Warm Bodies’ Hoult ready to go viral
Nicholas Hoult was notable, but now he’s on the verge of becoming unforgettable. “I have had some really cool jobs,” admitted the 23-year-old London-based actor smiling at his understatement during a Toronto interview.
For instance, Hoult plays Jack in the special effects action fantasy Jack the Giant Slayer, out in March.
He has a co-starring part in the much anticipated George Miller reboot, Mad Max: Fury Road, set for release next year.
And he’s preparing to bring his Beast back to the big screen in the sequel, X-Men: Days of Future Past, which will begin filming later in the year.
Soon, he’ll be making a name for himself as R, the misunderstood zombie in the droll thriller Warm Bodies, which opens Friday.
Call these coming attractions Phase 2 of his young career after introducing himself by portraying the waif in About a Boy, followed by the rebel teen role in the acclaimed Brit TV series, Skins.
As occupational hazards would have it, Hoult was also famously dating X-Men: First Class co-star Jennifer Lawrence before the couple split recently.
Meanwhile, back at Warm Bodies, Hoult’s R is an undead lost boy wandering around a post-apocalyptic America left in ruin after a decimating plague wipes out most of the world’s population. Things change for R when he consumes the brain of an unfortunate human teen and begins to fall for the dead kid’s girlfriend, Julie (Teresa Palmer), whom he eventually saves from a pack of zombies.
Based on the popular Isaac Marion young adult novel, the Jonathan Levine movie version attempts to present a delicate balance of humour and horror. And that’s exactly why Hoult gravitated to the Levine script.
“I liked the character, and the screenplay made me laugh, and I thought it was well written and moved along at a good pace,” said Hoult. Certainly, the comedy-drama approach is difficult to pull off.
“I knew it was going to be tricky, but I trusted everybody involved and especially the director,” he said of Levine who worked the same storytelling magic with his previous films, The Wackness and 50/50.
Despite the complications of Warm Bodies, Hoult refused to over-think his portrayal of the zombie who starts falling in love while showing all the human awkwardness that accompanies the emotion.
“I think every boy knows the experience of wanting to talk to a girl and not knowing what to say,” said Hoult.
After Warm Bodies, there is Jack the Giant Slayer.
“It’s a big family swashbuckling adventure,” he said of the performance-capture epic. “I play Jack, the farm boy trying to save the princess in the land where the giants live in the sky.”
In the fourth Mad Max flick, Hoult plays Mad Max’s warrior sidekick Nux, living in a different sort of post-apocalyptic world compared to Warm Bodies. Meanwhile, X-Men: Days of Future Past is scheduled to begin filming in the spring and will include an appearance by Hugh Jackman’s Wolverine.
“I like making different choices, and I think I have,” he said. “It’s fun to take risks.”