Emilia Fox is in her element. The 52-year-old actress has stepped into a new chapter of her life, and she's relishing every second of it.
"I feel that there's a real pleasure in being in your fifties. You have a different perspective on things, but it doesn't feel as though anything has slowed down at all – which is good, because I like being busy," says Emilia, who has a daughter, Rose, 15, with her former partner, the actor Jeremy Gilley.
© @olikearon"It renews something with work, where you feel you're not just juggling it; you're getting to really enjoy and relish it. My twenties and thirties were very work-focused, and then add to the work focus a small child… that was a particular time of bouncing between those two roles and trying to juggle them.
"My fifties are rich with work, and Rose is a little more grown-up. It's a lovely feeling being there to guide and light the way, but also to watch her become herself, an individual. I'm loving that."
Now, with the actress dressed to kill at HELLO!'s cover photoshoot in central London, Emilia's joie de vivre is palpable.
The star, who is based in west London, fondly recalls days spent wandering to Portobello Road Market in her twenties. For the star of the crime dramas Silent Witness and Signora Volpe, a photoshoot is akin to an acting role – and she's in heaven.
"In some ways, because you're being dressed up and made up, you're playing a character," she says. “I'm terrible at having my photo taken in everyday situations, but it's much easier when a whole team of people have taken over and your job is just to perform."
© @olikearonEmbracing single life
Earlier this year, Emilia told HELLO! about embracing single life following her separation from her partner of four years, the TV producer Jonathan Stadlen, in 2025. Now happily single, she reveals that she's open to love and isn't averse to going on dating websites.
"I have done dating apps before, but I haven't done them in the past few years," she says. "I've been preoccupied with all the other things in life, so maybe I've neglected that side of life a bit, but that hasn't been at the cost of my happiness.
"I think I wanted to process the last relationship I was in, which was a meaningful relationship. I feel that I've been able to do that in a good way and not move into something else.
© @olikearon"Who knows – there's something exciting about the unknown, and I think dating apps are amazing. I’m a great believer in human contact and finding out who someone is; I do think that's important, to find out who someone actually is before you launch into a relationship.
"I feel as though I'm enjoying what I have in my life now, not wanting something I don't have, but if something came along that felt right… also, you approach relationships differently, I think, at different ages."
"I haven't been asked to do Celebrity Traitors, but I think it's seen as a great honour if you're asked"
Filming Signora Volpe
It's fitting that at this juncture in Emilia's life, she is playing the British former spy Sylvia Fox in the third series of the detective drama Signora Volpe, which returns this month with three new episodes.
"Having chosen this career that totally preoccupied her in the early part of her life – she lived and breathed it – it wasn't bringing her the greatest happiness, and she missed out on the positive things in life, like family life.
“In the second half of your life, your priorities change. You start thinking about the choices you made in your early years, and I really relate to that."
© @olikearonIn season three, Sylvia, having recovered from her abduction at the end of season two, is settling into her new life in Italy with her partner, the Carabinieri captain Giovanni Riva. Of course, it's not long before a mysterious death occurs and Sylvia springs into action. Her former husband, Adam, played by Jamie Bamber, also returns in this series.
Filming took place in Italy – namely Rome and Umbria – over a three-month period. "I've been lucky enough to do three series, and I've always loved Italy anyway," says the star, who practices her Italian daily on the Duolingo language-learning app.
"Getting to work and live in Italy for three months at a time and feel a part of the Volpe family, with their attention to detail with costumes and the look of all the characters, is extraordinary."
"I would love to study something again – something that's a personal passion, like garden design or horticulture"
Emilia was overjoyed to be starring alongside the Waking the Dead and Game of Thrones actress Tara Fitzgerald, who plays her sister, Isabel. "Whenever we’re together in those roles, it feels as though we’re sisters," she smiles.
"We can quite easily switch between that closeness and the tensions between them, and how deep that goes, as siblings. I found that very real to play."
© @olikearonThe pair have become good friends. "I love Tara a lot, but I also love the whole Volpe family. You're embraced when you're out there with the warmth of Italy."
How did Emilia spend her free time? "There was very little time off – I would either be flying back to be with Rose on her weekends with me, or I would have my head buried in [scripts]." Rose visited her mother during half-term. "We had a real laugh. That's when we did the touristy things."
Motherhood and family life
Emilia's face lights up when she speaks about her daughter. "Rose is 15 now, nearly 16. I love her company. She's very happy at school, she's enjoying it, she's very busy, and it's really lovely to see her blossoming."
As a single mother, Emilia says she has a balanced view when it comes to co-parenting. "Single parenting presents its challenges, for both parties and for children, but there are silver linings to it, too. You get a relationship with your child that might be different, I suppose, in a two-parents-together dynamic.
© @olikearon"I think Rose has a good relationship with both of us. I think being as supportive as one can be in that situation is extremely helpful, to make Rose feel that it can be as normal as having two parents who are together. I feel she adjusted to that brilliantly."
