Keira Knightley finds wit and festive tension in spy series 'Black Doves'

British actress Keira Knightley says her new series "Black Doves" stands out for its tongue-in-cheek take on the world of espionage.

Knightley executive produced the show and plays Helen Webb, an undercover spy working for the secretive "Black Doves" intelligence organization. A loving mother of two, Helen has been married to a prominent British politician for years, stealing and passing on his classified government data. When her lover, a mysterious civil servant, is assassinated, Helen gets tangled in a web of conspiracies and risks her cover being blown.

"I was looking for a series to do, read the pilot and thought it was exactly what I was looking for. It's a thriller, but it's got this kind of amazing wit. It's faintly ridiculous but in the most delicious way," Knightley said at Tuesday's series premiere in London.

Ben Whishaw plays Helen's sidekick, Sam, a triggerman distracted by his past and complicated love life.

"It's so unlikely-slash-absurd because I kill a small army of assassins myself. All of them are sort of twice the size of me," Whishaw said. "This show has a twinkle in its eye that means that it knows it's being a bit ridiculous, but it's going to go there anyway."

Knightley, 39, said she identified with her character's capacity to classify the different parts of her personality.

"I'm a parent of two young girls, and I have a child-friendly face when I'm with them. And then there are other parts of my personality, and they still exist; they don't necessarily get the air they used to," she said.

FILE PHOTO: Actor Keira Knightley poses as she attends the European premiere of "Official Secrets" at the BFI London Film Festival 2019, in London, Britain, October 10, 2019. REUTERS/Henry Nicholls/File Photo

The six-part series was created and written by Joe Barton, whose previous credits include "Giri/Haji" and "The Lazarus Project".

Barton said he wrote "Black Doves," set in London in the lead-up to Christmas, "on a bit of a whim" between Boxing Day and New Year two years ago.

"I felt like the setting works quite interestingly against the spy stuff; it's all jolly and the tinsel, and it's quite a dark time of year in a way, where everyone's quite emotionally fraught. So, it adds to the tension," he said.

"Black Doves" starts streaming on Netflix on December 5.