BEN WHISHAW
He’s James Bond’s go-to gadget guy Q. He’s the voice of Paddington Bear. And he’s one of the most celebrated British actors of the last 25 years, specialising in torn, tortured souls. Total Film sits down with Ben Whishaw to discuss his stellar career and his most committed performance yet, in Surge…
I COULDN’T DO SOMETHING UNLESS, SOMEHOW OR ANOTHER, I LOVED IT
It’s 7.30pm on a cold Tuesday evening in early March and Ben Whishaw has just returned to his home in East London after a long day’s shoot. He’s delighted to be working again after almost a year off in the pandemic, bar some distinguished voice work – “The Adventures Of Paddington really kept me going in lockdown; it kept me sane.” But he’s not yet had his tea (marmalade sandwiches?) and he’s clearly famished.
“I’m filming this TV series called This Is Going To Hurt, which is based on a book by Adam Kay, who was a junior doctor,” he manages before cracking open a bag of Kettle Chips and a pot of hummus. He dips a crisp and flaps his hands in apology as he pauses to chew, then jiggles his laptop to better position himself within the Zoom frame, his dark hoodie and trademark tousled hair backdropped by a plain white wall. “And his book, also called This Is Going To Hurt, is his diaries, basically, from his time as a junior doctor,” Whishaw continues, loading up another crisp. “It’s about the NHS.”
Thankfully it’s a big bag of Kettle Chips because we’ve got a lot to get through – a celebrated career in theatre, TV and film that spans 26 years. A shy child, Whishaw found that acting allowed him to be more extroverted, and he joined the Big Spirit Youth Theatre in Hitchin, Hertfordshire. Accolades quickly followed when he played holocaust survivor Primo Levi in the troupe’s adaptation of Levi’s memoir If This Is A Man. The play garnered five-star reviews at the 1995 Edinburgh Festival. Whishaw was 15 at the time.
A British Independent Film Award for Most Promising Newcomer followed in 2001, for his titular role in film drama My Brother Tom, and he was nominated for an Olivier Award for his portrayal of Hamlet in Trevor Nunn’s 2004 adaptation at the Old Vic.
“The kind of evening of which legends are made,” wrote The Telegraph, and his career ever since is making good on that claim: film highlights include Enduring Love, Layer Cake, Perfume: The Story Of A Murderer, I’m Not There, Bright Star, The Zero Theorem, Lilting, Paddington and Paddington 2, The Lobster, Mary Poppins Returns, The Personal History Of David Copperfield, and, of course, playing gadget-master Q in Skyfall, Spectre and (out later this year, finally, hopefully) No Time To Die.
Notable TV work takes in Nathan Barley, Criminal Justice, The Hour, London Spy, Season 4 of Fargo, and A Very English Scandal. In the last, his portrayal of Norman Scott, the spurned lover of Liberal Party leader Jeremy Thorpe, won him a Golden Globe and a second Bafta, after a previous win for his Richard II in The Hollow Crown.
And now lands one of his best performances of the lot, in low-budget British thriller Surge. Whishaw charges every frame with radioactive energy as Joseph, a mild-mannered airport security guard who one day revolts against his hemmed in, invisible life and spends the next 24 hours busting out of societal strictures to do whatever the hell he pleases – including robbing banks.
“I hope it’s thrilling,” says Whishaw of what might be described as a British Falling Down. And thrilling it most certainly is, with debut director Aneil Karia locking us into Joseph’s frenzied mindset as the jostling camera struggles to keep up with his fast and furious actions.
Yes, there’s a lot to talk about. Whishaw dips a Kettle Chip and off he goes…
Surge came out of a 2013 short film you did with writer/director Aneil Karia called Beat, in which a man pushes the boundaries between conventions and impulse…
I had a great experience doing Beat. It surprised us both how much we enjoyed making that short film. We didn’t know each other and we did it off the cuff in two days and it went really deep, somehow. We kept talking, became friends, and then Aneil mentioned to me that he had another idea that had kind of grown out of Beat.
How did you get inside Joseph’s head?
Well, Aneil and I just talked a lot about Joseph and how he was experiencing his life, and then it was really just a case of doing it. As much as possible, when it came to the shoot, I didn’t meet any of the other actors before we started filming, so we were just thrown together and we discovered what was going to happen. And then we would do another take and refine it. But Aneil was great at allowing the unexpected to happen.
The film has a ferocious energy. Did shooting on bustling London streets among real people provide the fuel you needed?
Oh yeah, it was amazing. It feels like a dream now because our lives are the complete opposite of that [in lockdown]. But it was July, it was Tottenham, it was the middle of the week, the streets were heaving with people, there were buses, it stank. [laughs] It was so alive and so insane.
Surge can be read as Joseph having a psychotic break, or simply following his impulses to achieve a liberation of sorts…
Well, Aneil was very clear that he didn’t want the film to be something that necessarily only made the viewer feel bad, and that there be a kind of euphoria. It’s a trip, and in some degree, at least, joyous. So, yes, I don’t see it as being necessarily about a psychotic break. Other people watching it
can think what they like. But for me, it wasn’t at all how I thought about Joseph. I think the film leaves it open to the viewer to decide what they think of what Joseph’s done. I love that, personally. You’re not told… It’s not teaching you a lesson about mental health, although that is, of course, somewhere in there as part of the experience. You’re left to respond.
Not enough films give viewers that option these days.
Yeah, I definitely feel that. So hopefully a viewer feels activated. And I suppose, in that sense, it’s provocative, and it will be a divisive film, I’m sure. I know from talking to Aneil, it’s already been that way [Surge played at the Berlin, Sundance and Glasgow film festivals; Whishaw won an acting award at Sundance]. You get vastly different reactions, which I love.
