The success of Line of Duty has put Enniskillen’s Adrian Dunbar in the spotlight.

As the show’s popularity continues to rise, Adrian’s character Superintendent Ted Hastings has become a household favourite, projecting an actor who cut his teeth on the Ardhowen Theatre stage to worldwide fame.

“Huge numbers of people watch Line of Duty now in the UK and Ireland and all over the world and so therefore my profile has changed so far as a lot more people seem to know who I am,” said Adrian, when asked how he has seen his career change since Line of Duty started.

He continued: “On the one hand it is nice, but the other hand, I used to be able to wander about and be largely anonymous especially when I put my glasses on because I don’t wear glasses in the part, that seems to have gone now because Line of Duty has reached a real kind of saturation point where everybody knows about it now, whereas two or three years ago it had its fans but it wasn’t as hugely popular as it is now.”

“So it has been a real change for me, I’ve had to accept the fact that I am now in a really top hit show,” he added.

Playing Superintendent Hastings since 2012, Adrian explained that this is the first time he has been a character in a returning series. He said: “I usually do a guest lead in an episode of Morse or an episode of Cracker or I did a part in Ashes to Ashes and things like that but this is the first time I’ve been a character in a returning series so that the audience gets to know the character over a number of years.”

He added: “It’s good because it gives me a lot of profile, I’ll be able to do other things and get more offers but on the other hand you can end up spreading yourself very thin and I need to be careful about the amount of things I accept and say I can do cause I just end up getting run ragged a bit.”

Although his profile has risen dramatically over the last few years, the Enniskillen native doesn’t forget his roots, returning back to his hometown to take part in the annual Happy Days Beckett Festival every summer.

Taking a quick break from his busy schedule during this year’s festival, in which he directed ‘Ohio Impromptu’ on Devenish Island and read ‘Assumption’ at Portora Chapel, Adrian told The Impartial Reporter how “very happy” he was to be back home.

“I’m very happy to be in the town and the great thing about the festival is nobody asks me why I’m back cause they all know I’m back for the festival so it feels great, it always feels good to get back to the town,” he said. Explaining why he believes it is important to promote the arts, particularly in Fermanagh, Adrian said: “The arts are important anyway, I don’t think we need to make an argument anymore for why the arts are important, clearly they are very important to all societies but here in Fermanagh we are very lucky that we have our links to some very important international artists.”

He continued: “Oscar Wilde is probably the best known Irish person ever, if you look at any of the stats you’ll find that he’s in the top 30 people of all time to be known across the world and of course he went to school here in Portora. Samuel Beckett of course is the leading playwright of the 20th Century and you also have people like William Scott, the abstract artist who lived in the town and got his first instructions in painting here in the town so we need to remind everybody here about those people, we need to remind the world that they went to school here and they were affected by their time here. But for me, I just think the arts, they don’t belong to anybody, it’s a space where we can all interact together, it’s very good for healing, very good for bringing people together and we’ve always been good at coming together here in Fermanagh so I think the arts provide us with another interface to let all that stuff happen,” Adrian added.

During his time filming Line of Duty in Belfast, Adrian has felt right at home surrounded by a number of crew members who also hail from Fermanagh.

Commenting on how it feels to work alongside fellow Fermanagh natives, Adrian said: “It’s great. We all get together and we get photographs taken of us and they all talk about the Fermanagh Mafia and all this kind of craic which is great. We have a good laugh about that. We’ve got people from the town and Belcoo and various other parts around the place and yeah we stick together.” Laughing Adrian added: “They are all much younger than me these boys it has to be said, I’m a bit of a grandfather as far as they are concerned but they’re great guys and they are excellent technicians so it’s great, it’s great to see them in Belfast.”

Aside from his acting, Adrian is a keen singer. Having recently performed ‘What A Wonderful World’ by Louis Armstrong live on The Late Late Show, there have been talks of him releasing an album. He said: “Yeah I mean there will be something before the end of the year I think, or maybe at the start of next year and it will probably be country and jazz I suppose, that type of thing.”

A talent for music seems to run in the Dunbar family, with Adrian explaining that his daughter Madeleine, a rapper who goes by the alias of Minx, performed at Glastonbury this year. When asked if his daughter inspires his music and if he has dreams of a Glastonbury performance, he said: “She did three gigs at Glastonbury this year which went really well and I’d love to actually maybe do something with Madeleine at some point. It would be really good fun I think if I could get a song together but it’s the beats, that’s what the rappers are in to, what the beats are and I don’t know whether I can deal with the beats,” Adrian concluded with a wry smile.