BY now you may be familiar with the work of Mirren Mack. The Stirling-born actor has been lighting up our screens in BBC thriller, The Nest, on Sunday evenings, playing Kaya, a troubled young woman who offers her services as a surrogate to a wealthy couple.

The five-part series, starring Martin Compston and Sophie Rundle, will reach its dramatic conclusion in two final episodes to be shown tomorrow night and Easter Monday. It is Mack's first major TV lead and given her stellar performance, unlikely to be her last.

First, let's rewind a few weeks. It's a Thursday morning and Mack's voice drifts down the line from her family home in Stirling. We're in the early days of the coronavirus pandemic and everyone is still trying to make sense of rapidly changing events.

In Mack's case, instead of treading the boards, the 22-year-old actor is cooling her heels. She had been gearing up to perform in The Beast of Blue Yonder, the now postponed world premiere of Philip Ridley's new play, due to begin its run at the Southwark Playhouse in London this month.

Nor is she alone in that vein. Her father Billy, a fellow actor and well-known face of stage and screen, was supposed to be touring with the National Theatre of Scotland's upcoming production of The Cheviot, the Stag and the Black, Black Oil, another that has been temporarily shelved.

While her disappointment is palpable, Mack is stoic. "Everything that is going on is so much bigger than doing a play," she says. "Hopefully, we will get to do it in a year or nine months. But the focus right now is the health of everyone."

The Nest, written by Nicole Taylor who penned the multi award-winning Wild Rose and Three Girls, centres on Dan and Emily – played by Compston and Rundle – who are unable to have a child. In a last desperate attempt, they turn to surrogacy.

When fate throws Kaya into their path, it seems the perfect opportunity. She needs money to pursue dreams of a better life. Dan and Emily want a baby. Yet, as it soon transpires, Kaya is very possibly the last person you would want to be carrying your unborn child.

The dark and twisting tale has kept viewers captivated, not least with an impressive cast that includes Shirley Henderson, Kate Dickie, David Hayman, Katie Leung and James Harkness. Not bad going for one of your first big jobs, Mirren?

"It was incredible," she attests. "I admire all these people massively. I was totally in awe. On set, everyone was kind and generous. They were encouraging and gave me great advice. I also had a lot of fun. Everyone was a good laugh."

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Her character Kaya is 18, while Mack – who graduated from Guildhall School of Music and Drama in London last summer – is only four years older. Could she imagine being a surrogate herself?

"Oh, my goodness, absolutely not," she says. "At that age I was so full of everything that was going on in my life. I still am. I have so much admiration for people who are surrogates. Giving away the baby you have nurtured inside of you and kept alive, that is a massive ask.

"To do that for people who really want a child and can't have one is an amazing thing. But it is a lot of responsibility. You have to play by the rules."

To that end, Mack has done her homework. She pored over script notes, spoke with experts and spent hours researching surrogacy cases, as well as trying to wrap her head around the mechanics of pregnancy.

"I have never been pregnant. There was a couple of women working on The Nest who were pregnant. I would flood them with questions which was probably quite annoying. I would ask: 'How often were you sick?' and 'Do you waddle?'. I would watch them and try to follow what they did."

Testament to the deftly woven plotline, the sympathy of viewers jumps between the characters. "Totally," says Mack. "When I was reading the scripts before we started filming that's what I felt because everyone has their own motives.

"Everyone is human. No one is a 'baddie' or a 'goodie'. They are all human beings trying to get what they want. I could never tell who was in control, who was the puppet master and who was manipulating who, because it changed all the time.

"I would be questioning myself: 'Maybe this is just three people getting what they want from each other, it's a simple and easy exchange.' Then the next minute: 'What was I thinking? This is exploitative.' I'm excited to hear people's opinions once they have watched it."

Someone singing Mack's praises is Martin Compston. In a recent interview with The Herald Magazine, the Line of Duty actor described her as "a wee superstar". When I mention this, she can barely contain her bashful delight.

Compston once found himself in a similar position as a breakout actor in a major production when, as a wet-behind-the-ears teenager, he was cast in the 2002 Ken Loach film Sweet Sixteen. I'm curious what pearls of wisdom he imparted?

"He told me to trust my instincts," she says. "If there were choices I wanted to make in the scene, he would say, 'go for it'.

READ MORE: Line of Duty star Martin Compston on his new thriller The Nest

"To work with someone who was up for anything was exciting and freeing. Martin was really kind. If I was nervous or unsure, he would chat through it with me, make sure I was OK, and that my head was screwed on straight to go into the scene."