As one might expect of a teenager, her mother's shows aren't necessarily on her radar. "I don't know that she has watched Signora Volpe," Emila says, thinking back to her own youth. Her father, Edward Fox, 89, starred in the 1973 film The Day of the Jackal, and her mother, Joanna David, 79, was in the 1971 TV adaptation of Sense and Sensibility.
"I thought I'd be a journalist or do something related to my English degree"
Her brother is the Slow Horses star Freddie Fox, 37, her cousins include the Riviera actor Jack Fox, 41, and her uncle is James Fox, 87, who starred in The Remains of the Day.
"I remember it with my parents; I never watched what they did. I wasn't allowed to watch television very much, and I didn't have much awareness of what Mum and Dad did. It was just acting, their job.
"Rose is a bit the same. She's watching her series that she watches as a teenager; she's not really interested in what I'm doing. She does love a good mystery."
© @olikearonAs a member of the Fox acting dynasty, does she find that family get-togethers are full of talk of roles and scripts? "Quite the opposite," Emilia says. "It's quite rare to get big family gatherings because everyone's got children now, and different lives in different parts of the country. But even with direct family, we rarely talk shop.
"My mum and dad are that much older. I'm so lucky to have them in my life and I want to try to get as much time with them as possible, so I've been trying to make the most of that."
Acting beginnings
Emilia didn't always have performing in her sights. "I didn't want to do it at all," she admits. "I was only aware of what my parents did when I went to secondary school, what people said about it and what the expectations were of being part of an acting family.
"I did school plays, but it wasn't something I wanted to do because I was quite work-focused. I had my heart set on trying to do well academically. I thought I'd be a journalist or do something related to my English degree."
Everything changed when, during her summer holiday from the University of Oxford in 1995, she was cast in her first acting role as Georgiana, the younger sister of Colin Firth's Mr Darcy, in the BBC’s TV adaptation of Pride and Prejudice.
"I went up and auditioned for Pride and Prejudice; that seemed like a much more appealing thing to do than waitressing, which I'd been doing since I was 14 in the holidays to earn money," she says. "I went and did that and had a lovely time. I didn't know anything, really, about the business. In some ways, I was quite naive to it."
Colin Firth, recalls Emilia, "was actually more interested in talking to me about what I was studying at university, and Jennifer Ehle [who played Elizabeth Bennet] was immensely kind to me and sweet".
The enduring love story is now being remade again for TV by Netflix, in a version that will air this December. "It's a classic," Emilia says. "It's going to get remade again and again, and quite rightly so. If it brings a whole new generation to Pride and Prejudice, then superb."
Emilia then found herself an agent – the comedian Jack Whitehall's father, Michael – who has also represented Dame Judi Dench and Daniel Day-Lewis. "He was my first agent, and we laugh about it now. I've seen quite a lot of Michael recently."
The actress finished her degree, which she is glad of "because it was three joyous years of making friends and doing plays without any pressure". In 1997, she was cast as the second Mrs de Winter in the 1997 TV drama Rebecca, opposite Charles Dance. "I literally went from the end of finals, jumped in a car and went to rehearsal, and I never looked back. I'm so lucky to still be here now."
© @olikearonEmilia on screen and future dreams
Emilia has just finished filming series 30 of the BBC's Silent Witness, in which she plays the forensic pathologist Dr Nikki Alexander, and is about to start work on a top-secret project. She rules out an appearance on Celebrity Traitors, however.
"Rose is always saying: 'Mum, will you do something like that?' I haven't been asked to do Celebrity Traitors, but I think it's seen as a great honour if you're asked," she says. "I think I would suffer from awful guilt if I was a traitor and probably reveal myself far too soon to make it fun watching. Do you know who I thought would be brilliant on Celebrity Traitors? My mum!"
Her dreams for the future include travelling, nurturing a kitchen garden and going on cookery courses. "I would love to study something again – something that's a personal passion, like garden design or horticulture.
"I'm a massive fitness fan and I would like to do more of it," she adds. "On Volpe, I was working out five or six times a week, but I'm not talking extreme workouts. I'm just talking about wanting to feel healthy and to feel good in myself. I do try to eat healthily, because I was brought up like that."
She's non-judgmental about cosmetic treatments. "I wholly believe that whatever makes each individual person feel confident and comfortable within themselves is totally up to them, and there should be no judgment in that whatsoever. The thing that makes me feel good is looking after myself and being healthy."
Reflecting on this new era of her life, Emilia knows exactly what fills her cup.
"I want to enjoy time with the people I have and really make time for them," she says. "I want to make the most of every second with Mum and Dad, and I want to be there for Rose when she needs me – sometimes when she doesn't need me, too."
Episode one of Signora Volpe season three is available to stream on Acorn TV, with new episodes airing Mondays.
