Podcrushed - [Rerun] Eddie Redmayne

Episode Date: March 4, 2026

[Original air date: December 12, 2024] Oscar-winning actor Eddie Redmayne (The Theory of Everything, Fantastic Beasts) takes a break from gracing the stage (and the soundstage) to bring his characteristic charm and kindness to the pod. He recalls early memories from growing up as the artsy one in a family full of athletes, and talks about his early days as a young theater actor in London, in awe of the bright lights and buzzy energy.    🎧 Want more from Podcrushed? 📸 Instagram 🎵 TikTok 🐦 X / Twitter ✨ Follow Penn, Sophie & Nava Instagram Penn Sophie Nava TikTok Penn Sophie Nava See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

but you would walk through the back alleys of the theatre and down past these reels of costumes and these gigantic sets that... And that... Without the... Well, it is a cliche, but the smell of the makeup and the... And the camaraderie and the eccentricity

and uniqueness of theatre people was just... I was so seductive. I couldn't believe that I got to do that. And I got paid 20 quid a performance, you know? And... Which my parents would then sort of... invited all their friends to come and see.

it and the tickets cost sort of 60 quits. So there was a massive loss-making experience for everyone. But it was no, that was the intoxication. Welcome to Pod Crushed. We're hosts. I'm Penn. I'm Nava

and I'm Sophie. And I think we would have been your middle school besties. Writing letters of love upon a scratch, parchment paper scratching within ink quilt. No, is this not? isn't resonating? Scratching.

That's perfect. Welcome, welcome to Pod Crushed. I have a question just to kick us off. Why not? Are you resting or making me money? Wait. Who someone else? Are you resting?

Or are you making me money? Sophie, how about you? I've never heard this question, but I've also never rested. Suspicious, although I can confirm. Never rested. Navas never rested. It's been my birthday recently.

It's the best time of year. Happy birthday. Thank you. Thank you. Which also means that it's Sophie and David's little babies' birthday, the day after, November 2nd. It also commemorates the morning I woke up to this text from Nava. Are you resting or are you making me money, Penn? Wait, what was the rest of it?

What was the rest of the message? Well, then you quipped back. Nav was the momager of this family, to which I said, this isn't a family. Yeah, always always offensive when you feel the need to point out or not blud technically. And then I said, P.S. It's my B-day. Nava, did you know that it was my birthday? No. I honestly did not know. That information is publicly available on Google, but I did not know.

So you don't have a Google alert, you're saying? No. But Penn Badgley's the most famous Scorpio. Am I? No, sure. Probably. Yeah. Yeah, sure, sure, sure.

So then Navi says, never mind or Nivima. no, just in text to speak. You're doing great, sweetie, which I love. Sophie then said, P.S., I'm in labor. So that, that was... The most casual P.S. I'm just like such a chill girl in labor. So, Tilly.

Yeah. I would have quipped about it in the days leading up that, like, maybe you would be, like, resting on your belly, you know? Yeah. The phone was on her belly, and the belly's like, contract. The phone was, like, bouncing it. Well, actually, it was, like, the more chill side of labor,

but I knew just for the way the group chat was popping off and pinging that I wanted to, you know, announce my departure. And then how did you respond, Penn? Oh, I just did that nice thing in comedy where I brought it back to the beginning. I said, you're doing great, sweetie. Put the phone down, though. Put the phone down though with a question mark. See? Never.

This was a great moment in the group chat. I would venture to say perhaps my favorite moment in the group chat, primarily because Penn was participating, which is a rare honor in and in of itself. Yeah, we finally have proof that Penn does read the group chat. and actually not only does you read it, he goes back to read it. I take a scroll every now and then. I do. Yeah.

Just like this for 37 minutes, just scrolling, trying to find it. No, this is a great moment from our group chat. And it turns out that U.S. Cellular is actually doing a really cool campaign right now where they are turning your group chat moments into wrapping paper for the holiday season. So with your permission, I will be submitting this as our moment. I don't know that I want this moment memorialized because I don't look so great but I do think the idea of getting a gift

wrapped in a memory is so meta. I love that. So between now and November 24th, you can DM US Cellular on Instagram with a screenshot of your favorite group chat moment of the year, of the whole year. And they might, if you're lucky,

they might send you a free group chat wrap. So you can literally give the gift of connection to your loved ones wrapped in a memory. Speaking of loved ones. Yes, today we are joined by the lovely Eddie Redmayne. If you don't

know, he's the award-winning actor. I mean, he's got Tony's, Olivier's, I think Bafters, Oscars. He's been everywhere and he's only 42. Really an incredible talent. You probably know him

from his portrayal as Stephen Hawking. A fun little piece of trivia is that he was the first man in his 80s to win an Oscar. So he holds that record. The first man from the 80s. Wait, to play? The first man from the 80s now, but that's a huge point of clarification. Yes. And he won that Oscar.

He was the first man born. Did you? Were you in the interview? He won that Oscar, of course, for playing Stephen Hawking in the theory of everything. He's also been in the Fantastic Beasts films, The Trial of Chicago 7. He's been on Broadway on the West End. Most recently, he's got a miniseries called The Day of the Jackal. Out now on Peacock.

It's about a ruthless, ruthless, a ruthless, a ruthless, he's a wolfless British assassin. He's a British assassin. The classic character, The Jackal, now made fresh and modern. in 2024, 2025. We were honored to have Eddie here today. You're going to love this one. Don't go anywhere.

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You can find my husband's wife wherever books are sold. Hey, it's Hassam-Min-Haj here from the Hassam-Min-Haj doesn't-no podcast, among other things. And I hate the smell of rotting food almost as much as I hate wasting it in the first place. Thankfully, now I have Mill. Mill is a food recycler that is odorless, guiltless, and completely effortless. See, I've always wanted to reduce my food waste. It is one of the easiest ways for an individual to make a big impact on the environment. But I just cannot stand the mess of a compost bin in the kitchen.

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Good thing, you can try it risk-free for 90 days right now and get $75 off with code HMDK. Visit mill.com slash HMDK. That is mill.com slash HMDK. Eddie, thank you for coming. Thank you for having you. Where are you guys? Navas in L.A., and I happen to be in Florence. In Florence?

