Divorce between billionaire tech mogul Morgan Henderson (Dominic West)and movie star spouse Carla Duval (Sienna Miller)is hell in HBO's legal drama "War." (new episode 9 ET/6 PT).
But hell is highly entertaining when the bitter split features the deliciously imperious attorney St. John Smallwood, played with barely restrained relish by Pip Torrens.
Series creator George Kay admits he has to resist giving St. John too much spotlight. The formidable attorney prefers to operate in the shadows for his billionaire client, making every expensive word count. But writing St. John's witheringly dry lines is just as much fun as watching "The Crown" star Torrens, 66, deliver them onscreen.
"I've come to the point with St. John where I have to delete stuff
from the script to keep from having too much St. John," Kay says. "I have to limit the treats to keep it a treat."
And what a joy it is watching St. John (pronounced Sin-jin in upper-crust British), especially knowing that his formidable powers are focused on crushing the opposing legal team representing Duval. It's a front-row seat to a master of the devastating verbal blow.
St. John could make ordering a cappuccino sound like a thinly veiled threat to the Starbucks barista. Even his exquisite delivery of the line "delicious," when describing his opposition's legal tactics, sounds positively divine.
Torrens found similar acclaim playing the terrifyingly efficient Sir Alan "Tommy" Lascelles, the royal private secretary in "The Crown,"who regularly and unflinchingly delivered uncomfortable truths to the monarchy with the same precision of his clipped mustache.
"The Crown" creator Peter Morgan was so taken with the Torrens' character that he kept Lascelles around far longer than originally intended, extending the role into the series' Season 3 — even as other characters were aged out and the real-life Lascelles retired from royal service in 1953.
"I wasn't supposed to be in the second season of 'The Crown,'" Torrens says. "But they called my agent and said we need to book more episodes because Peter can't stop writing for Lascelles and these toe-curling scenes that only he can deliver."
High acting praise, but Torrens deflects the attention in a manner Lascelles would approve.
"It suggests sort of an undramatic quality that you can just say unpleasant stuff at speed to people," Torrens says, crediting this skill to growing up with an Anglican minister father and having a private school education that culminated in graduating from Trinity College, Cambridge.
"You come out with the beginnings of an understanding of the establishment. You understand form, good manners, courtesy and work these to your advantage dramatically," Torrens says. "So the unpleasantness these characters voice is a joy to sell."
Torrens isn't just one of TV's elite bearers of bad news on prestige series. His pompous character Peter Munion, the shamelessly social-climbing husband of the Roy siblings' mother, Lady Caroline Collingwood (Harriet Walter), is one of the great unsung characters of HBO's "Succession."
So it's no Hollywood lip service when Kay insists Torrens was the first and only choice he and director Ben Taylor had for the plum "War" role of St. John.
"I listed all these good character actor possibilities," Kay says. "And Ben just looked at me and said, 'It has to be Pip Torrens, doesn't it?'" End of discussion.
Torrens stands out amid the star power of West and Miller, whose characters' bitter divorce fuels the first season's legal warfare. St. John sits atop a formidable ensemble of legal sharks, including Beatrice "Queen Bea" Ubosi (Nina Sosanya), his intimidating colleague at the powerhouse firm Cathcarts & Sons.
Across the legal battlefield at rival firm Taylor & Byrne are Serena Byrne (Phoebe Fox), Nicholas Taylor (James McArdle) and ambitious young lawyer Johnny Warren (Archie Renaux), all fighting for Duval's interests.
In this clip, Torrens demonstrates the power of the snort, first employed when St. John brushes past Taylor in an exquisitely dismissive power move, then repeated when acknowledging a point made by his billionaire client.
Torrens and the legal teams will return for "War" Season 2, taking on a new high-profile defamation case featuring Marisa Tomei, Kelly Macdonald, David Harewood and Richard Schiff.
Yet for all his stellar turns in prestige dramas, Torrens knows which of his roles stirs up a devoted fan base. He played First Order officer Colonel Kaplan in2015's "Star Wars: The Force Awakens." It's an explosively short role, beloved by "Star Wars" fans.
"The weird thing is, if you've done anything on 'Star Wars' or on 'Dr. Who' in Britain, people are going to write in (letters) about that," Torrens says. "Sci-fi is always going to get the fans."
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: The most fearsome HBO 'War' lawyer also rattled cages in 'The Crown'
