TO millions he’ll always be EastEnders Grant Mitchell, but Ross Kemp has revealed these days far more recognise him from his documentary work.
Since leaving the BBC soap in 2016, the telly hardman has filmed factual pieces from Afghanistan battlefields to HMP Belmarsh prison, the depths of the ocean and beyond.
Ross told me: “It’s always the taxi drivers and the people at the check-outs in the supermarkets that are my barometer.
“It’s the people that serve you at the deli counter, telling you that they like the diving show.”
They’ll be pleased to hear Ross is back in his wetsuit for a new Sky HISTORY series, Ross Kemp: Deep Sea Treasure Hunter, and also narrates a new immersive experience at The Mary Rose Museum at Portsmouth Historic Dockyard called Dive The Mary Rose 4D.
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The series, which airs on April 10, follows the action man as he takes a deep dive into the history of Britain and swims the wreckage of the Mary Rose in a TV first, swims into the wreckage of the Mary Rose in a TV first.
Former EastEnders star Ross added: “If you said to me four years ago, Ross you would get a real hit out of finding something that hasn’t been touched or seen for 500 years, I’d have said not really - but boy is it addictive.
“I get why some people want to go off at the weekend as the rain pours down searching through fields for pieces of Saxon jewellery!
“It is like shaking hands with ghosts.
“I started diving in the 1990s as a hobby and then someone came up with the idea of me diving down on shipwrecks.
“We were diving on the Mary Rose site, only a handful of people get the opportunity to go down to the site and check it, the majority of the starboard side is actually in the museum, we dived at the front of the boat, there’s a small trench that has been created by the chain that’s attached by the boy to warn people to stay clear of it, and we did find some artefacts.”
Ross and the team of experts found pieces of glazed pottery, thought to be from the Tudor times.
It gave him a buzz unlike one he has felt before.
That comes despite his documentary titles including gritty subjects including Ross Kemp on Gangs, Ross Kemp in Afghanistan, Ross Kemp: The Fight Against ISIS, Welcome to HMP Belmarsh with Ross Kemp and Ross Kemp: Extreme World.
So how does his current work compare?
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Ross said: “I don’t think they are comparable. They are two different branches of television. “They are both documentaries, you can’t compare going into a prison to diving on the Mary Rose.
“I am very fortunate to have quite a broad width of work at the moment, last year I did a game show (Bridge of Lies for the BBC), I did a diving documentary for Sky History and I’ve just done a drama for Channel 5 so to have that variety of work in a year I feel very lucky.”
Of the Dive The Mary Rose 4D attraction, Ross added: “Anyone who doesn’t usually come to museums this is very exciting and brings it all alive. Come here and experience what it’s like.”
Ross Kemp narrates Dive The Mary Rose 4D - the new immersive cinema experience at The Mary Rose Museum, Portsmouth Historic Dockyard. Readers can visit www.maryrose.org.