Yeah. I'm visiting my parents. of jealousy. I know, I know. Whereabouts in Florence are you? I lucked out. Right on the Arno, my parents live here. Yeah, it's nice.

It's not a bad place to visit. That's beautiful. I'm very jealous. I got engaged in Florence. Really? Oh, sweet. So we do usually start at like just about 12. Yeah.

So we want to go there. But as far, if our research serves us, did you do. Terrified of research. Yeah, right. Did you start, did you go to, Jackie Palmer's stage school at age 10. We're going back. We're going straight in. Yeah, we are. We are. Welcome.

Welcome. Well, good morning. Yeah, I did. So, my, I grew up in a family who were very sporty. And that was kind of, I suppose, the language in our, in my elder brother, my younger brother, my half-brother and half-sister, my dad, everyone. there was brilliant sporting capability, and I kind of lacked a certain amount of that. Was it very clear or very early on? It was pretty clear, pretty early on,

anything that my brother, particularly my elder brother, because we were quite close in age, anything he was brilliantly accomplished at, I was not. And so I don't know whether it was an active thing, but I was always doing the opposite. So sort of from an early age, like music and through music, really, theater became something that I was sort of passionate about. And I always was amazing looking back on it, particularly as a parent now, is that despite my parents not really having any knowledge of that

world, they were sensationally sported. That's what it sounds like. I mean, honestly, just what we learned, you know, Wikipedia gives you something. It does give you something. It really does seem like, I mean, I'm glad what you're saying supports what we were... Like, it really feels like you came out of nowhere a little bit in your family. I mean, I don't want to suggest a black sheep or something like that, but it's cool, you know? I mean, the rest of the family being so oriented in these other ways, you know, like I think also very business-oriented just in terms of the careers that were pursued, right?

But I think there was something, weirdly, the first sort of manifestation of something different was, I sat at a piano when I was little. and I was at a friend's house and my mum came around afterwards and the friend's parents were like you know you should get Eddie a piano because he really enjoys it and she was like I didn't even know you did it

and I had this weird thing which I can kind of remember from when I was about six or seven years old that I could sit at a piano and my fingers would sort of do I could sort of improvise something and it felt incredibly freeing and so my mom rented a piano and I started having lessons

And as I started to learn the piano properly, like technically, kind of all of that freedom or sort of facility disappeared. And I'm not, I sort of learned the piano in the very kind of formal way. And I wasn't particularly good. But I can remember. Did it become less inspiring, I guess? Yeah, I think so. But I remember early on, like age of nine or ten being in a concert at this school.

They sort of, everyone was playing their pieces. And I was just sort of put in front of the piano to play. and I remember having no fear and I remember being out of sort of Do you mean just to improvise? To kind of improvise. Now looking back on it I mean

I fucking hate improvising I'm a control freak I don't know there are all these elements but I look back on that time as this kind of I do have a glint of the memory of it of what that freedom was

and I always think now with work and the older and many things in life actually that mixture between kind of the control and the discipline of things you do versus the kind of that instinctive freedom that we all have in us. It's like how those two things marry

is kind of intriguing. I'm with you. I'm totally with you. So I've managed to avoid the Jackie Palmer children's... By talking about some... Well, you know what I was thinking is it? You just went to performing art school. Is that not what that is?

It's not. So no. So I was at a normal school and I loved music, singing particularly, and I loved theatre, and one day I was on holiday and I met this lady and I was talking to her and she said, oh, my little brother is at this school in High Wycombe, which is just outside London.

So it was like a class. Yeah, it's a class. And it's actually a school, but I just went at weekends sporadically. And they had an agency there. And so I sort of signed up with a headshot. Oh, that's right, and you did end up modeling later. Is that what I know?

You don't need to go in that. Very unsuccessfully. It was amazing. At this class, you'd go once a year and do this kind of showcase at this theatre. And James Corden was there. He was, I mean, even at that age, he was a couple years old. He was so charismatic. And he was an amazing dancer and a sort of huge, sort of passionate theatre kid.

And yes, I started auditioning for, like real sort of musicals and things and just about a 10? 10 11 yeah that's cool yeah you know I moved to LA

when I was 12 yeah and I started working so for me and by the way they are former middle school administrators

slash teachers so the joke is is that they're teachers and I dropped out of middle school it's not a joke it's not a joke it's not funny

it's mostly true stay in school yeah but I know that for me like I can remember standing in the arrivals like a pickup

taxi line at LAX at 12 years old at like 9 p.m. listening to Drew Hill on my walkman and just you know my life before and after was different and and and you know in as much as I've been able to pursue a career as an artist

I guess I'm curious when did acting specifically become like wow this is feeding me in a way I don't think, not for a while, honestly. I think it was music, and weirdly it was sort of movement. And I am a really shoddy dancer, but I remember at that period, feeling very free physically. And the elder I got, the more self-conscious and restricted and sort of restrained, I felt physically. But I'm just quickly curious about that moment in L.A.

because you hear of American actors arriving in L.A., often young. So what does that mean? Does that mean that you had a career where you grew up, and there was a moment where you said to your parents, like, I'm moving to L.A.? What does it mean to get off of place? It sounds so insane. I was with my mom.

It was with your mom. And that was for pilot season. You know, you've heard of that, probably. Yeah, all the Brid actors. We all come out for pilot season in order to escape the rain. Right, right. So it really meant that I had an agent-manager in Seattle, Washington had been doing plays since I was about nine musicals.

For me, actually, music was the intro into it. I loved music, knew nothing of acting. Through that, got into musical theater, then got into theater, and then got into the suggestion of movies, TV commercials. I, you know, I tested on like... I remember, do you recall the film with Miko He, Hughes, a young child actor, and Bruce Willis called Mercury Rising. I have not seen that movie.

