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Paapa Essiedu plays Ed Washburn, a reporter for The Post.

Tell us about your character?
I play Ed Washburn, who is a rookie journalist. He’s Oxford educated, he's quite middle class, he’s the son of two university lecturers, but importantly his parents are Herald readers - more liberal and left-wing - so it’s a big thing for him to start working for The Post newspaper.

He starts off enthusiastic and goes for it, but he’s inexperienced - you see him grow in confidence and experience. He’s a character that does before he thinks. He’s impulsive and is very much led by his ambitions. As an actor it’s my job to honour that and to not judge him. It’s about him finding his moral compass really. I feel like the series and his journey all reach in the search for his moral compass and what he’s willing to do. It’s how his morality intersects with his ambition. He’s got professional ambition and he wants to be the best.

He is very, very talented and he wants to go far - but at what point does he compromise his morals to do that?

What can you tell us about the story of Press?
There’s one newspaper that is very much about the way you look, it’s about having the clout and it’s about getting the story at all costs… and entertainment. And the other newspaper is about making the world a better place through classy journalism and going the extra mile in order to change the world.

Tell us about Mike Bartlett’s scripts.
You always start with a script, so if a script is good it’s going to pique your interest. The script was brilliant. There’s something about his command of language and his imagination for characters which is the best out there at the moment. It was a real pleasure when the scripts came into my inbox.

What research did you do for Press and what did you learn?
What was surprising was the idea that journalists often work for many different newspapers and many different types of newspaper. So you’ll have a journalist that will work for The Daily Mail and The Guardian or The Mirror and The Sunday Times. Each seems to be diametrically opposed to the other, but it’s just a fact of life for journalists. I found that quite mad. I lived in this dream and thought that you started off at The Guardian, for example, and then you’d work there your whole life.

Why will Press excite and appeal to audiences?
Genuinely, I think audiences just haven’t seen this before. They haven’t seen this world put on television. All of our biggest stories come through the press. I think it’s such an exciting world.

Describe the show in a sentence.
You are seeing the blood, sweat and guts of a newspaper.