Malachi Kirby

In A Thousand Blows (2025), Malachi Kirby makes us see why Hezekiah Moscow wants to get ahead without asking us to approve of every choice. The series moves between people competing for power, and Kirby keeps us aware of what each struggle means for Hezekiah. We worried about Hezekiah because his need to survive felt convincing, while his judgement remained open to doubt. Kirby gives us a reason to stay with him through the changes of storyline.

His breakthrough was as Kunta Kinte in the Roots remake (2016), followed by Stripe in Black Mirror (2016). He later played Darcus Howe in director Steve McQueen’s Small Axe: Mangrove (2020), before taking the lead as the Jamaican immigrant and boxer Hezekiah in Steven Knight’s A Thousand Blows. Historical characters have become a substantial part of his work, with the research into real people an attraction for him. There is a practical difficulty in these parts: an actor has to keep a person interesting when a script wants to explain the circumstances around them.

Knight and his fellow writers do not always make that easy. A Thousand Blows sometimes states what unequal opportunities have already shown, and its crowded plotting means neglected characters need explaining when they return. Kirby is particularly valuable when the series gives him space, because we can understand what Hezekiah stands to gain or lose without quite so much help. Erin Doherty remains its chief pleasure, and Stephen Graham is another reason to stay; this is a cast capable of making the struggle for money and control understandable. The dialogue should trust them more.

Kirby also worked with Graham in the single-take kitchen drama Boiling Point (2021), playing Tony. He also played Bill in Wicked Little Letters (2024), a comedy whose central joke wore thin for us. Start with A Thousand Blows, and allow for the stretches in which the writers insist on telling us what Kirby has already made plain.