Happy Sad Confused - Ralph Fiennes, Vol. II

Episode Date: December 29, 2021

We're ending the year on a classy note with one of our finest actors returning to "Happy Sad Confused"! Ralph Fiennes returns to discuss his action hero turn in "The King's Man", how he was convinced to play Voldemort, and the character turn he fought against in the James Bond films. Don't forget to check out the Happy Sad Confused patreon here! We've got exclusive episodes of GAME NIGHT, video versions of the podcast, and more! For all of your media headlines remember to subscribe to The Wakeup newsletter here! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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or go to explorevolvo.com. Don't miss Swiped, a new movie inspired by the provocative real-life story of the visionary founder of online dating platform Bumble. Played by Lily James, Swiped introduces recent college grad Whitney Wolfe as she uses grit and ingenuity to break into the male-dominated tech industry to become the youngest female self-made billionaire. An official selection of the Toronto International Film Festival, the Hulu original film Swiped, is now streaming only on Disney Plus. Prepare your ears, humans. Happy, sad, confused begins now. Today on Happy, Say, Confused, Rafe Binds embraces his interaction hero in The Kingsman. Hey guys, I'm Josh Horowitz, and welcome to another edition.

And yes, the last edition of Happy Second Fused just for the year. Calm down. Did I scare you for a second? Don't worry. I'm not going anywhere. But yes, this is the last podcast of 2021. for happy second fused and it's been another hell of a year guys we made it we're in it together we're still here we're still standing we're still sitting we're still reclining wherever however you

are you're listening i'm talking so we're okay um thank you as always for tuning into happy say confused and um hopefully enjoying my sometimes silly sometimes substantive sometimes a little bit of both conversations with the best filmmakers and actors on the planet that certainly fits the bill for today's guest, Mr. Ray Fines. He has, by the way, been a guest on the podcast before, probably about five years ago. So if you want to go back into the archives, check that out. Or just go right to this conversation, because this is a bit of another career chat with Raph. He, of course, has done, I mean, how do you sum up what Ray Fines has been in?

The early works, including Schindler's List and the English patient. In recent years, the Harry Potter films, the James Bond films, and now center stage in his own action film. The Kingsman from Matthew Vaughn, a filmmaker I greatly enjoy. Of course, the Kingsmen films, not Kingsman, the Kingsmen films with Taryn Edgerton and Colin Firth, very successful. And now this is a prequel. This is set in World War I. And yes, does connect to those other stories, but it's very much its own thing. A different vibe in this film. And I dug the vibe. It's got some of that bravora action, but it's also a bit of just like a World War I action thriller. And yes, Ray Fines helps class it up a little bit. And he is, he is supported in

his endeavors by a great ensemble, including Gemma Arderton, Harris Dickinson, Shymanonsu, Reese Iphens, who is just going for it, guys. So this was a great chat with an actor. I just couldn't have more admiration for. He's just always fantastic. Some great stuff in here about his participation in the Harry Potter films, of course, playing Voldemort. I'm not allowed to say Voldemort. I just did. Oh, well. And also, some really interesting stuff about his participation in the James Bond films. He, of course, plays M in the Daniel Craig era, the last few films. And he kind of, he talks a bit about a way that the character of M was going to go, but that he fought, fought against. So stay tuned for that. I found that really interesting. My

ears perked up when he talked about that. So yeah, a lot of this conversation. On a broader level, as we look back to 2021, as we take stock of it all. I just want to thank you guys, as always, for being along for the ride. If you're new to Happy Set Confused, welcome. There's nearly 400 episodes in the archives waiting for you, all free. And I like to think of it as a really eclectic, fascinating mix of some of the most amazing actors and filmmakers and comedians of our times. So if you have some downtime in this holiday season,

season, go, go look up your favorite actor or filmmaker. They very well might be in the archives. Beyond that, you know, I've said it in weeks past. I'll say it again. We're in a really cool part of the year where there's so much good stuff out there. I'm just looking at the December schedule guys of like what's recently come out. On the film side, West Side Story, I positively adored. I can't wait to see it again. Spider-Man, No Way Home. I'm not going to spoil it just yet. I still want to give folks some time on that one, but still a lot to talk about. And I don't want to jinx it, but there may be a podcast in our future that really directly, how do I say this?

