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The hype is real for Slow Horses, an upcoming spy series starring Gary Oldman. He has described his character in the six-parter as "rude and obnoxious to everyone around him," but also a "great agent and incredibly smart." We're tapping into the excitement by making Oldman our British Icon of the Week.
Here are 10 things we admire and find interesting about this prolific performer.
1. He is an Oscar-winning actor.
Oldman won Best Actor in 2017 for his transformative performance as Winston Churchill in Darkest Hour. For his portrayal of the iconic British Prime Minister, he also collected silverware at the Golden Globes, BAFTAs, and SAG Awards.

2. He has played many other, very different real-life figures.
Among them: punk icon Sid Vicious in 1986's Sid and Nancy, playwright Joe Orton in 1987's Prick Up Your Ears, the infamous murderer Lee Harvey Oswald in 1991's JFK, composer Ludwig van Beethoven in 1994's Immortal Beloved, and Hollywood screenwriter Herman J. Mankiewicz in 2020's Mank. For the latter, he earned his third Oscar nomination.

3. He guested in an episode of Friends.
Oldman earned an Emmy nomination for his amusing work in the 2001 episode "The One with Monica and Chandler's Wedding." He plays Richard Crosby, an actor working on a movie with Matt LeBlanc's Joey who can't stop spitting whenever he says his lines.

4. He is also a director.
Oldman made his debut as a writer and director with the highly acclaimed 1997 movie Nil by Mouth. Based on his own upbringing in Southeast London, it's a raw and unflinching portrait of a poor working-class family whose lives are haunted by alcoholism and violence. Star Kathy Burke won the Best Actress prize at the Cannes Film Festival and the movie itself took home two BAFTAs: Best Original Screenplay and Best British Film.

5. He has dipped his toes into the music world.
Oldman once recorded a duet with the great David Bowie, 1997's "You've Been Around," and also produced a live performance for The White Stripes' Jack White. He appeared in a Guns N' Roses music video, too, portraying the devil in 1994's "Since I Don't Have You."
Oldman was especially close to Bowie, and appeared in one of his music videos: 2013's "The Next Day." You can watch him singing Bowie's classic song "The Man Who Sold the World" at an L.A. tribute concert below.

6. He has some pretty nifty dance moves.
During his 2017 appearance on The Graham Norton Show, Oldman was more than happy to revisit the time he impersonated James Brown... while dressed as Winston Churchill. Once you've seen this clip, you won't be able to get it out of your head.

7. He helped to launch the acting career of his sister, Laila Morse.
Morse has a supporting part in Nil by Mouth, which earned her a nomination for the Most Promising Newcomer prize at the British Independent Film Awards. She told the Daily Mail that Oldman persuaded her to take the part, when it turned out that the actress originally cast wasn't quite right. She had reservations owing to her lack of acting experience, saying, "It was a shock to go from working in a betting shop to acting alongside a cast of top actors in a major film. Thankfully everyone was hugely supportive."
Morse went on to become well known for her longtime role on BBC soap opera EastEnders as the tough-as-nails matriarch "Big" Mo Harris. She played Big Mo from 2000 to 2016, and then again from 2018 to 2021.
According to Digital Spy, Oldman modestly noted in 2011 that Morse attracts more attention from fans than him, adding that his own fame "comes in waves."

8. He has been teetotal for the last 25 years.
Oldman has spoken candidly and unselfconsciously about his battle with alcoholism in several interviews over the years. 
"I used to sweat vodka. It becomes such a part of you. My tongue would be black in the morning. I blamed it on the shampoo," he told the L.A. Times last year. "I wouldn’t wish it on my worst enemy, to be in the grip of it. It’s hell. And that self-effacing humor? That’s just there to mask the inadequacy."
9. He made the unusual decision to go uncredited in the 2001 movie Hannibal.
The idea was to lean into his role as Mason Verger, a child sex abuser who has been facially disfigured by Anthony Hopkins' title character. But, Oldman has said he was also playing off his reputation as an unusually versatile, shape-shifting actor. 
"We thought that as I'm unofficially 'the man of many faces,' you know, of Lee Harvey Oswald, Dracula, and Sid Vicious, and Beethoven, we... just had a bit of fun with it," he told IGN at the time. "We thought it would be great. The man with no face and no name, and sort of do it anonymously. It's no secret that I'm in the film. We just had fun with it, really."
10. He tells a great story.
In this clip from The Graham Norton Show, Oldman shares what it's like to record a voice role on the World War II-themed video game Call of Duty. Along the way, he does a terrific impression of Kiefer Sutherland, and gets very, very loud. Actually, you might want to turn down your volume before watching it...

Do you have a favorite Gary Oldman performance?