Okay, it's fine. It was a role that I tested for and got very close to as like a nine-year-old. Yeah. Oh, my God. Do you remember that feeling, though, when you were that little? My reference was, of all things, Dustin Hoffman and Rain Man. So like at nine years old, I recall that, like watching that and wanting to emulate that and feeling really good about trying to embody that, all those ticks and stuff, which, you know,

So that's something that we also have in common. You have done, I'm thinking of the incredible embodiments of physicality and ticks that you've done in certain roles. I guess, like, what was your perspective on art and the theatre then? Did it seem illustrious and majestic and, like, far off? It felt romantic is what it was. By that point, I was going to the theatre in London sporadically. My parents would take me. And at about the age of 12, through this agent, through the Jackie Palmer Children's Agency,

I got a part in a production of Oliver. But, I mean, hearing about your test, I remember that feeling when I first had an agent. You know, a week later, I got an audition for Annie Get Your Gun. And it was in the West End, and I was like, this is it. This is where it all starts. I remember learning the song and going and queuing. There being this queue outside the theatre,

this line that went round the block and lots of kids from theatre schools all wearing their matching sort of sweaters and he went on stage and it was like an episode of American Idol you sort of all had your number and I prepared the whole song

a whole kind of number and after singing one line of that song it was kind of wha and I remember it was such an extreme memory and now I sort of can't of rejection and I sort of can't believe

that my the strength in some ways of my parents allowing me to, I was like, no, but I want to keep trying. I want to keep trying. But Oliver was something I got and I was just one of, you know, 60 kids in the cast. But I remember that feeling of being at high school and in the middle of class, age 12, getting up

and walking across the bridge over the Thames and getting on the subway, the tube from Hammersmith Broadway to Oxford Circus right into the kind of epicentre of London and going to the London Palladium which is this incredible old theatre and Jonathan Price was playing Fagin and I was one of many kids

but you would walk through the back alleys of the theatre and down past these reels of costumes and these gigantic sets that and that without the, well it is a cliche but the smell of the makeup and the camaraderie and the eccentricity and the eccentricity

and uniqueness of theatre people was just so seductive. I couldn't believe that I got to do that. And I got paid 20 quid a performance, you know, which my parents were then sort of invited all their friends to come see it. And the tickets cost sort of 60 quits. So there was a massive loss-making experience for everyone. But it was, no, that was the intoxication. That was the moment.

You mentioned your brother, him being into sport, and because he was close to age made you kind of veer in the other direction. But I'm curious about your relationship in general. Yeah, well, I'm really close to my family. And I, so my elder brother is two and a half years old than me. And then my brother Charlie is sort of decade or so older than that. And who is my, so he's my half-brother

and my half-sister Eugenie who's a bit older than that. And then my little brother, Tom, is six years younger. So I really grew up in those sort of formative years. Tom was little. And James, my brother, who's two and a half years older, was very present. And he was and is very talented, brilliantly driven. But he's a force of nature. And we have very sort of differing personalities.

And I never, it's interesting because I love sport and I still do, but it was just he was so good at it that anything that he did I don't know whether it was subconsciously I chose to do the opposite so even within sport in England in the summer you basically

played cricket and or a few people play tennis and so he would play cricket I would play tennis he would play football I would play rugby and I think it was just not wanting comparison really

but even then as even in the world of sport, I remember being aware of my, I was quite self-aware in what I was good at and what I was bad at. And I suppose at being able to manipulate the things that I was not so good at and be, use those things that I was better at to aid that. So in sport, I could act the part. Like I could, you know, I could say the right things and sort of put on the right tone. a voice to make it look like I knew what I was talking about.

But it never felt sort of instinctive to me. Eddie, I've heard you talk about how competitive your family is. And I think in particular you've said your mom. And I'm curious if you have a memory of like a moment where you realize it might be more than usual. Like it might be over the top, the degree of competitiveness in the family. That's a really good question. It was really a work ethic. My mom has an extraordinary work ethic and drive.

and she instilled that in all of us from an early age and I went to boarding school when I was 13 but sort of by that time I had a sort of level of discipline and I think I'd probably retain that level of discipline and I don't think it's always necessarily a good thing that but it but it and these things are things you now question now that I'm a parent but but but I'm trying to think of

Well there was one I'm trying to think of a specific moment When she was competitive She was also incredibly caring And I remember there was this one time When I was playing a rugby match And I was pretty skinny But I was playing for

You were as opposed to now Sadly I never had my bulk up phase Despite my best efforts I was playing game of rugby And my mum would come to watch we were playing this school and within about the first minute that this sort of crash move came

when this guy ran towards me and when you're a teenager I definitely looked like I was sort of 14 years old and this guy looked like he was 25 and he was six foot he was called Dougie and he sort of lifted me over his shoulder threw me on the ground and then sort of fell fell on me with his elbow on my ribs

and sort of broke my ribs and I'll just never forget that the image of my mom on the sidelines having to be sort of restrained from sort of coming on and having to say her level of protection. But, yeah, that was after that, that was the sort of last game of rugby, I think that she could sort of bear.

Wow. Yeah. No, that's great. So it's called Pod Crush, this podcast. We do like to ask about, you know, first crushes, first heartbreaks that are so characteristic of this time, you know, that can be so massive at the time.

You look back and cringe and just think, like, you know, what was I thinking or what was I doing? But you were in boarding school, which also challenges that. I mean, you know, so I'm curious, what was, do you have a memorable story of first class? I mean, what to start with boarding school. Right? So I sort of went to boarding school at 13,

but the school that I went to is this school eaten that is, you know, one of, one of the most, It's an extraordinary place. And of course, when you're that little, you don't understand that, and you don't, and you normalise so much. So, for example, at Eton, you wear a black tail coat, you wear a starched collar, every day. Wow.

And you wear this sort of strange little starched piece of fabric that goes in, and as you say, every day. And you're in the middle, and it's a town, really. very, very beautiful town. It sort of perhaps feels more like a university. And there are tourist busts that go past every day and they're kind of looking at you dressed as penguins. And yet you've completely normalized the fact that you're dressed as a penguin

because everyone else is dressed as a penguin. And it doesn't feel weird because when you're young, you don't... Well, I didn't question any of that. But it is a school that is embedded in history. It was founded by Henry VI, who also founded King's College, Cambridge. And it has the most staggering facilities, kind of imaginable. And it's, you pay a lot of money to go there. They now have brilliant scholarships, and you can get grants to go.