You give such an intense, committed performance. You’re constantly pacing, grimacing. Could you shake off the tics when you got home each night?
[Laughs] Can you imagine if I’d not been able to switch it off? I don’t have that problem. It’s work, and then it’s home. But we only had five weeks to make the film. It was so much fun to make, but it was very focused, so I just remember being exhausted and going home and sleeping, then waking up and trying to be ready again. God, it’s so weird to think back to that time.
People in lockdown will relate to Joseph breaking free. Did you feel liberated playing him?
Yes, I guess I did. I think one thing that’s happening in the film is someone moving from experiencing the world up here [taps his forehead] – overthought, and knotty thinking, and trapped, basically, by his mind – and moving into experiencing the world in his body. How things feel. That was really wonderful to do. And to experience, for me, as a person. It was truly one of the most fulfilling things I’ve ever done. Why did I love the experience of making this film so much? One, because I was making it with friends, in a small group, where we could do what we wanted. But also it felt really personal in a way.
Aneil is obviously a talent. As someone who’s worked with several auteurs over the years, do you think he’s going to be a filmmaker of real note?
Yeah, I really do, actually. I think that because I recognise the thing in him that I’ve seen in other people, of singlemindedness, and a kind of real clarity about what he’s interested in and what he’s not interested in. Auteurs have a way of seeing the world which is particular to them, and the work they make is an expression of that. I just know that’s Aneil. For an actor, it’s incredibly confidencegiving, because you know that even if no one likes it [laughs], it’s something that’s been done with absolute integrity, and kind of a purity. It’s just very thrilling, because then you can just launch yourself in. You don’t have to be frightened.
You’ve worked with Todd Haynes, Yorgos Lanthimos, Jane Campion, Terry Gilliam, Sam Mendes… how much does the director steer your choosing of which projects to take on?
It’s really important to me. I feel very lucky because these are things that have just sort
IT WAS TRULY ONE OF THE MOST FULFILLING THINGS I’VE EVER DONE
of come my way, you know? I feel incredibly excited when these people come to me and offer me things. And I love anyone who pushes me someplace else that I haven’t been before, who has a strange perspective on things, who’s got a language of filmmaking that’s not conforming to the ordinary run-of-the-mill stuff. I love that energy. [Pause] I do also think, hopefully, you do one piece of work, you do another, and you start to build up a body of work behind you.
Was there a point in your career where you stopped having to audition for roles?
Yeah. I do still audition for things, but lots of the things that I’ve done in the last 10 years have been people asking me. It’s really nice. I’m very blessed. And it’s a real honour to feel like you’re going into something as a collaborator, as another creative person, with your own mind. But I love to audition, too, because then you feel like you’ve really won the role. And that’s satisfying.
So are you at a place where you feel relaxed about work coming in, and that your days of scrabbling for gigs are long behind you?
This is the thing… you always slightly… you never take anything for granted. I think almost every actor I’ve spoken to feels the same. You never know what’s coming next, or if anything will come next. I appreciate every one of these opportunities so much.
THE PADDINGTON FILMS ARE BEAUTIFULLY MADE, I THINK
Throughout your career, you’ve been drawn to playing troubled characters. Is it just more gratifying to deal with complexity?
Yeah, I mean… I feel like, who isn’t troubled on some level? And isn’t that why lots of people want to make a piece of work, or tell a story, to explore the real stuff of life? I really love anyone who wants to get into the nitty-gritty of it, because that’s the thing that gets my blood going.
How do you find playing real-life characters? You’ve played Keith Richards, Herman Melville, John Keats, Bob Dylan...
I think it’s different. I think you have a responsibility when it’s someone’s real life that you’re entrusted with. It’s different how you approach those real-life characters, depending on the nature of the film. And, to a degree, what material you can get your hands on regarding them. But they eventually become fictional again anyway, because they’re in a film, which is a piece of fiction. So with John Keats and working with Jane [Campion, Bright Star], that’s Jane’s John Keats. It’s not an academic’s version or a historian’s version. It’s very much how Jane felt about that man. You have to work with what the film is doing. But I love the research – reading, listening, watching things. That’s very exciting to me.
How about playing Paddington, or Q in the Bond movies? Is it nice to have a break from all the seriousness, to have some fun?
Yes. I have to say, I’ve had such a wonderful time doing those Bond films. Really… such a pleasure. Because it’s fantasy. [laughs] It hasn’t really got anything to do with real life, but that’s what people need. That’s what people want when they go and watch that. That said, someone like Sam [Mendes] doing a Bond film feels like a character study, in some ways. That’s the way he approaches it.
Was it fun from the start, or did you feel the weight of history on your shoulders when you first slipped on the lab coat?
I think I’ve got quite good at blocking out those voices. Whenever you do a revival of a play in the theatre, for example, you know that you’re going to be watched by an audience of people who’ve likely seen the play before, sometimes many times. So I’m quite good at quickly going, “I’m not going to think about that.” It has to be your thing. You just have to own it.
That said, when you came back to the role on Spectre, did you feel more at ease? Did you feel, ‘This is mine now’?
I think there’s no question about it, because people liked Skyfall. I think everyone felt a little more relaxed.
How has your relationship with Daniel Craig changed over the years? You worked together several times before
Are you firm buddies now?
Skyfall.
Yeah, to some degree. I just feel very relaxed with him. I think he’s bloody brilliant and collaborative and creative, and someone I just really like. Sometimes it’s not about being best buddies or hanging around with each other, or even