ScreenAnarchy had the opportunity to briefly chat with Daniel regarding Beast of Burden.
ScreenAnarchy: Taking a look at your post-Potter films,
you’ve played an eclectic bunch of characters, from Igor (VICTOR
FRANKENSTEIN) to Allen Ginsberg (KILL YOUR DARLINGS), to a multipurpose
corpse (SWISS ARMY MAN) and now even a drug mule. Have you always
embraced the notion that diversity is the spice of life or did you
deliberately start looking for projects that are radically different
from one another to show off your range?
Daniel Radcliffe: I think when I first finished Potter,
it was obviously something I had thought about and was something I
wanted to show: that I could do more than just play that character but I
think, actually, as I’ve gone on I have the same desires that any actor
has and most actors just want to do as great a variety of work as they
possibly can. That's the same for me.
I have the most fun doing my job when I’m doing a wide variety of
things. So yeah, I think I am a ‘variety is the spice of life’ kind of
person, certainly work-wise anyway. What is interesting is I’m really
not particularly that way in my personal life. I’m a creature of habit
and routine in almost everything else that I do, but in my work I’m a
little more adventurous.
What are you looking for when selecting a new project and what made BEAST OF BURDEN stand out to you?
I’m looking for something that I find interesting. Just going by the
test of 'I want to make things that I think I would want to watch as an
audience member'. But I also never want to repeat myself. I want to find
new things for myself to do, either in terms of genres or different
kinds of acting challenges or styles or whatever it is. But also, as it
very much was with this, I really liked the script, love this director
and I thought the combination of this script and director could be
something very very interesting. That was what drew me into Beast of Burden.
With the exception of the climax and a number of flashbacks,
you are confined to a single location, i.e. your plane, and only
interact with other actors by way of aviation communication. How do you
prepare for a part in which your co-stars are not physically present?
Did you have someone to react off of?
[Laughs] I don’t think it’s something that I really factored
into my preparation for the film. I was very lucky that Grace Gummer
was actually there on set for a huge amount of filming and was kind
enough to do on camera work for me.
But yeah, it’s definitely a strange one, being in the one location
the whole time, but what it also meant is we were able to film very,
very long takes, which I’d never done before. We were doing 25 to 30
minute takes and it meant that after a while you really did forget that
the cameras were even there and what else was going on. You just became a
person reacting to whatever was being phoned at them. That was a really
fun way of working.
Without giving away too much, the film sort of plays like a
riff on ‘how far would you go to save a loved one?’. An important part
of the film is the relationship between Sean, your character, and Jill,
Grace Gummer's character. If the audience is ever to care about your
mission, we sort of have to be willing to root for this couple. How do
you go about building a believable relationship in a movie if you only
have one or two scenes with the actress playing your girlfriend?
Yeah, those are the moments where it’s really important to know or
have sort of thought about some sort of backstory, so you know for
yourself what’s going on. So Grace and I had a couple of days of
rehearsal where we could talk about that kind of stuff. And I think I
was sort of lucky on this film ’cause she’s a fantastic actress and a
lovely person and she came to set to … We both came to set with a
similar mindset, which is that we were going to have to build up and
sort of discover this relationship very quickly. I think we both came in
with an attitude of ‘let’s just be really open with each other’. Grace
is an incredibly generous actress and I hope I was the same way with her. It made it easy to kind of try and build that chemistry quite quickly.
You’re something of a risk-taker it seems because KILL YOUR
DARLINGS, THE WOMAN IN BLACK, SWISS ARMY MAN, IMPERIUM, THE GAME
CHANGERS, these are all films that were directed by relatively
inexperienced people when it came to helming a feature length project.
All of your recent films, including BEAST OF BURDEN, have been indies as
opposed to big budget productions. Ever worried that such creative
risks might not pay off artistically?
Well yeah, that is the worry … that the gamble won’t pay off
artistically, but you’re probably not gonna get to very many interesting
places without taking any risks. Swiss Army Man is a
great example of something that in the wrong hands, yeah, would’ve been
terrible but when you meet the Daniels, the directors, you just know
immediately that these guys are gonna make something amazing.
I think when you can sense that off somebody it doesn't particularly
matter if it’s a first-time or whatever it is; you just get a sense. So
far I’ve been very lucky. Certainly all the first-time filmmakers I’ve
worked with have been amazing and actually some of the most fantastic
experiences I’ve had on set have been with first-time filmmakers. So I’m
definitely not shy about working with people like that.
Of all the post-POTTER films, is there one that you feel
didn’t get a fair shake? Either because it didn’t perform well at the
box office or because it sort of flew below the radar.
Not particularly, but there’s still a part of me that thinks ... I did a movie called What If that was also called The F Word
and I think that’s one where the trailer did it a bit a of a disservice
and made it look like a very cheesy, corny romantic comedy and I don’t
think it was that. That’s one where I go like ‘oh, I wish more people had seen that’ because I think it’s a lovely film.
There's some films I make like Swiss Army Man or Kill Your Darlings, to a certain extent, you know there’s a certain audience for this and you don’t expect it to particularly go beyond that, but What If is
one where I was hoping that it would find a bit more of an audience. I
think the change of title, which was forced because of very silly
reasons in my opinion, and some of the trailer maybe didn’t do justice
to it. [...] It’s a very trivial thing to think that a title could make
that much difference but I actually do think that on that occasion the
title does make a difference. What If is not what I would’ve chosen.
One final question about one of your upcoming projects. Is
there anything at all you can tell us about GUNS AKIMBO and the
character you’ll be playing in it?
[Laughs] I don’t wanna say too much about it because I’m
sort of very superstitious about these things and, you know, until we’re
actually on set, making it, I just don’t wanna jinx it in case it falls
through, but it is looking good … Hopefully, I’m gonna get to
that later this year and I’m very excited by it. It’s a crazy script
that’s incredibly funny and absolutely mad. I have never done a film
like it before in terms of the amount of pure action there is in it. So I’m really hoping it happens ’cause I love the script, I love the director [Deathgasm's
Jason Lei Howden] [...] I'm excited about the prospect of making it and
fingers crossed that you’ll hear more about that later in the year.
source: screenanarchy.com
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ScreenAnarchy interview
Marion
|
20 February 2018
|
18:33
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