Malachi Kirby Discusses His Role on ‘A Thousand Blows’ and Reflects on ‘EastEnders’ [Interview]

Hulu’s A Thousand Blows takes audiences back to the East End of Victorian England in a more action-packed world. Created by Steven Knight (Peaky Blinders), the series focuses on the Forty Elephants, an all-woman crime syndicate, and their feud with London’s illegal boxing organization.

I recently spoke with Malachi Kirby (Black Mirror, Roots, EastEnders) about his role as Hezekiah Moscow in A Thousand Blows.

The character is an ambitious immigrant from Jamaica who wants to become a lion tamer but gets caught up in the mischievous activities of the Forty Elephants.

While Kirby had yet to meet creator Steven Knight until the end of A Thousand Blows‘ production, he was appreciative of what Knight had created. It was one of the big inspirations that helped him resonate with Hezekiah’s journey throughout the series. 

“I hadn’t seen Peaky Blinders, but when we were in the process of auditioning, I literally watched the whole thing back to back,” Kirby recalled.

“Hezekiah is like a dream of a role, honestly, for me,” Kirby continued. “Getting to play someone who’s from Jamaica like myself as well, but also this really well-rounded human being who I get to work out and get in physical shape and explore the physicality of him through boxing.”

Hezekiah’s journey is an emotional one as he goes from being a nobody to being a fierce fighter. “He has this really big emotional arc that’s heartbreaking for me as I’m reading it from episodes one to six,” Kirby said.

“There’s a lot of them that he kind of gets down, gets knocked down, gets knocked down, [and] keeps getting back up,” he explained. “To be able to kind of go on that journey with him as an artist was a great one for sure.”

However, Hezekiah isn’t the first historical role that helped Kirby gain prominence. In fact, his performance in the 2016 Roots remake saw Kirby portraying Kunta Kinte, a West African slave whose relatives were sold to be European slaves.

“I don’t know why they keep picking me for these roles,” Kirby joked. “There’s something about it. But, it’s an honor to get to do this, especially knowing that they were based on real people.”

“That’s what blew my mind,” he said. “You really had this guy from Jamaica in the 1800s that came over to London to become a lion tamer of all things and ends up becoming a boxer.”

“That’s a true story, also with [Erin Doherty], who plays Mary Cobb, the leader of the Forty Elephants, like an all-female gang that ran East London in the 1800s.”

“As far as my history knew, I thought that was a time when women were seen and not heard. Then you have this leader of a gang literally going into Harrods and just basically putting men in their place.”

While A Thousand Blows will pull viewers into the East End in the Victorian era, this doesn’t mark the first time viewers have seen Kirby in this city. In fact, Kirby was in the series that centered on all things in the East End, EastEnders.

Reflecting on both experiences, Kirby went in-depth on the transition between both settings.

“What’s interesting about that we were set in Victorian East End, but it felt so modern, and they had this incredible set that they had built, which we knew was set in the past,” Kirby said.

“Honestly, so much of East London still looks a bit like that with the cobbled streets and stuff,” he continued. “There’s places you can go to now that still resemble the [sets and the sounds] we had.”

“The sound isn’t so far from now. There’s different words used, obviously, like language has changed over time, but the sound is the same,” Kirby said. “The energy is the same, the struggle is the same, like working-class people in London, it still felt like a world that I knew.”

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*Interview edited and condensed for clarity.

A Thousand Blows is now streaming on Hulu.

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