What do I say? That directly addresses some of the plot developments in the film. Did I just jinx it? I probably did, but stay tuned. What else? There are good films out there. All the Kingsman, there's Matrix Resurrections. that's on HBO Max.

There's The Lost Daughter, I think, is dropping on Netflix pretty soon. If you haven't heard about this one, this is Maggie Gyllenhaal's directing debut with Olivia Coleman and Dakota Johnson, really impressed by that one, being the Ricardo's from Aaron Sorkin, Pedro Almodovar's film Parallel Mothers, don't look up on Netflix. There is a lot out there. And that's just the films, guys. In the TV side, there's Station 11. There's McGruber, there's The Witcher.

There's something for everybody out there. Anyway, I guess we should just toss to this last great conversation of 2021, but I do want to thank you guys for listening, as always, and supporting Happy Second Fused for making our recent benefit with Tom Hiddleston such a huge success. And if you want to check out more stuff, if you want to see video versions of the podcast, if you want to see Game Night, which is our frequent, very loose, very fun game version of Happy, Sad, Confused with huge movie and TV stars, go over to the Patreon page. That's patreon.com

slash happy, sad, confused. I think you guys will take it. If you enjoyed that podcast, you'll probably enjoy what we're doing over at the Patreon page. Okay, that's enough of me rambling for 2021. I'm going to rest up for what's sure to be hopefully another big, exciting, and hopefully healthy year for all of us, 2022, around the corner. In the meantime, though, enjoy this conversation with one of the classiest guests ever to be unhappy, say I confused, just his diction, his inflections, his voice, his timber. It's all class. Here's me and Mr. Rafe Fines.

Congratulations on the new film. This is one of those things where you hear Matthew Vaughn, you hear Ray Fines, and my mind as a lover of both of your works, is that like, what is that combination going to look like? And the answer is, it works. It's fantastic. So congratulations all around. We'll get to the Kingsman in a second.

But first, just for some context, and because you've spent so much of your life in the theater, and I know you're working in the theater right now, outside of doing some press for this film, give me a sense of the last year. I mean, I know your production with David Hare was one of the first productions, I think, back home. of that scale that was that was a monologue david hare wrote about having he had covid

in april march of 2020 and he wrote about it in the form of a monologue also having a go at our government's pretty inadequate response at the time to the arrival of covid in the uk and it's quite it was quite visceral and angry and funny and i think audiences appreciated this kind of cathartic Speaking of frustrations and bewilderment and the description of the of having the illness. And then this year, sorry, sorry, I didn't mean sort of answer. No, I mean, now I'm just doing something else. I'm doing this production of a poem by T.S. Eliot called the four quartets, which some people may know. It's a beautiful complex poem, which we put on in the summer.

and I told it through different regional cities in the UK, and now it's coming towards the end of a short run in London. Really, the David Hare production. You mentioned catharsis for the audience. Was it also catharsis for you? I mean, we were all going through collective trauma in the last year and a half. It must have been a fascinating experience for you

to kind of deliver that emotion of David's on stage night after night. Yeah, it was strong stuff. I mean, he didn't pull any punches about what he felt about our government's handling. And I agreed with the principle of where his anger was coming from. And he's such an electric writer. I mean, it was strong stuff. But also touching about being vulnerable to the symptoms of the illness.

And it was one of the first productions, if not the first production, back after the first lockdown in London. Right. at the Bridge Theater. But it was also in sync with other monologues, some by Alan Bennett. So the bridge came back. The Bridge Theater came back with a series of monologues. But I think that Beat the Devil was the newest of them. I mean, your name is synonymous with great theater the last couple decades, sir.

I mean, did you feel almost a responsibility, a compulsion to be one of the first out of the gate to bring theater back? It wasn't really, it didn't, I mean, the beat the devil didn't come from me. I mean, weirdly, I've been planning a production with the bridge, actually about a great American figure, Robert Moses, the New York City planner, but that's coming up next year. But because of what COVID was doing, David, David wrote this piece and Nick Heitner, the director, and artistic director of the bridge said, Rafe, would you be interested in doing it? So I was excited to do it.

It was just alive at the time. I don't know whether it, I mean, filmed it too, actually. We recorded it. Right. I don't know if it would be something to redo again because it was so of the moment. And it was only, it was just okay. It was still, it still thought a little bit late

because it was so hot off the press and it's what he was saying. But no, I mean, you know, it was exciting. Because like everyone, we didn't know what was happening in the theater particularly. We didn't know where, how that was going to come back. And a lot of West End theatres were suffering and closing, and a lot of commercial producers were very uncertain about the future of the theatre.