And now their outreach is substantially more than it was in my day. but my God is it a privileged place to go? Again, you don't, you're perhaps not conscious of it. But there's another thing that happens with school when you're that age is, I think, and it was an all-boys school as well, that the self-consciousness begins to kick in around that age. And the notion of caring too much

or being passionate about something kind of is deemed uncool. Of course. And that was, I felt I was, and remain a deeply uncool human being. And so I was pretty passionate about many things then and so could exploit the facilities, which, done founding art department, incredible theatres. So you remained passionate. I did.

I mean, I did. And I think I was mocked for it in the crushedness of the pod crushed. You know, that was definitely a level of like this guy is, you know, God, he's so eager, he's so. And but again, perhaps I, and because I had done by this point, theater and professionally and I'd earn money. I was kind of like I don't give a fuck. But one of the sadnesses I've witnessed of that school,

which is if you do go there and your parents have paid all this money and yet you are busy playing the kind of I don't want to engage. It's just such an extraordinary waste because it has dumbfounding done founding things back to the crush rather than the crushedness there was this thing called the slab which was this area in each of the boarding houses so the school was divided up into boarding houses and had 10 boys in each year um in the house and the slab was this communal area as you entered a house and it was where there were um pockets for notes that might get sent around the school and it was where people were to linger and there was the phone booth and so my sort of first relationships were

letters. I remember I'd kissed a girl at this party and she was at a boarding school as well. And so how did you even have part? I'm just kidding. You don't have to paint too much in London in which sort of everyone would gather. There were sort of events that were sort of organized. For the schools. Yeah, yeah. I actually don't know whether it was, it wasn't specifically but I remember that you'd start writing letters. I remember age 13 because you're you're in a boarding house who a friend came in and he saw me sort of writing my first letter and as I was writing

I love you to this person my mate was like dude you kissed at once sure you love it I was like isn't that what you say anyway so this anyway fortunately he guided me to probably not

commit undying love to someone on the first after having kissed him once and I sent many letters to this person over a term we saw each other and we'd speak on we would have these phone calls on the slab

but you'd do phone calls on a Saturday night and you would wait and there'd be this line of people or the older boys would do the calls first and you'd go into this little to the phone booth

and it would stink of kind of like adolescent male BEO and then you would do your call to this person who would then have it to their school and they would go you'd wait 10 minutes

while they were summoned from watching their watching Baywatch or something, and come back and have your sort of three-minute conversation before you'd get pulled out by someone else. Anyway, so that was my functional relationship. It was letters and sort of three-minute conversations for... That's so romantic.

Yeah, and then she dumped me. It is so romantic. Because she sent me a letter being like, Eddie, you know, I suppose we haven't seen each other. I'm not sure that's a relationship. I think, yeah, good point. Well made. So it wasn't that crushing. You're right, okay.

That's not quite what you was. No, no, I mean, I love that. I mean, I love just the image. That could have happened 100 years ago, I feel like the way that it was happening, especially in your penguin suit. In my penguin suit. And, yeah, and the, but I miss letters.

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Well, I certainly do. 2025 brought us some ridiculous far-fetched health claims and some especially terrifying changes in public health. What's in store for us in 2026? I'm Chelsea Clinton, and we're back with season two of my podcast. That can't be true. Follow along and catch up on season one wherever you get your podcasts. I have a question.

It does take us fast forwards a little bit, but as I understand it, you had been friends and known your wife, Hannah, now, for 12 years before you ever started dating. Is that right? That is true, yeah. Okay. Okay.

And I think that's remarkable. And I was wondering, maybe more people should be looking within their friend group for their life partner. And I wondered how you made that leap from friends for so long to partners. So I met Hannah probably when I was about 15 at a party. And without being, you know, it really was one of those moments when I saw, I saw clocked eyes with someone across a room. and I was and we chatted

and she's incredibly funny and deeply charismatic and I was like this is amazing this is it and she sat on my lit knee and asked me to introduce her to this guy across the room

and I was like that's where the friendship started and then for years that's when the 12, 15 years was we were kind of part of the same friend group but we were never close friends We always had this kind of chemistry for one of a better word

that whenever we saw each other, there was something alive, and we would be it parties, but we were always in relationships. So it wasn't a close friendship. It was one that it was a... It was waiting to unfold. It was waiting, yeah. But then many years later, it was known within our group of friends that this chemistry existed

and was it ever going to be acted on. and literally when I was 30, I think, or 29, I was at a friend's wedding, and Hannah's always late, and she was meant to be one of the kind of bridesmaids. I was at this wedding in this church, and it was a half of ten minutes into the wedding. There's the door slammed open.

My mate nudged me, and Hannah came running in late to the wedding. And so even that night we got together, and I thought it was, you know, and I texted her a couple days later. And all our friends were like at last, why did it take 15 years? And I texted the next day. No, I left it two days. I'd learned from my years. My early, don't say I love you in the first.

Two days and then you said, I love you. And it's always been you. And then she didn't respond. And I was like, see, I knew it. It's like this fickle quality. Anyway, year went by. Wow. A whole year.

Yeah, yeah. because I wasn't going to go back. I wasn't going to glutton for punishment. And a year later, this friend of us, Laura, was like, Eddie, why did you never get in touch with Hannah? I was like, I did. I texted her. She said what number?

I said this number. She said, that's not her numbers. Oh, no. So we... You had the wrong number for 15 years. This is like the number. But then it was while, I remember it clearly, because I just rehearsed Lemma's Arab, the movie.

And I had four days off before we started filming. And I was single. I'd booked to go to Florence. And I, you know, to sort of drink double espresso and chain smoke. You know, write poetry. Is this really? Yeah, that's great. All the above.

And anyway, I texted Hannah on this right number. And I said, you know, you don't want to go to things. theater do you? And she sort of said, yeah, let's do that. We went to the theater and that night went out for supper and it was extraordinary because it was the first time. It was someone that I'd known for 15 years, felt, knew me for exactly who I was rather than, you know, that sort of, I'm speaking myself, but that version of a person you can put on when you're trying to start dating and trying to be the sort of best version of me. So there was no bullshit. She kind of could see straight through all of that.