Then there was the thrill of Scottish acting royalty and fellow Guildhall alumna, Shirley Henderson, being cast as her mother. "I have admired Shirley Henderson forever," says Mack. "She came in for a chat with my year at Guildhall. I was, at that time, the only female Scot across the three years.

"Whenever I have seen her in anything, she is who I remember most. She is chameleon-like. I thought: 'That's what I want to be like.' When I found out she was playing my mum, I was so excited and nervous.

"Sometimes I felt like a bit of an imposter. I was so new to it and nervous to meet these incredible people I had admired for so long. I hoped to bring something to the table. It was scary."

Born and raised in Stirling, acting is in Mack's blood. Her father Billy is well respected in repertory theatre and regularly pops up in TV shows such Rab C Nesbitt, Still Game and Taggart, while her mother Callan teaches drama.

"My dad has been in the trade for ages," she says. "He's been such a brilliant role model. My mum is a drama tutor, so I'm very lucky with the people I have had around me.

"It is exciting to come home and speak to them about work. They are always very careful at giving advice. Sometimes I'm like: 'Please just be a mum and a dad …' My parents and my sister are my favourite people."

Mack attended her first play as a babe in arms. "When I was a few weeks old I went to Romeo and Juliet – my dad was playing Tybalt. The first one I remember, though, was going to see Annie with my little sister. It was for her birthday and she was three."

Her younger sister Molly, 19, is another blessed with the performing gene. "She is one of those annoyingly, amazing people who are excellent at everything," says Mack. "She is a brilliant actor, artist and musician, she plays guitar and is in a band and sings. She is a bit of a rock star.

"When she was three, while watching Annie, my sister stood up and shouted at one of the quiet, emotional bits: 'I want to be on that stage!'. I remember thinking: 'Wow, here we go …'"

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Mack's own proclamation of her intended future career path, while a tad lower key, took place in front of an audience, nonetheless, at her primary school graduation assembly.

"We were all to dress as what you wanted to be when you grew up. There was a Formula One racer, a photographer, and all sorts. I went in a tartan dress with a Bafta in my hand and was like: 'When I grow up, I'm going to be an actor. But not just that. I want to be an award-winning actor …'"

She cracks up laughing. It's an anecdote that could come across precocious, but Mack tells it in an endearing manner. "I have always loved acting and storytelling," she continues. "Even in class, I loved it when people laughed at me. That was my favourite feeling in the world.

"When I was in primary two, we were asked: 'What do you want to be when you grow up?' My favourite people were my mum and my dad. I said: 'I want to be a mum and I want to be an actor.'

"As I got older, my dad was very excited that I was slightly good at chemistry and thought I was going to be the money-maker in the family and do something academic. Lo and behold, I said: 'No, I like putting on costumes and singing and dancing …'"

The Mack sisters performed together in the closing ceremony for the Glasgow 2014 Commonwealth Games at Hampden. "We were dancing in front of Kylie with all these amazing athletes around us. I was like: 'What the heck?'"

As a teenager, Mack attended the Dance School of Scotland's musical theatre course at Knightswood in Glasgow where, over two years, she garnered prizes and roles alike, including Batboy and Godspell at the Citizens Theatre.

She went on to win a place at Guildhall to study BA (Hons) Acting and was able to attend thanks to a number of scholarships and bursaries, including the Josephine Hart Scholarship, Laurence Olivier Bursary and Dewar Arts Awards.

READ MORE: Line of Duty star Martin Compston on his new thriller The Nest

"I have been so unbelievably lucky," says Mack. "I don't know what would have happened if these charities hadn't been so generous. I wouldn't have been able to do it."

The Dewar Arts Awards were set up in memory of the late First Minister, Donald Dewar, who died in 2000. It's something Mack thinks about whenever she sees his statue on Buchanan Street in Glasgow. "I always touch his toe and say thank you, when I pass."

Mack landed the part in The Nest in her final year at Guildhall, as well a small but key role as asexual drama queen Florence in the second series of hit Netflix comedy-drama Sex Education. It gave her a first taste of how a TV show can touch the lives of viewers.

"I did not realise how little representation there is for asexual people," she says. "When Sex Education came out, there was a lot of feedback from people who are asexual and found it great to have some representation. I thought that was cool."

Mack should be in the midst of her five-week run of The Beast of Blue Yonder. "That was my next thing and would have taken me up to the middle of May," she says.

