Rufus: ‘I tried to understand what Andrew was thinking’
RUFUS Sewell has revealed he had to use plenty of empathy to portray Prince Andrew in his car crash Newsnight interview.
The actor stars in Scoop, a Netflix drama released this week about the royal’s interrogation by Emily Maitlis.
Rufus, 56, said: “I watched the interview obsessively. Maybe that’s too big a word but I watched it a lot.
“And I would just basically try at first to sound like him, to mimic, but more than anything just to try to understand not just what he was thinking when he was speaking but all of the hesitations, all of the body language, to find something that might be the root of that. I was trying to break it down so that I could be seeing it in that moment, from his perspective, without judgment.” Asked how he approached scenes that show Andrew alone, he said: “It’s this question of sympathy versus empathy. Empathy is very interesting...you really try to see something from someone’s perspective, what they would be thinking, what the truth they’re telling themselves about that moment, their reasons for being the way they are, so that you can represent them fully. Not make them look good, not make them look bad, but just try to be truthful.”
The film delves into the story behind the interview about the prince’s friendship with billionaire sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.
Gillian Anderson, 55, who plays then BBC journalist Maitlis, said: “It was a little bit more daunting than playing somebody who is deceased but I’ve been a big fan her for a while so it was a joy to step into the shoes.”
She added: “Because of how many times she looks down at her notes, it looks like I might be looking at my lines! But no I didn’t!”
Scoop is on Netflix from Friday.