So, and it was just, anyway, that evening went pretty wonderfully. And I said, drunk later, I was like, you don't want to go to Florence next week, do you? And she said, you don't mean that. And I said, well, kind of do. And so the next day, I sent my EasyJet booking form, which is, do you know what EasyJet is? It's like, so Jet blue, it's really well. And exit. sort of, yeah, no frills.

I think I used it once. Exactly. I never went back. It's a no frills, very convenient, Ellen. Anyway, she let me stew for a few hours, and then she sent her booking form. And even then, I knew if this relationship was to have any legs that we had to meet on the plane rather than at an airport.

And I was right because I got on the plane the next day, and I was sitting next to these three nuns and a monk from Ireland. The plane was absolutely rammed. And there was just one seat next to me, three. And the captain was like, ladies of gentlemen, we're waiting for one person. And kind of arrived. No way. Late and has remained late for the rest of our relationship.

But that's, and so, yeah, our first proper date was where you are. Oh, of course. So sweet. Eddie, that's so incredible. That's a long wind. You didn't know. No, no. No, no.

No. That's great. Eddie, I wish we had you for three hours. You're such an amazing storyteller. We do want to transition to your career and just to be mindful of time. My mother. Career, smear. This is what you're saying.

It's amazing. Just to be mindful of time. I think let's start with Day of the Jackal. We got screeners. And what's that to me is just I couldn't stop thinking about how much time you must have spent in the makeup chair because you have spent in the makeup chair because you've so many disguises. So my question for you is, do you have a ritual?

How do you stay sane doing hours and hours and hours of makeup? How do I say sane is probably a more existential question? The, I, first thing in the morning, you're right, prosthetics take a long, long time. And you do have to go to a, and I don't know if you've done many. Not that level, I've done like, you know, the bruises and the swelling. They take a while. They take a while. Like an hour.

But, I mean, you're drinking like three hours. This was, yeah, three or four hours. But you kind of, I'd never done prosthetics at this level. And you zen out and you then put in your ear pods and you listen to a podcast until they start doing your ears. And then your ear pods get stuck. And, but I find it actually a really good way into the day. The other thing about when you, in David Jackal, he's at the early scene, he's transformed. into this kind of 75-year-old German chainsmogger.

And seeing the layers of those things appear is actually kind of helpful for getting into character because it's not just plonked on you. It kind of, you emerge from it. And the other thing that was lovely in the day of the jackal is, whereas in moments in theory of everything where I'd work with some prosthetics, you're playing the person.

Here, you know, the prosthetics is part of the jackals' toolkit and he's doing it himself. So actually, whenever, I don't know how you are, but whenever I was sort of feeling, you know, insecure about any of these characters that I was playing as the Jackal, I had to keep reminding myself that the Jackal is an actor and he's doing the best that he can do. So if there are any kind of faults there,

you know, blame it on the Jackal's lack of acting capability rather than your own. That's funny. Another thing we have in Kamenetti is that we play Babyface assassins. Babyface assassins. Yeah. She's not up a club.

But one thing that I, you know, sometimes I do struggle to, hmm, believe the mortal stakes, you know, when the stakes are mortal. Episode after episode after episode, we've done in the end 50 episodes, you know? Yeah. So that's a lot of mortal stakes. Of being like, there's a body in the trunk. There's a body out here. There's a bit, but I love you.

Yeah. And and and, but my thing is that if I ever don't believe it, well, you know what? This dude actually doesn't always believe it. He's lying. Yeah. So that I, that, I understand that. It's a strange, there's a strange mental space when you're playing somebody who is, um, a sociopath, actually. I think that's the point.

I mean, it was interesting. I did a film last year called the, um, the goodness playing a man with Charlie Cullen, who, you know, is a real, um, maybe the biggest mass murderer in this country. and trying to get into the psychology of that and the kind of the cruelty of it, but the coldness of it, and also weirdly, clearly, the humanity that this guy had to his friends.

He seemed like a normal... The only way I can reconcile those two things, and it's the same with the Day of the Jackal, albeit a completely fictional character, is that there is a polarity to them. It's two different people. And yet those chinks when those two people reconcile with each other are the kind of intriguing moment. You spend a lot of time silent in this.

I would imagine, is it the most silent role you've ever played? Of course, I've seen the early episodes. It may be a change. I think it probably is, although strangely playing Stephen Hawking for the latter part of his life. when he was like I would speak was a lot about, that's true. About, although he would speak through his computer, there was a lot of silence, but I love that.

I love, I hate words. I do too, that, too, guys. Always with a script, I'm like, lose it, losing. Yeah, and I love those writers also who really, because I don't know how you find, but there's this whole thing quite often with scripts where it's almost like there's the producer's version, which is the version written that tells the story over it,

and then there's the version in which, things are filleted out and have faith in actors to kind of communicate that stuff. But I really enjoyed that about this character. The kind of enigma of him was thrilling. Yeah, I suspected that. I actually looked at the time code. The first time you speak is at 22 minutes into the first episode, which is a long time.

And then you don't say much. Aside from practicing the German. Yeah, that's the English bit. Sorry, you do say, you do like mutter German. I'm muddered German. The way you're saying that, I'm muddered German. I can't tell you how fucking long. It took me to sort of muttering.

It's good. It's good. It was so strange. It was so strange. Acting in a language you don't speak a word of. Because what's weird is you're playing this character who's German. But I had an amazing language coach who one called Simone. And she would teach me the German.

But you would also have to go, look, the way I kind of want the character to say it is, If it was in English, it would be like, oh, these fucking people, I can't do it. And so you'd have to rely on her for the music of the phrasing or most of the words as well as the pronunciation of the words. It was an interesting exclaimed. Well, what I love is that you kind of see that exercise in the opening scene.

