shakespeare’s Ophelia in Hamlet, the titular role in King Lear, and won her Tony Award for a revival of Three Tall Women (in a role previously played by the one and only Maggie Smith).
Fun Fact: Even though she excelled on stage and screen, acting isn’t Glenda Jackson’s only claim to fame — she took a not-so-brief intermission from acting to pursue a career in politics. In 1992, she stepped away to serve as a Member of Parliament of the United Kingdom. In 2015, after a remarkable 23 years in politics, Jackson resumed her acting career shortly before her 80th birthday, proving it truly never is too late to return to what you love.
Danielle Vitalis
The Character: Adele
The Actor: Black Mirror fans will recognize East London actor and writer Danielle Vitalis from two episodes of Netflix’s hit series: Joan is Awful alongside Salma Hayek and Annie Murphy, and Hotel Reverie with Issa Rae and Emma Corrin. Vitalis has also recently shared the stage with MASTERPIECE favorite David Tennant, who played the husband of Vitalis’ character in a London West End theatre production of Don Juan in Soho.
Fun Fact: Danielle Vitalis’ talents extend far beyond on-screen acting into the world of audiobook narration. You may have heard her narrate the audiobook People Person by Candice Carty-Williams, who is British Book of the Year Award-winning author of Queenie. Vitalis also read How the One-Armed Sister Sweeps Her House by Cherie Jones.
John Standing
The Character: Arthur
The Actor: John Standing comes from a acting family, including his great-grandfather Herbert Standing, his grandfather Guy Standing, and his mother Kay Hammond. In Standing’s first acting role, he shared the stage with stars Vivien Leigh and Laurence Olivier in a 1955 production of Titus Andronicus. John Standing has been with MASTERPIECE since the very beginning! He was a part of the first ever MASTERPIECE series, The First Churchill, and decades later the drama Churchill’s Secret. His long career spans decades, including a starring role in Noël Coward's Private Lives with Maggie Smith, a corpse on Game of Thrones, and roles on Midsomer Murders, Murder, She Wrote, and The Crown.
Fun Fact: Much like his The Great Escaper character Arthur, John Standing is also a British Army veteran. He served as an officer in the King’s Royal Rifle Corps in Germany in the mid-1950s. “But the nearest I got to any action was dodging bullets in the Welsh hills on a training exercise,” he told The Times.
Laura Marcus
The Character: Young Rene
The Actor: Highlighted as “one to watch” by The Evening Standard (UK), Laura Marcus is a multifaceted actor and writer from London, who wrote, shot, directed and performed in her own short film during lockdown in 2021. She has appeared in multiple other projects, including The Serpent Queen, The Devil’s Hour, and Bad Education. It was recently announced that Marcus will appear as the deadly and formidable Silke Sharp in the newest addition to the Hunger Games film franchise, Sunrise on the Reaping.
Fun Fact: If Laura Marcus looks familiar, it’s probably because you’ve seen her on MASTERPIECE before. Laura Marcus played young Miss Scarlet in flashback episodes of Miss Scarlet Season 4 — reminisce with her behind the scenes photos. She also appeared as Susan in Tom Jones.
Will Fletcher
The Character: Young Bernie
The Actor: Will Fletcher studied at Bristol Old Vic drama school (UK), performing a lead role on stage in The Girl Who Fell shortly after graduating. Recently, he appeared in The Road Dance and had a prominent role in Amazon series The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power.
Fun Fact: Co-star Laura Marcus isn’t the only The Great Escaper actor to also appear in MASTERPIECE’s Tom Jones. Will Fletcher played Nightingale on Tom Jones – see some nearly unrecognizable photos of him in costume with co-star Hannah Waddingham.
Victor Oshin
The Character: Scott Selwood
The Actor: Victor Oshin’s acting career took off when he accepted the role of Othello in an international tour with the English Touring Theatre (ETT) in 2018. Since then, he has taken his career to the screen, appearing in Michaela Coel's BBC/HBO series I May Destroy You and Guy Ritchie’s The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare for Lionsgate.
Fun Fact: When asked by the English Touring Theatre which five plays he’d take with him to a desert island, Oshin had some great picks that make us want to join him there. His list includes: Animal Farm (adapted from the novel by George Orwell), William Shakespeare’s Othello, Elmina’s Kitchen by Kwame Kwei-Arma, Sucker Punch by Roy Williams, and Market Boy by David Eldridge.