So, I mean, I think that Nick Heitner, who ran the National Theatre for a long time, is a great visionary about where theatre can go. And he's also got a great overview of all kinds of theatre, you know, or from, you know, comedy, popular entertainment to some more, maybe more niche kinds of playwriting. But he's just because he's run the National Theater, he comes with a great breadth of awareness about what audience would like the menu

of what an audience can hope to see. Was the early ambition to do both theater and film when you were starting out was, you did so much of your early work primarily on the stage, was film part of the dream, or was that an unexpected evolution? No, film theatre was what I, I mean, I grew up listening to recordings of actors like Lawrence Olivier and my mum taking me to the theatre and that was the theatre was the thing. I think

I've just thought that was my dream. The film just felt so far away like a remote thing that theatre was, you know, I'm living in London as an art student, theatre was on my doorstep, but the world of film just felt kind of impossible. So, yeah, when I went to drama, school and then I was happy to get invited to join the National Theatre, then after that Royal Shakespeare Company. So, yeah, no, theatre was the thing. But once I was invited to be in films, I got, you know, then I saw what what films can do and how actors can communicate very differently in films than the theatre. And it's fascinating and great, It's great to be able to, I'm lucky that I can go between the two.

Because I think you can take from one for the other, you know, the sort of interior shifts that the camera likes to see in the human face that probably wouldn't transmit on a stage. But you can bring to bear that same interior life on stage because actually if you're only projecting and gesticulating in a theatrical way, it becomes just. a mask. So, you know, I think the film, the truth that film likes is absolutely a requirement for the theatre, except the theatre audiences in the theatre, there's a different vocal and gestural language, which also is exciting to manage, to use, as a way of expression. And not to mention, you know, bringing us to the film you're promoting today, the Kingsman, I can say a lot of things about it. It would not work on the stage. This is something designed for cinema.

And as I alluded to at the outset, I'm a big fan of Matthew Vaughn, and I'm sure you are as well, and I think it's probably for some of the same reasons. This is a man who, in this era of blockbusters and, you know, giant, giant action films, and I've certainly seen more than my share. There are very few filmmakers that can bring a life of vitality,

a singular vision to them outside of Matthew. Yeah. Were you, I mean, do you track directors? Were you much aware? aware of Matthew's work prior to this? Not much. I'd seen, I had seen the first Kingsman and enjoyed it very much. Yeah. And then I caught up with stuff that I hadn't seen

like kickass, which I think is fantastic. Yeah, kick ass layer cake. I mean, they're all, they're all fantastic. No, I think I was completely taken back by Matthew's kind of mix of in your face action with totally unpredictable storytelling that's exciting. You just don't know where it's going to go. And that was the same on the page when you read this Kingsman prequel. And Matthew engaged with me in a very genuine way. He really wanted my input.

He genuinely wanted to have ideas. And, you know, I mean, we discussed one or two quite extreme scenes around the depictions of the Russian Tsar, which were not something I can describe on the public TV. channel but they were I don't they didn't make the movie but they were but I mean when you read it it was like oh my god he's really he likes shock value and he somehow makes it worse so but but yes and that's right and the sort of although what I read originally wasn't in the film but the shock value is still there I think in the film oh absolutely surprise element and also the human you don't know you sort of taken aback by oh my god this is happening I can't and I never saw this coming well we always talk you know in these kind of conversations about finding the right tone in a film and a film like this is is a challenge i mean it's a challenge to find that tone that can shift between i mean i'm sure part of the also the ingredients for you as an actor approaching it is this this character from the start is just dealing with real human trauma and loss like this is like yes this is in some ways you might think of this as a frivolous fun kind of four quadrant action movie but the bones of it the for you as an actor

there's a lot to chew on, and that must be a relief. Well, that was why the part was attractive because there was a lot to chew on in terms of his past and what he's dealing with. And I mean, I was aware that Matthew was sort of, it was a high-stakes proposal because he was dealing with family trauma, high-profile, high-intensity, humorous action sequences

with the horrors of the First World War in the trenches, which are very real and still resonate. Certainly in the UK, the First World War is still sits as a painful historical thing. So how is he going to bring all these things together and not veer into something which felt like in bad taste?