Again, this thing of playing a sociopath transparently, which is interesting, you know, you see the jackal rehearsing, which I love, you know. I can't remember the words, but it's a very jarring opening scene. It's so, it's, yeah, there's an interesting musicality to it as you're like, and listening to, I suppose, what would have been a recording of that man's real voice? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

But it was, what was strange about it is I learned the German in my voice, which was sort of Kainazak, then suddenly when you've got this prosthetic on, and he's this chainsmoker, he's kind of, kind of, it was down in this, weird place that looked completely odd until you had a had the prosthetic on but the the idea of performance the jackal as an actor was one of the things that i found it was that the whole show was an actor's playground in many ways i watched the good nurse uh soon after it came out and i thought it was an incredible film i actually went back and looked in my texts because i remember telling everyone i knew about it have you watched it have you seen the good nurse have you seen the good nurse

And I think I had texted five friends and two group chats. Have you seen it? Let's talk about it. I thought it was incredible and you played him so well. But I think depicting true crime is so tricky because there's like a balance that you have to strike without, you know, like you described the polarity, trying to depict the polarity of a person or at least using that in your preparation for the character. everyone in the story is a real person, a whole person with lots of different facets to them. But you want to depict it in a way that doesn't glamorize the perpetrator but also doesn't dishonor the victims. And it's a very fine line. I think the good nurse really struck that balance. And I guess my question is two parts. First, how do you think the team and yourself were able to

strike that balance? Like what if you have any insight into how that happened? And then also what you think about the sort of rise now in true crime dramatizations healthy you know it's it's so intriguing to hear that because it was something that I've wrestled with thought a lot about for for a couple of years that the the appeal of that script was twofold it was it was the director to Beas Lindholm, who is this utterly brilliant Danish director, who has made some brilliant Danish movies based on true events, but that have a quasi-documentarian quality to them, that are not, that are about displaying the events rather than insinuating or evoking kind of, I don't know, an indulgence in the watching of it. It's, it's a, so I knew that it was in his hands

And secondly, the script by Christy Wilson-Kerns, the piece is about Charlie Cullen, but it's actually about this extraordinary woman who was able to sort of reveal him and pull him in. But the main villain of the piece is actually the infrastructure. It's the hospitals that moved him on. This guy who they were conscious was killing people, and they moved him on because they didn't want to deal with

liable of all the law cases and the idea that that how insidious that is that and i felt that that there was dispassionate quality to the film in which those um the villains of the piece were were twofold both charlie but also the system and and um and i felt that it was delivered with that with the observational quality of that rather than something that was emotionally indulgent I think that's actually really important

in what we're calling true crime because what does feel sort of maybe unhelpful at a cultural level is how indulgent it can be but then if we're telling stories about this there's a depth of human nature that is more dispassionate. I think that's where it can be more useful

and more insightful. And also, weirdly, the thing that I found interesting about the goodness is at the end, this character who has appeared kind of gentle and kind and done these continuously horrific things, he's asked why he does it, and he says, because they didn't stop me.

And so there's no kind of revelation. I think quite often in human nature and true crime is looking for the catalyst, like what is it that makes someone behave like this with the idea being that it's one moment of trauma or one one key that alleviates and opens up people's behaviour, but I think human beings are more complex than that. And certainly in the good nurse,

I think there were people that watched it going, wait, I wanted to know why. Obviously that is a real life story in which hundreds of people's lives were taken and families were affected, but the human need to know why is, I think, kind of at the core of our intrigue with true crime. Yeah.

Eddie, sorry, we're just jumping around because you've done so many incredible things. Let's go to Cabaret. So you, I mean, there's so much we could ask about Cabaret, but one thing that stood out to me in doing research is that there was a bit of backlash when you were cast in the West End, cabaret, and you shared that it created a little bit of a crisis of common, confidence in you. Yeah.

And you seem to be someone who prepares very rigorously for roles, but I'm curious, are you grateful for the backlash? Did it affect the way you played the role, the way you prepared for it?

Do you think you would have gone about it differently if people had just been thrilled from the jump? That's a great question. Firstly, I managed to sneak in last night to see Cabaret on Broadway. The production that I was in,

which Adam Lambert is now doing, and it is breathtaking. He is so extraordinary as all the cast are. But you're right, look, I have a history of parts that, parts that I've played that have been problematic in some of those choices, and I've spent a lot of time ruminating on those things and wondering what I would do differently.

I was, when it came to cabaret, I didn't take the part, I had learnt my lesson and I didn't take the part on without knowing exactly what I was doing. And the thing with Cabaret is the musical is based on Isherwood's book Goodbye to Berlin which tells the story of the two protagonists,

Sally Bowles and Cliff Bradshaw. But the MC doesn't exist. So the part that I played in London and New York was the MC. The MC was a character. that was created for the musical by Joel Gray and Hal Prince, and it was to weave the kind of narrative together. But as far as what he exists as on the page, there is no character description for him.

No one talks about him. He doesn't exist in the book. And now he has been played iconically by queer actors, absolutely brilliantly. And certainly, for example, in the Alan Cumming version at the end of the piece, the piece. The MC, his costume is taken off and he's revealed in a concentration camp outfit with a pink

triangle, which was incredibly moving and was incredibly powerful on Broadway, and I think had sort of made people go, this is a gay character, and so I absolutely understood the questioning of that. But actually, my take on it, rather than the MC being the victim, was the MC as perpetrator. And this idea that in my sake on the emcee, he starts in this world. He's kind of based on some of those characters from, you know, German expressionist movies. He can lull people in, as those cabarets did, and skewer audiences, people who've paid a lot of money to kind of be slapped in the face a bit, you know. And then gradually over the evening, this kind of puckish figure rises into the,

kind of Aryan perpetrator. And I think when I was cast, people assumed that I was going to be doing and because of the work that I'd done previously that I was taking an iconically queer role. And whilst I absolutely understand that discussion,

I also think that that character is descriptionless and deserves any form of interpretation. I found it, I was upset by the backlash, but I went when it was announced, but I had faith in my own take on the role. And I sort of had to wait for, I suppose what I was saying is please just wait and see the performance before you make judgment on it. And we'll be right back. Hey everyone, it's Leah Greenberg. And Ezra Levin, you might know us as two of the lead organizers of the No King.

protests. We're also the co-founders of Indivisible, the grassroots movement organizing against Trump's regime. And this is What's the Plan? Your weekly guide to the state of our democracy and how we fight back. This is not canned talking points. It's a real live discussion space for the pro-democracy movement. We wrestle with strategy together. We take your top-voted questions in real-time, and we talk about the most impactful actions we can take right now. Democracy is a participatory sport. The fascist win when we sit on the sidelines. What's the plan is about how we get into the game?

