Alan Cumming Says ‘Tip Toe’ Was His Greatest Role Ever — but He Never Wants to Think About It Again

[Editor’s note: The following interview contains spoilers for “Tip Toe,” including its finale.]

Most viewers these days know Alan Cumming for hanging out with Traitors, in one of television’s most addictive reality shows. But recently, he took on a role of a lifetime in limited series “Tip Toe,” in which he plays Leo, a queer bartender with a heart of gold whose life is cut short when he tries to strike up a friendship with his volatile and bigoted neighbor, Clive.

The five-episode limited series takes viewers on an emotional journey, opening with a shocking first scene which is also how the series ends. Leo has been hung outside his house, with Clive and a group of men looking on. Leo’s story is beautifully devastating, and the finale is one hour of gutting television.

Cumming recently sat down with IndieWire to discuss the finale and why he now needs to let Leo go.

Created and written by Russell T. Davies of “Doctor Who” fame, “Tip Toe” follows Leo and Clive (David Morrissey) in the days leading up to Leo’s brutal death at Clive’s hands. The show is not only filled with trauma, but deep joy, especially in showing the friendship between Leo and George, Clive’s teenage son, who is grappling with his own secret about his sexuality.

Davies can’t say enough good things about Cumming, and revealed that he took the entire young cast to a Lady Gaga concert as a bonding experience. Cumming confessed that he and Davies had been trying to work together for years, but it never worked out timing wise, until “Tip Toe.” Let’s just say Davies had Cumming at hello.

“Nine months before, we had a Zoom, and I simply described scene one of ‘Tip Toe,’ and from that moment on we had him,” Davies said, lighting up as he recalling the chat. He added that Cumming kept his schedule free a year before for filming the series.

“It’s the thing I’m most proud of in my career acting-wise,” Cumming said. “It was so grueling and traumatic to make.” He added that he didn’t really have to do extra research, because he lived through a lot of what Leo lived through. “I’ve never really played a part where I was able to bring so much of my own life, my own experience to the screen,” he said.

He also sees why Leo tried to trust Clive so much. “I understand everything Leo did. I let people behave badly for too long,” Cumming said. “I try to see the best in people … thinking you can fix people. And also, just being sort of a people-pleaser.”

Cumming said his favorite experience making the show was when the cast came to see his play in Scotland, and then came up for a weekend to his house in the Highlands. As for those grueling, traumatic end scenes, Cumming said, “The football boys who had to kill me were so supportive during filming.” With each terrible scene, they would stop and hug Cumming afterwards. “In the course of doing something about what a terrible place we are in our society, I was really heartened by working with the young people in this,” he said.

Filming the finale was not easy for any of them. “The hanging scene was just awful to do. It was so long, took so many days. The actual going up, and being hung, it was so traumatic. I didn’t realize how traumatized I was by it, until it came out. As soon as it finished [filming], I’ve never wanted to get away from a character as much as Leo. As much as I loved him. It was so heavy on my shoulders,” Cumming said.

But the true heart of the show, according to Cumming, is Davies’ writing. “It could easily be horrible straight guy and battered gay guy. What’s so brilliant about the writing is you can see blame and fault in both ways. But also, goodness in both,” he said.

In many ways, the show couldn’t have come at a better time. Cumming said, “It’s so prescient. We have allowed hateful rhetoric to become normalized. To the point that, we don’t bat an eye when really awful things happen. … Hopefully, this will be a conversation starter.”

For Cumming’s breakdown of the finale, watch the full interview in the video above.

All five episodes of “Tip Toe” are streaming now on Starz.