Which actor plays Detective Inspector Greg Lestrade in BBC Sherlock?

Rupert Graves plays Detective Inspector Greg Lestrade in BBC Sherlock.

Graves’s Lestrade is a senior Metropolitan Police officer who regularly works with Sherlock Holmes on difficult cases. Although Lestrade is often exasperated by Sherlock’s rudeness, secrecy and unconventional methods, he recognizes Sherlock’s exceptional ability and frequently trusts his judgment when other officers do not.

The character is adapted from Inspector Lestrade in Arthur Conan Doyle’s original Holmes stories. The BBC series updates him to a modern Detective Inspector, or DI, working for Scotland Yard. One recurring joke is that Sherlock struggles to remember his first name, even though Lestrade is one of the people who consistently supports him.

The wrong options are other Sherlock cast members with different roles. Paul Chequer plays Detective Inspector Dimmock, Jonathan Aris plays Philip Anderson, and Mark Gatiss plays Mycroft Holmes. Graves’s performance gives Lestrade a grounded, humane presence that contrasts with Sherlock’s eccentricity and helps anchor the detective stories in the procedures of the Metropolitan Police.

Rupert Graves is also known for roles outside Sherlock, including John Brooke in the television adaptation of Middlemarch and James Wilby’s screen partner in other British productions. In Sherlock, however, his defining role is the loyal and frequently harried police ally Greg Lestrade.