Sure. But I just thought, well, he's smart and he knows the danger areas. After talking to him, I was aware that he knew the pitfalls. But I just thought, this is a great part. There's a great arc. And I just thought, I must just play the guy, certainly for the first two-thirds, completely straight, where the humor is in situations. There are other characters that bring to bear so humorous, kind of satirical element. And the Duke of Oxford is meant to be the straight center of the story.

And the reluctant hero. Nothing better than a reluctant hero. No, reluctant hero. Reluctant hero. That's a good. That's right. Yeah. So there's also, I mean, I don't know if you agree with me, but there's a certain irony that this is perhaps your most physically taxing role, I would imagine, at least in some time. Like, I mean, in your 50s, you're getting to do the action that most 25 year olds normally would do. Is that, is that a badge of honor or something that you could have enjoyed like, I can, I can be the guy at my age now. I can real, like this is, I have. Well, I was, I mean, there's a little boy in me that longs to do action sequences. Actually, and particularly this kind of. more peer, I mean, with a sword fight. Ah, I love, you know, I love stage fighting when I was younger,

and I've always loved. Now, when I did Hamlet, I love, the duel in the Hamlet that I did was directed by Bill Hobbs, one of the great fight directors, sword fighting directors ever. He did all the sword fights for Ridley Scots, the dualists. Sure. He's got a great list of credits. So to be directed by Bill Hobbs was fantastic. And I love those old films where those actors from the 30s and 40s could really fight. I mean, there's no stunt. There's Errol Flynn and Basil Rathbone. Tyrone Power. Amazing. And I can't claim to have their skill, but I definitely loved rehearsing that sword fight. And so, yeah, no, it was fun. It was fun. I got to do stuff that I didn't expect to be asked to do at my age. Do you take as much pride

after completing, like, a physical scene like that as, like, a dialogue-heavy scene? Is it a different sort of pride? Yeah, no, absolutely. There is. And there was a great, very committed, dedicated stunt team directed, sadly, by Brad Allen, who's now sadly passed. Oh, yes, yeah. He died last, earlier this year.

But he was a lovely man. He was dedicated to realizing Matthew's vision in terms of action sequences. is very, very fastidiously perfectionist about every single shot. And the gratification was Brad saying, you know, a bit like those teachers at school who were a bit scary, but you wanted them to say, well done.

And Brad had that effect. He wasn't scary, but he was intense. So when he gave, yeah, good job, that was good. It felt like high praise. So, yeah, that was. What about the satisfaction in, there have been certain kinds of films in your career where I would imagine seeing the finished product must be fascinating

because you can read it on the page, you can talk to Matthew, but until you see something like this put together with the editing and the sound and the music, much like the Harry Potter films, I'm sure they look great on set, but like again, it is a tapestry, it is a filmmaker's medium for these kinds of films in particular.

Is there something that awakens inside of you when you see the finished product for the first time in a film like The Kingsman or a Harry Potter film? Yeah, every time you see any film you've done, it's always interesting, terrifying, sometimes gratifying, sometimes disappointing. And also because it's so subjective, it's, you know, one's own face and stuff, and you kind of wrestle with all that stuff of watching yourself, which is complicated. But so, yes, it's always with this, I thought, when I saw this, I thought, Matthew has a real handle on this. And I didn't, usually you can, if something isn't right or you don't like the way you're shot

or the seat, you can just feel a little disturbance in your inner being. Oh, my God, this, but this was, this just felt, I couldn't know, I don't know how the people, I just felt, no, this seems to flow. He knows what he's doing. Yeah. And, you know. So, so going back, if you'll indulge me a little bit, you alluded to this before about sort of your theater being the first love and something you were exposed to as a child.

I mean, your parents were both in the arts, I know. Your mother was a novelist, your father, a photographer. That's right. Were they the biggest influences in your life in terms of exposure to the arts? Do you remember how you kind of found your way? My mother, my father was definitely a supporter of everything I did. But my mother was a key inspiration. She would have introduced me to Shakespeare, to Hamlet, to poetry, to the theatre.

