Hello, I'm Lauren Laverne and this is the Desert Island Discs podcast.
Every week I ask my guests to choose the eight tracks,
book and luxury they'd want to take with them if they were cast away to a desert island.
I hope you enjoy listening.
My cast away this week is the actor Anna Maxwell Martin.
Her stellar CV includes everything from Shakespeare and Dickens to The Line of Duty via the comedy series Motherland.
She's an Emmy and double BAFTA winner who's been called the most un-typecast actress in Britain.
Equally at home in gritty dramas like ITV's Until I Kill You as she is in crowd-pleasing crime like the BBC's Ludwig.
She set her heart on performing when she was just a little girl growing up in Yorkshire.
Her scientist parents were, she says, bemused, but backed her all the way, driving her to singing contests
where she belted out Whitney Houston songs to get a taste of being on stage.
In recent years, she's also become a campaigner,
speaking up for vulnerable children and families navigating the SEND system.
Her advocacy is informed by experience, the sudden loss of her children's father
and her own difficulties in finding the right support for her two girls in the wake of his death.
She says, whether I'm on a set or in a rehearsal room,
my priorities are being a mum and meeting the needs of my kids.
They are my favourite people.
I laugh every single day with them.
I feel grateful to have them over and above anything that will ever happen in my career.