What's the plan available Friday, January 23rd, wherever you get your podcasts? Subscribe, recruit, discuss, organize, and win. That's the plan. Given how much you invest, and I mean, I love the way you're reflecting on this. It's really beautiful and really inspiring to hear somebody who just, you know, care so much. And then has had the opportunity to dig into stuff where you can care that much. And it's just, I mean, it's really lovely to hear. When I read once that you, and correct me if I'm wrong, but it's the Internet.

Is it true that on the set, you described at some point rediscovering a love for, maybe it was film acting on the good nurse through your sort of partnership with Jessica Chastain? Yeah. What do you feel you had lost? And maybe what are some of the reasons why

and what were you rediscovering? I think I was rediscovering of freedom, honestly. I feel that, and I think it was cabaret and the process of prepping for cabaret and throwing myself into different worlds of going back to, I went to like clowning school in Paris. I went and worked with this brilliant choreographer, Julia Chang, people who physically, vocally took you to different places

that made me realize that what happens with acting is you work hard, you audition for everything you can, you desperately try to make a career. If you can, you get a job, you do it, you get pigeonholed into different places, depending on what... I know nothing about that moment. I look back on my work and there was definitely like a

I had a sort of Elizabethan period like any film with Elizabeth you've gotten some good pigeonholes I guess I don't get wrong I'm not complaining about but yes you've had many pigeon holes which means there's no pigeonhole

but it got to a point I think where I just I was sitting on I wasn't necessarily inspired by the by the process and then honestly it was working with Tobias Lin-Human, Jess Chastain,

a brilliant cinematographer called Jodie Lee Lipes who did this thing, went on the first day on the goodness, I arrived on set, and I was in this corridor in a hospital, and the set was virtually pitch black, but you could see nothing. And then I looked in the camera, and it was much lighter,

and you could, and there was a kind of, he was, Jody was filming it that way to create this kind of graininess, almost like a film texture. And it was amazing, it meant that you didn't see the crew and you didn't see... So that odd thing that I always find with filming

is the first kind of mental leap that you have to take is you're having an intimate chat and there are 20 people's standing here. It was... Our brilliant crew became kind of a recessive or disappeared. I remember years ago doing a pilot for an HBO thing which Barry Aykroyd shot and Barry shoots on these long lenses from miles away.

and it was the most wonderful experience imaginable because we could be shooting this scene without the feeling of being scrutinized and I don't know how you find but every time I mean my show is never seen it it's the cameras are I'm acting with an X on the map that was fantastic piece for me right yeah exactly

it's a different skill isn't it a different skill it's a kind of and it's innately more technical and it's bloody hard yes in my current role I feel like I have become such a technical actor that I'm constantly thinking about lighting I mean I directed an episode so it sort of

ended up paying off in that sense but it's yeah that what you're describing right there sounds really lovely so Penn talks about the directing oh they don't want to hear this no I do actually please I but I do want to hear about how did you find that first moment

when you because I've thought about that well and but like would you direct a you'd probably direct a film right I mean you direct something that you would act in I don't I don't know. That's my question is how did you, what was that first moment like? I mean, for the sake of brevity, I would love to give you the, as an in-depth answer as you as you want.

But for the sake of our podcast and time, I will try to give you something clothed in the garment of brevity. Let me pause for a while. Now, it's so because the role is so technical, because the show is called you and I'm at the center of it, everything is from my perspective. my voiceover is like 90% of the spoken words I am often acting with X's on a matbox because the camera has to be right here because the whole thing is glued together by like my face and thoughts happen

it is already like a producerial editorial, technical, I work more with the camera crew than I work with other actors like literally. I have a different crew and cast every season like it is a role that is so uncommonly central to the apparatus that directing was like oh no this is actually kind of like

I almost would rather do this if the GIF, and what I did not get was time to prep. Yeah. Adequates on the prep, I couldn't watch playback. So it was like I was doing everything very intuitively. Yeah. Never do it again like that. However, it was very interesting.

And I was in London, by the way, I love, I love London. Wait, but also time to prep, but also presumably time to edit. Because this is why I don't know. On these shows, it's so, my show, I found so relentless. Yes. Yeah, yeah. Television, even when you're doing it at the prestige level, time is so hard to come by you're just doing so much and so little time

I was editing on LA time in London so I'd come home from a full day and then edit on over Zoom but then you know in television this is the thing you're not you're not the same you're shepherding something as opposed to generating it the way you are in film you know as a director in television you are you have an easier

job it's a little more utilitarian so so I you know you get to leave your stamp you get you get to have certain moments where it's like this is the essence of what we do and that's awesome and then a lot of it is kind of facilitating things that the crew already knows how to shoot the show you know yeah i'd love to have a chat a proper chat with you about the difference between the american system and the british system i think there are quite a few there are some significant differences we had we had trouble doing our show in london we were we were like a month over in the end wow yeah for a lot of

reasons for reasons that are where you staying uh uh laddorbrook grove most of where I live. Yeah. I love it. Apart from being away from my family for so long, I loved it there. I loved it, loved it, loved it. It's a great city, I've got to say.

I've been away. I was in Hungary doing Dare the Jackal for eight months, and I had four days off and came to New York where I've been for it. So I've just got home, he says, from New York. But I just got back to London, and it's, yeah, it's a beautiful, beautiful place. I sort of forget how wonderful it is. You mentioned the differences between America and America, American film and British film.

And I'm curious, my mom is English, my dad is American, and so I know, it goes without saying that there's such cultural differences between the two places just generally. And I'm curious for you growing up in England and then also, you know, being in Hollywood, what are the cultural differences that you had to get used to? I don't know if that cultural differences or they're my... But I think there's a kind of, there's an odd thing with the sort of English politeness, you know, that manifests itself in actually we don't quite say what we mean and then we repress it and bitch behind, you know, behind your back that we haven't said what we wanted to say and can't you read what I'm saying, you know, by the subtext with which I said it rather than in America. Everyone says it's sort of up front.

