Jodie Comer Puts Her Talents on Trial

When the actress Jodie Comer first read the description of Villanelle—the assassin and antihero of the spy series “Killing Eve”—she responded with dismay: “How naked is she going to be?” She imagined catsuits and stiletto heels. Instead, she found herself in brocade Dries Van Noten suits and custom-dyed Chloé—a dandy psychopath, a huntress, who never sacrifices style for efficiency when dispatching her victims. She strangles one with a necktie, kills another with poisoned perfume, and sparks a very understandable erotic fixation in the M.I.6 agent (Sandra Oh) on her heels. Even as the script sagged in later seasons, Comer’s command remained absolute. She garnered a small shelf of awards and handled success with a total lack of pretense. “Our show doesn’t have a huge message to the world,” she said with cheerful bluntness. “That’s probably why people enjoy it so much.”