Actually, my sister joked with me, because I'm doing this T.S. Eliot, and so much of my love of T.S. Eliot comes from my mother's love of him and of poetry. So there I am in the West. I'm doing it now. I do the red carpet for the Kingsman, which is the kind of film my dad would have loved. He would have loved me playing that kind of stoic man of integrity, decent, reluctant hero. and he would have loved all that stuff. And so my sister, like, she said, there you are going from what daddy would have liked

to what our mom would have liked. Because I left the red carpet. I had to go, literally, go into the theater and prepare for the show. Amazing, yes. It must have been, you know, fascinating. When I was doing the chronology of your career, you know, Schindler's list, of course,

exploded and changed the course of your life. And if I'm remembering it correctly or seeing the dates right, you suffered the loss of your mother, right, around that. That's right. No, she died at the very end of 93. So, Schindler's List was filmed in the spring of 93. And my mom sadly died at the very, very end of December, 93.

So it was a funny time. I mean, not funny, hilarious. I mean, it was odd and emotional and full of grief. But, I mean, it was because there was Schindler's list, getting such an extraordinary response. And I was reeling from the loss of my mother at the time. Yeah. So it was, yeah, it was, it was, it was bewildering

because I didn't, I suppose, the sort of movement of focus on the film and the success when people being asked to fly here for this event and that and probably, probably, you're not really having time. People say you need time to grieve. And I suppose I didn't. I mean, I found a time,

but then it was it was bewildering. I saw actually that I'm going to complete it. I started to watch just last night. There was a film you did just a few years later about one of your mother's novels, I believe, and it seems like that was a way perhaps of reckoning a bit. That's right. We did that.

And I think it was in support of a last novel she wrote was posthumously published, thanks to Liz Calder, who then ran Bloomsbury books. And the path of the novel, seeing, having a readership, was that Michael Ondarci read it, and Liz was his publisher. Wow. And she read it and wanted to do it. And so I think the film was made to support the publication of the novel called Blood Ties. Right. I'm curious, you know, we talked about sort of like your theatrical career early on. And I would think kind of you know the path that, you know, the kind of parts you want,

the kind of career you're going to forge. On the film side, once Schindler's List happens and Quiz Show happens, like, did you feel like you knew what kind of film career you wanted? Was there a clear path for you or was it sort of just figuring this out as I go, I'm just taking the best material, I'm going to my gut. I mean, give me a sense of what your attitude was at the time. Well, I think for any actor who's lucky enough

to be in a film that has that kind of success and to work with directors like Spielberg or Redford or their equivalent today, whoever they may be, and to have that, when the film business here, I suppose I'm talking about Hollywood or the LA-based film business, when that looks at you favorably because of what you've been in, it's a tantalizing and also quite unnerving time because I had no points of reference.

I had the films that I liked. I didn't know who, I just, you know, there's so much ignorance about who one should work with, what is a good film script. You're not always, you know, you don't, you're a lot. of scripts are sent to you and of course you're flattered your your ego is massaged by lots of attention and meetings and lunches with exciting directors who want to work with you and it's your so um it was quite um it wasn't unpleasant it was just if i look back now thinking i thought

oh that that young man was a bit bewildered he was sort of where where to you know how do you hold on to your truth whatever that is right Right. Well, because in theater, again, I'm going to go Shakespeare and Pinter, and I'm going to follow the great sense. But in film, it's just sort of a little more amorphous of what is a film career for a 30-year-old man with your experience. It must have been. Because it occurs to me, like, today, given that kind of success, you would be Dr. Strange today. Like, you would have been plucked out. Marvel would have sucked you in, and you would be doing Marvel film after Marvel film. And that might be nice, but that would be a different path, a different life. Well, I think I made choices that surprise people.

the English patient was, I'm very proud of that film. I'm working with a great mind, Anthony Mingheller, with great actors, William Defoe, Juliet Binash, Kristen Scott Thomas and Saul's Ants behind it. So that felt definitely of something of worth, of value, a great emotional scope, a filmically interesting proposition of different time zones, and Anthony's intelligence and his way of working with everyone was, you know, it was an extraordinary. experience to everyone involved. And that was recognized as an achievement as a film. But I think then I did Oscar and Lucinda, which is a quirky story,

beautiful story by Peter Carey, Jillian Armstrong directing. And I remember that. It didn't have the crazier response. It had a sort of respectful response, but it wasn't a huge hit at all. But what I would remember is I wanted to play that part. I believed it was about love and faith and the sort of the gambling at the center of it is about choices in life and how you take a risk on something. And so there's there's quite a complex idea at the heart of the story. And I love this character, Oscar Hopkins, but it's very, he's quirky, he's geeky.

