Meet The Forsytes' Millie Gibson
Get to know English actor Millie Gibson, who has brought incandescent new life to The Forsytes’ storied love interest, Irene. In an interview with MASTERPIECE before The Forsytes’ March 2026 premiere, Gibson gushed about her character, described preparing for the role, revealed how she and costar Joshua Orpin (Soames) tease each other, and shared her Irene-inspired tattoo. Read and learn all about the young actor who will continue capturing our hearts for Seasons 2 and 3 of The Forsytes!
She Loves The Forsytes’ New Version of Irene
Gibson first auditioned for Irene at age 19, and was surprised to learn that The Forsytes’ was to feature a younger version of the character, one who was a ballerina. “She’s got this bohemian eccentric background, where she grew up in Paris with her mom and dad. And I feel like Debbie [Horsfield, the writer] has really reimagined Irene for the better and given her more of a youthful light as a girl, as a girl in love.”
Crucial to that youthful light is Irene’s innocence, a quality that Gibson really enjoyed exploring. “I really love her innocence, and her fragility to these prestigious men, like Soames, in Season 1. I think in her mind, because she's never experienced this kind of flattery before, she's trying to find a gentle side to him that he’s probably not shown to anyone else before. And when he's getting off the horse in the polo match, she feels like, 'Oh, I'm the only one that sees this side.' And I think it's just that young love, and that young flattery. She's so pure, and just she's so human."
Photo: Kristina Bumphrey
From Alien-Fighter to Ballet Student: All in a Day’s Work
To prepare for her Forsytes role of aspiring ballerina Irene, Gibson researched ballet in the late Victorian era, and like many viewers, was surprised to learn that it was considered a somewhat scandalous art form. But her prep real work was physical, and coincided with her run as Ruby Sunday, companion to the fifteenth Doctor Who. She recalled, “I had an incredible choreographer, Sammy Murray, who taught me all of the simple ballet steps at first. I was getting ballet lessons whilst I was at Doctor Who, so it'd be the weirdest day–I'd be encountering aliens, and then it was, ‘Okay, Millie, ballet lessons.’ And I'd think, ‘This is just bizarre.’"
Among her favorite moments filming Season 1 of The Forsytes were her scenes of Irene dancing in Paris. She recounted, “It was really fun. I had three lessons to learn it all, but I was surrounded by all of these incredible ballerinas from the Royal Ballet in London. I was like, ‘Hi guys…I can't really do much,’ but they were all so welcoming and lovely, and some of them ended up getting parts as my friends in that episode, which was really nice. And I just loved being flung around like I was this professional ballerina all of a sudden.”
She Loves The Forsytes Cast
Coming from Doctor Who and joining the Forsytes cast a month into filming made Gibson’s initial experience similar to Irene’s. “When I met them all, they’d already been working together, so coming in as Irene, joining the family late, was kind of method and weird. But obviously in the real world, they were a lot more welcoming than the Forsytes are! I absolutely loved it.”
She also loved moving from working primarily as a duo in Doctor Who to an ensemble cast with its large group scenes. “I’d not done it for so long, and it was so fun! And they are all so different,” she described. “Jack Davenport is the dad that complains all day, ‘When are we going to finish?’ And then we've got Steve [Stephen Moyer], who's the cheeky uncle who's telling naughty jokes. And then Tuppence [Middleton], she’s the cool older sister. All the dynamics were so rewarding to be around, and I learned so much off every single person.”
She Surprised Both UK and US Audiences with Her Hair Color–For Different Reasons!
American audiences experiencing Gibson’s work for the first time might be surprised to learn that the actor is naturally blonde. But because Gibson wears a red wig as Irene in The Forsytes, and is widely known in the UK for her longtime run on Coronation Street and then Doctor Who with her natural hair color, the reverse was true for British audiences…and her own grandmother! “My nana didn't even recognize me when I was showing her some photos,” Gibson laughed. “She was like, ‘Have I got the right show on? Are you sure you're in this?’ and was like, "Nana, I'm the redhead."
And Gibson loved the change. “That wig, I feel so, so beautiful in it. I'm not going to lie–every time they put it on my head, I just feel like a completely different person. All of the cast were like, ‘Are you going to dye your hair red? You suit it.’ But it's so nice to have that separation. When I take the wig off, I'm like, okay, back to my blonde personality.”
She and Joshua Orpin are Worlds Apart…in Accents
With so many scenes one-on-one with Joshua Orpin, who plays Soames Forsytes, the two quickly developed a close rapport–which did not exclude teasing one another! “I loved all my scenes with Joshua–he was a really good anchor for me, and he's an amazing actor," the Greater Manchester native said. “But we both can't understand each other. Mancunian and Australian are worlds apart, and it kills him every time, if I'm ever in the Irene getup and I'm doing this Manc accent, he’s like, ‘I can't. It sounds wrong. You don't suit how you sound.’ And honestly, that Australian accent kills me. And I'm that person that if someone has an accent, I always mimic it without even realizing, so it does drive him insane!”
She Has an Irene-Inspired Tattoo
Sharing her love for her character, Gibson revealed that she had a tattoo inspired by Irene. With a ballerina-like lift of her leg to the Zoom screen, she displayed a delicate, pretty tattoo of a ballet slipper, saying, “I got the tattoo for the show, because I love The Forsytes so much. It was a job that really healed me, and I just really wanted to put that somewhere on my body.”