But then... I even noticed when you said the first two questions you at least told us that you proposed to your wife, but you said, you don't want to go to the theater, do you? And then you said, you don't want to go to Florence, do you? That's true. Do you? You're like, no, you know.

I mean, how much do you pay for therapy? Like, you couldn't be my dad in this. But it's also, what's weird, honestly, as a British actor, though, is you go, fuck, you then read when you start coming over and you depress and people are like, oh, it's English, he's sort of charming. And you go like, oh shit.

Like, is that part of your schick? You know? It's the only reason you've made it. Seriously, genuinely. Don't get me there. The act is so alluring. Like, you go, but I am

trying as I get older to sort of get rid of it because there's a difference between politeness and being disingenuous. You don't strike me as, well, I don't necessarily. So my wife is British, but she moved here when she was 12. Right. So she has a very, like, she has a very un-British, like, sincerity and earnestness.

And, like, she's so open and warm in that way, in a way that's like, I actually kind of thought she was like South America when I first met her. I didn't know what that was. And then after having spent some time there, I definitely have more of a sense of what you're saying. But, you know, I have to say you, this self-consciousness that you just mentioned. I mean, you didn't use that word, but like, what strikes me is that you and your early 20s, you know, coming out of, coming out of like boarding school and the experiences you had there, I did really want to hear about your thesis with this color blue and like that. That was, we can't get into that. Your lack of self-consciousness that you, at least between those moments of action and cut, because I understand that who you are between action and cut is not this person you necessarily ever get to be anywhere else, you know. there's something very special about those moments.

And the best thing we can do as actors is just strip away all that we've prepared and thought of, would say, no, I prep, I prep just exhaustively. So I'm really with you there, too. We have just so many similarities, it's uncanny. But that lack of self-consciousness, like seeing you say in The Good Shepherd, you know, how old were you there?

24? 24, yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, you know, you're standing alongside some of our most iconic American actors, and that's its own just, I mean, you're like on a film set, those differences. You have this, like, beautiful lack of self-consciousness, which it just, I think that's what, you know, all the other things make you great.

But that to me is like, without that, without that, you can't be present and you can't do what we do. And I just want to commend you on like, you know, whatever the wild insecurities you must have, which everybody has, between action and cut, you at least know how to, how to strip it away. Thank you very.

And it means a lot because it's, it's, I think of, you know, adolescence. Like for me, the moment of adolescence was, was the moment of a switch going off into self-consciousness. Exactly. And I hate it. And I can, like, why I brought up that sort of piano thing was I just, I remember there being a period where you didn't think about making friends. I remember that being a thing when I arrived at age 13 at school. and suddenly having to think about conversation. Until then, everything, everything was on instinct.

And my kids are six and eight. And it's so glorious to see that. And I don't know what that is that chafes away at it. But there are definitely moments, those moments on screen, like the reason I'd love acting and there's an addiction to it is for those millisecond moments, I think, that happen maybe once every three years in which there is a moment of complete freedom,

A total lack of self-consciousness, and that's the drug. Like, that for me is the thing that brings you back and back. But I love that you think I've conned you into thinking that I'm not self-conscious for a lot of time. Well, no, no, no. I mean, I know that you are. I just think that you have a utility of stripping in a way enough so that you, so that I think that's what makes great actors great. I think it could be as simple as that. It's the self-consciousness between action and cut.

So you were bringing it back to that time of adolescence, which we love it. So thematic, that's when it switches on. So if you could go back to 12-year-old Eddie, what would you say or do? If anything. And this is our last question. Yeah, I think, you know, I've talked about not caring

what people think, you know, when I was at school. And I think that's true to an extent. in that I put up some pretty hard barriers to go, I don't care, you can throw the mockery at me, you know, I don't give a shit. But I actually think that is when the strictures started coming out, and I think it was probably exacerbated by being at an English boarding school. I kind of wish that I had, that art of not giving a fuck had really been more potent than.

and because I'll not forget when I was prepping for cabaret, I went and spent a day moving with this choreographer, Julia Cheng, and I really can't dance, but she is this extraordinary dancer who specialised in street dancing and whacking and vogueing, and I was terrified to go into this room with her, because I was what the hell, and she just brought movement out of me in a way in which, if anyone had watched, it would have been the most humiliating thing

in the world but I felt free and and I hadn't felt that feeling since I was since before adolescence before that moment of and and I think that freedom is is something that we can all aspire to in some ways but that's probably what I would say I have no idea what it was that I would say it's a lot of lucious and weird Eddie I just want to say I think you're physically the furthest away a guest has ever been. And at the risk of embarrassing you, I do want to say that the whole interview, I've had this, like, been flooded with this feeling of feeling so lucky to be in your presence because you just seem like an extraordinary person. So even though you're like, physically far away, I can like feel that. Thank you so much. It's been a real, real treat for me.

And I'm sorry not to meet you guys in person. I'm very jealous. You're in Florence. Say hi to the Arno for me. Go and sit on one, go into Santa Spirito and have a peach dacery. Oh, you. Okay, I know you've been here because that is the best square. That's the best piazza. It was so nice to meet you. Thank you so much, mate. Thank you. Thank you so much. Thank you, guys.

You can watch the Day of the Jackal on Peacock, and you can keep up with him online. No, you can't. He's off socials, but go watch Day of the Jackal. We are so excited that you can now listen to Podcrush, ad free on Amazon music. In fact, you can listen to any episode of Podcrushed ad free right now on Amazon Music with an Amazon Prime membership. How do you react to an intro? I always find it quite cringing.

I have to see, I don't like doing it live because you know what it feels like. Yes, and I hate when people list my Oscar nominations as well. I know that's the problem you have. It's the one I get to. Also my BAFTAs, also my Olivier's, also my Tonys. It's infuriating. It's humiliating. Like, Ken, just please focus on the work.

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I'm Gretchen Rubin, the number one bestselling author of the Happiness Project, bringing you fresh insights and practical solutions in the Happier with Gretchen Rubin podcast. My co-host and Happiness Guinea Pig is my sister, Elizabeth Craft. That's me, Elizabeth Craft, a TV writer and producer in Hollywood. Join us as we explore ideas and hacks about cultivating happiness and good habits. Check out Happier with Gretchen Rubin from Lemonata Media.