"I was getting to play three different characters. One is a young girl from Essex who gets proposed to. There is Marilyn Monroe, who I look nothing like, but I was going to wear a fancy dress and a wig. Then there is Mindy who dresses as 1940s, Joan Crawford-esque woman.

"It goes through different time periods and is an awesome play. The script was one of those you tear through. It was the same with The Nest. When I got the scripts, I read through them as quickly as I possibly could. I was hungry for the next bit.

"I was sitting on a bean bag in someone's living room, reading through the scripts. I don't know how much time passed, but by the time I looked up, no one was around me. I was totally absorbed in this world."

Like many of us, she has been taking stock of life in recent weeks. "It is like nothing anyone has experienced," says Mack. "This is something our grandchildren's grandchildren will speak about in biology and history; the time that the coronavirus came. It is very strange.

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"There are important people in my life who are vulnerable. My grandparents. My mum is high risk because she is diabetic and has had pneumonia before. Seanmhair, that's what we call my dad's mum, lives in Stirling just down the road from us. It is figuring how we visit, so that she's not by herself at home, while making sure we protect her.

"Hopefully this is a time where, although we can't physically be together, we can pull together as communities. I'm going to make sure I'm healthy before I venture out, but there are people on my street who maybe can't get to the shops or need simple things like their dog walked."

It is her belief that as we return to normality post-coronavirus – whenever or whatever that may be – everything mothballed will burst forth in joyful renaissance. "I think there will be a massive want to see art and people coming together to celebrate each other and what we've got," she says.

For now, the safety of the sofa is king. The Nest, filmed in Glasgow and around the west of Scotland, proffers escapism beyond the four walls of our living rooms.

"The locations were magnificent," says Mack. "At one point I was standing on a rooftop looking over the whole of Glasgow and the next I was in Cove [in Argyll] looking at that beautiful water, which is filled, strangely, with submarines."

One jaw-dropping shot sees her perched atop high-rise flats in the Gorbals. "It was scary sitting on the side of the building, but I was strapped in safely. I was thinking: 'Just twiddle your thumbs and think about nice things.' I got a very numb leg."

As for future ambitions? "I want opportunities to play different characters," she says. "When I was growing up, I was a bit confused and angry that I only got one life and to make one set of decisions and that was it forever. Through acting there are so many different lives possible.

READ MORE: Line of Duty star Martin Compston on his new thriller The Nest

"When you read a script that stays with you, to be able to tell that story you feel passionately about is an amazing gift. Good stories are all I am interested in, whatever form that may be, on stage, film, television – or just in my back garden."

With her star firmly in the ascendant, there's no doubt Mack will go much further than that.

The Nest continues on BBC One, tomorrow and Monday, 9pm

COMING SOON ... FIVE FILMS AND TV SHOWS SHOT IN SCOTLAND

No Time To Die

Scenes for the new James Bond movie were shot in Aviemore and the Cairngorms National Park last summer. Locations include the banks of Loch Laggan and Ardverikie House, near Newtonmore, which fans of BBC series Monarch of the Glen will recognise as Glenbogle. The release date has been pushed back to November 12 due to the coronavirus pandemic.

Vigil

The six-part BBC drama starring Suranne Jones, Rose Leslie and Martin Compston is being shot in and around Glasgow and Dumbarton (production is currently suspended due to coronavirus). Its plot centres on the disappearance of a Scottish fishing trawler and a death on-board a Trident nuclear submarine, stoking conflict between the police, the Navy and British security services.

The Princess Switch: Switched Again

Vanessa Hudgens spent time in Scotland earlier this year filming the sequel to the Netflix Christmas romcom The Princess Switch. The Princess Switch: Switched Again shot scenes at Glasgow Cathedral as well as Edinburgh Gateway train station, which was transformed into an airport. The exterior of Mimi's Bakehouse in Leith became a festive-looking cake shop.

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Eurovision

The Netflix comedy, which stars Will Ferrell and Rachel McAdams as Icelandic singers representing their country at the Eurovision Song Contest, was shot in Edinburgh and Glasgow last autumn. The Scottish capital's Old Town and New Town, as well Holyrood Park and the waterfront at Newhaven, are among the locations. Glasgow Airport was also used during filming.

Fast and Furious 9

The streets of Edinburgh were the backdrop for high-octane car chases in the latest instalment of the Fast and Furious franchise, now due out in 2021. The film's star Vin Diesel was so taken with the place, he belted out a rousing rendition of Flower of Scotland to fans on the Royal Mile. He also conducted "a very sacred meeting" with movie executives at Rosslyn Chapel in Midlothian.

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