And, you know, I followed the descriptions that my hair dyed red. And that was all where I had the chance to work with great Kate Blanchett. opposite me as Lucinda, but I remember feeling, I remember an interview with the Hollywood Hollywood Foreign Pressing, why did you, it was like, why are you doing that? As if I had made a reverse choice. But in retrospect, yeah.

No, but you were- But the thing is I've always, I've never been, I've never regretted something I've made a choice because I believed in the material, I've believed in what it was about, and who knows what the film can happen. I've always thought they were one or two choices, which I won't go into where I've gone, I've did that slightly for the wrong

reasons. Like, is that a good career move or will I be seen in this light? And those feel like not, they seem like a kind of calculated choice, whereas sometimes the ingredients just feel great, just feel right, and you go with your gut. And you don't know how it's going to come out, but you go, something in here says, like the bigger splash of film I did with Luca Guadino. I love that part, not a part I get asked to play. that's an outrageous, loud, brash, kind of willful record producer, Harry, but alongside Tilda Swinton and Matthias Rannatz. And I love Luca's world and his intelligence.

And so I met Luca and I read the script that felt, and I mean, I did okay, but I'm that felt like a everything felt aligned in a good way well it does feel like you've devoted your much of your film career to something that is sadly diminishing more and more which is the adult drama which is like I think you know the end of the affair is another film we could mention that I feel like not many people think back to but it was a great Neil Jordan film at the time constant gardener these are just like look in retrospect you have you've worked with the greats and you've devoted yourself to the right material so there should be no second guess it I'm curious, here's one random one that just came up, came up when I was reading up on you.

There was talk, talk about a fork in the road, that Joel Schumacher had you and mine potentially to play Batman at one point. Do you remember any conversation? No, I didn't know that. I didn't know that. No, I mean, I think when these, I've never really, I mean, I, yeah, I suppose I grew up liking what you call the adult. dramas yeah um and and have and i like i still like them i think what's what's a little um i think because of the the the huge success of streaming series in a tv streaming series that go on and on and on yeah that the what's being eroded is the belief in or the you know or the commercial

viability of the film the adult film that's two hours long that deals with drama. It can be, you know, a film noir, can be a romance, it can be something like the end of the affair. It doesn't have to be a literary base to it, but those sorts of, those are the films I grew up with. And my awareness of film at all that I like was those kinds of films, you know. You mentioned Harold Pinter, but he did some great screenplays like The Servant and Accident and French Lieutenant's Woman. So those, you know, that kind of film that seems to be uh i think i think you know netflix are making those kinds of films but but they just happen to be 10 hours that you know what they just happen to be 10 hours long yeah

yeah well like yes or they are they're they're there for the streets that mean where where are we with the cinema i suppose you know going um what's going to happen to the film the cinema experience it is the the existential question for folks like us that have devoted our lives to cinema and i don't know if we have the answers quite yet um Harry Potter always comes up as it should. You are to a generation, to future generations will always be Voldemort. When last we spoke,

I remember you said that there was some initial trepidation on your part. What was the key thing you were worried about going into something like that and how was it alleviated? Again, it was ignorance. I hadn't read the books. I was aware of the first two films

being these young children and wizards and it felt like I hadn't invested in it, or I hadn't been curious about it, possibly in my ignorance a bit dismissive, and then a very great casting director called Mary Selway, sadly, also no longer with us, but someone who had been a big part of my early career and a woman I've profoundly

respected. At the time, not at all well, was casting the film of the fourth, I think, Harry Potter film in which Voldemort is reborn out of the cauldron. Up until then, he'd just been seen, I think, as a digital animated figure coming out of someone's head. So no actor had yet played Voldemort. And I was, because I was not invested in the series or the the evolvement of J.K. Rowling's world. I had no clue as to how important Voldemort was. There was a combination of factors. It was Mary being incredibly insistent. When Mary was insistent, you sort of listened. And then my sister, my sister Martha, who has three children, who were then right at that age, maybe sort of 11, 10, 7.

