Long-time theatre actor…villains are the best to play. Hand’s down. Audiences love a well-played villain.
There’s an old saying “the nicest actors make the best villains”. Good people LOVE to express their ‘shadow side’ by playing villains.
For the record, the greatest villain in film history was Tim Roth in “Rob Roy”. Simple fact, not at all my personal opinion.
As an actor who’s played several ‘villains’, I get far, far better community-response from those roles than from protagonist roles. Depending on the script, of course.