Peaky Blinders actress Kate Phillips "forced into a horrendous physical state" for cliffhanger

Linda Shelby (Kate Phillips) was seconds away from killing her husband Arthur (played by Paul Anderson) before she was shot by Aunt Polly (Helen McCrory).

Her sudden urge to murder her spouse came after she discovered he had battered a Quaker man who she had confided in about her relationship with Arthur.

Whether this really is the end of Linda remains to be seen – and Phillips is keeping quiet – but she has opened up about filming the “horrendous” scene.

“That evening was a night shoot and I’ve never been so cold in my life,” she told Digital Spy. “The place that they chose to shoot that scene was on a bridge and it became this horrendous wind tunnel of ice cold air and I was wearing next to nothing.

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“Actually, it's quite helpful when you're forced into such a horrendous physical state – it does bring out a lot of emotions. So it was kind of helpful to the performance, but it was definitely quite a full-on evening, we were all unbelievably cold.”

Phillips added that discovering Linda’s storyline and the twist was a "shocker".

“That's what's cool about the scripts is that you read them like you're a crazed viewer, you're desperate to find out what's next in your story – when your own storyline becomes that cliffhanger at the end of the episode, it's quite intense,” she said. “It was a real shocker to read and it's always cool to be part of the twist, as well.”

Peaky Blinders continues Sundays at 9pm on BBC 1