I think I said, I don't know, I've been asked to do this, Voldemort. What do you think? She said, what? What? You've got to do it. You're crazy, crazy. So then I kind of woke up, I think. And then I got into it what it meant in the J.K. Rowling universe and the world and that he was this extreme satanic figure, snake-like evil element. And then I went for it, you know. I went for it and then got completely into it and loved it. Certainly did. Have you seen Curse Child? on stage and I mean it feels inevitable at some point that they will turn that into a film and indeed Voldemort does factor in is that an intriguing proposition to you I have to confess I've not seen it on stage so but I would be up for revisiting Voldemort for sure for sure um I'm recently just did a Q&A with um Daniel Craig and Carrie Fukenaga about no time to die quite a big swing of a final film for Daniel in that series.

Was that a no-brainer? I think it was it Sam Mendes that came to you or Barbara Broccoli? Was that something that was an easy yes? It was funny because actually a while back Barbara Broccoli talked to me once about possibly playing Bond and that didn't happen.

But Sam Mendes, as we know, directed Skyfall and the pitch was very attractive at the time. And, you know, Judy Dench, M, dies, and you're set up as the next M. And it was a, and I thought, great. I also love Daniel's bond. And I just respected Sam's intelligence and the approach to it and the way he, what he was doing with it, I thought it was, Ms. Guifel was a great script. It was great. although I think I can say now that I had to fight off an attempt by Sam in Spector to make M

I said I don't want to play M and then you turn around and make him the bad guy M is never the bad guy Oh wow he was going to be on the other side I had to have some pretty intense discussions with Sam saying this is not flying with me M isn't

Was he in league with Blofeld? Was he, was that? Yeah, yeah, no, it was like, yes, he was Blowfeld or something, but that was, that wasn't, that was a red line for me. This is not what I signed up for. This is not what you sold me. Was that an intriguing proposition way back when when you talked to Barbara about potentially even playing Bond? I mean, again, just that the kid in you must have been intrigued by that notion. Yes, I'm not sure I'd have been very good as Bond.

I mean, I would love, I like the books a lot when I was in my teens. I like the films, particularly the earlier Connery films. I had a teenage obsession with Bond, and so when that day came, of course, I was flattered. But I still, I mean, I think they tried to do this up to a point when Daniel came into the franchise. I mean, they went back to Casino Royale, and they kind of honored. I mean... because of the way the films evolved through the 80s and 90s, 70s, 80s, 90s, they got kind of fun, bizarre. I mean, you know, Roger Moore was great entertainment, but they got further and further from the quite dark, slightly acidic, dangerous sort of nocturnal world of the books and a kind of flinty, difficult, slightly elitist mindset of bond and kind of.

I've been highly individual and kind of, you know, he had his views, he's quite opinionated. He says he had Fleming's lots of ways, but he would probably be canceled a million times over the bond of the books now. That's true. But I liked what I imagined that there could be a bond, a filmic world, which would be set right in the 50s

that you would do Casino Royale right in the 50s and it would be dark, but it would be really tough And that, you know, you would be quite brave with the violence in it, and you would be quite unapologetic about the sex in it. So it would be quite, you know, it would be quite grown up, and like the books are. I mean, well, they're not, are they grown up? Maybe not. But I get a kind of, they have a steely kind of, I mean, I think they offend some people because they are, and now in the current climate, they probably wouldn't fly at all. But, I mean, that's what I remember thinking, oh, could the Bond films go down this noirish, almost even a black and white world?

But I don't think that was anyway, you know, I think there's, I think it's not for me to say. I think I think early on, I think what I read about when Cubby Broccoli bought the options on the Bond, the first thing they addressed was the kind of. he didn't have much sense of humour. They wanted to make him attractive and kind of wry and this thing. And I think they did quite rightly. They've made him, you know, we like Bond's humour and his kind of ironic detachment. And there's a wit. And I think they had to find something that that women and men had to like.

And that's, of course, as our taste has changed and what we find acceptable has changed. So, of course, and the Bond franchise reflects... intelligently, and I think that's the sort of brilliant way that Barbara and Michael have managed it as they've got, you know, really strong actors to play Bond. And Daniel, I think, is, you know, masterful in the way he's inhabited that. And they've kept the alert to the world in which the franchise has to exist. And I think probably the period bond that I have in mind is not. I'd watch it for the record. It's always a pleasure, sir. I really appreciate the time today. As I said, I'm a fan of yours and Matthew Vaughn

and the combination in the Kingsman certainly delivers. And hopefully we'll get you back on the states here in the States in New York one of these days as well. Thank you. Great talking to you. Thank you. And so ends another edition of happy, sad, confused. Remember to review, rate, and subscribe to this show

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