Amazon Prime Video's psychological thriller Malice is the kind of glossy, unsettling escape that pairs perfectly with a January TV binge.
With its sun-soaked Greek setting, sharp emotional tension and a quietly disquieting stranger at the centre of the story, it’s a series that lures you in gently before tightening its grip.
Carice van Houten — known for Game of Thrones, film work, and decades of acclaimed screen roles — leads the ensemble as Nat Tanner, a woman whose life appears enviable from the outside but is beginning to fracture beneath the surface. She speaks to IMAGE.ie about the character, the themes in the show, and the quiet complexities running beneath the glamour.
On paper, Nat Tanner has everything: wealth, a beautiful home, family, a career and a seemingly endless social life. But Carice says it was the tension beneath that perfection that drew her in.
“My first impression was… [she’s] a little bit of a caged bird, you know, caged in wealth. It’s very privileged, obviously, but there’s things that are lacking. I think she doesn’t really feel seen.”
Nat moves between high-end gatherings, motherhood, step-parenting and running her own business, but Carice was determined not to let the character slip into stereotype. “I didn’t want her to be just a wealthy person that doesn’t give a sh**,” she says. “I think there’s a warmth to her.”
What complicates Nat’s world is her husband Jamie — loving but often distracted, more focused on providing than truly noticing her. “She wants to be creative… she doesn’t feel seen in her creativeness… she’s maybe seen as a mother, but that part of her is not really acknowledged by her husband.”
These small cracks become the perfect opening for Adam, the charming guest and soon-to-be “manny”, whose attentiveness gives Nat something she’s not quite getting in the way she needs: focus, admiration.
And though comfortable in her life of privilege, there are the tattoos from a party-girl past, a hint of former chaos beneath the expensive linen dresses. “She’s not just a woman with a lot of money. She also has a bit of a wild background, a European feistiness,” she says.
Building a marriage on screen
The lived-in chemistry between Carice and David Duchovny is one of the first things that lands in episode one, it’s relaxed, witty, familiar without being overly polished.
Carice says that came naturally. “We have a very similar approach to acting in general. We really like the natural… he’s also up for improvising, and we’re both up for mistakes as well. When you can do that together, that’s when really great things can come.”
“Sometimes we’re both like, just let that [happen], because that is funny… it’s not perfect. We both embrace the imperfection.”
The result is a couple who feel authentic, which will be important as the episodes go on.
She’s not just a woman with a lot of money. She also has a bit of a wild background, a European feistiness.
An ensemble shaped by island life
While the tension in Malice grows episode by episode, behind the scenes the cast grew close quickly, thanks in large part to an unusual shooting schedule.
“To be on an island helps, because you hang about with each other, you hang near the pool together,” Carice says. “It has been a really nice job.”
In a twist, the Greek scenes, the ones that look most like a tight-knit, decades-old friendship group, were filmed after the London segments. “We knew each other way better at that point… and of course, the story gets more bleak and more distant. Everyone becomes little islands along the way. That’s why it’s probably good that we shot it the other way around.”
The stark contrast between the glowing Greek light and the darker psychological turns of the story also shaped her performance. In one scene, Nat watches her nanny struggle and Carice recalls, “She doesn’t even have the energy to get over the sun beds to check on her.” This easy luxury is clearly seductive, but it has softened Nat’s instincts to the unusual elements of Adam that, at first, go unnoticed by everyone. Almost.
Though the show carries the title Malice, the themes it explores are broader and more universal. Van Houten says, “It will come down to something really profound in the end for them… it gets down to what is really important in life. You can have all this life. But if other things are not resolved, what are you doing it for?”
And with six stylish, unsettling episodes, this is exactly the kind of series you can settle into over a couple of winter evenings.
Malice is available to watch on Prime Video now
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