‘Fired from many a
Eddie Redmayne might be an Oscar winner b terrifying joining the voice cast of the Aardma to LAURA HARDING about the embarrassing film and how provid
EDDIE Redmayne is sweaty. But please don’t draw attention to it or it will make him feel even hotter.
He is having second thoughts about the chic but toasty shearling jacket (worn over a lumberjack shirt, over a white T-shirt) now he’s sitting under glowing lights in a London hotel.
“I’ve got to the point where I’m so sweaty that I can’t actually take it off,” he confides.
If anyone could pull off a glistening brow though, it would be Oscar-winning Redmayne, who is as affable and charming as he is model-handsome (he appeared in a Burberry campaign with Cara Delevingne).
It might be a little surprising then to lay eyes on his character from his latest film.
The star of Fantastic Beasts And Where To Find Them, The Theory Of Everything and The Danish Girl is now voicing a toothy caveman called Dug in Aardman Animation’s new movie Early Man.
The company that brought the world Wallace And Gromit, Shaun The Sheep and Chicken Run is now turning its attention to the dawn of time, when prehistoric creatures roamed the earth.
“Dug has a massive mouth, I have a massive mouth so we related there,” Redmayne laughs.
“I definitely did spend a lot of my time with really wide-open eyes.”
While some actors have extensive experience of voice work, lending their dulcet tones to countless animations, adverts and documentaries, Redmayne’s previous experience was rather more limited.
“The only other thing I’ve ever done was voice the train Ryan in an episode of Thomas The Tank Engine.
“I was told they get everyone to open their eyes incredibly widely and talk with great enthusiasm.
“That is what I did back then and I took a little bit of that into Dug because he had a similar optimism.”
Some of that optimism might have come in handy for the 36-yearold, who says he was a bundle of nerves about joining an Aardman project and working with famous animator Nick Park, the creator of so many beloved characters.
“I’ve loved Aardman since I was little but what if I went in and did the voice and they said, ‘Oh, you’re going to do it like that?’
“In order to preemptively not get fired, I said could we have a session where we play around with who Dug is?
“We did and sweetly Nick didn’t want to fire me.”
He continues: “I’ve known o Nick since I was growing up, watching him win Oscars, and those amazing award speeches would give.
“He’s the most affable gentleman and it’s the same w you spend time with him, he’s disarming.”
So how real was the fear he might get fired?
“It’s happened before,” he s