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There Are A Couple Of Films That I've Done, Where I've Had To Get On A Horse And Wear A Pair Of Tights, So That Helped. But, Nothing Could Have Prepared Me For The Fun Of Wielding Magic Like Merlin Does, Especially In The Perverted Mind Of Chris Chibnall.

-Joseph Fiennes

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There Are A Couple

Joseph Fiennes

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There Are A Couple Of Films That I've Done, Where I've Had To Get On A Horse And Wear A Pair Of Tights, So That Helped. But, Nothing Could Have Prepared Me For The Fun Of Wielding Magic Like Merlin Does, Especially In The Perverted Mind Of Chris Chibnall.

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You Know What? Joy Is The Only Guide. I'm Going To Have Fun Regardless.

I Love Life. I'm Fascinated By Human Behavior Because That Feeds Back Into My Work.

I Think Academics Are Infuriating. For Every Expert On Shakespeare There Is Another One To Cancel His Theory Out. It Drives You Up The Wall. I Think The Greatest Form Of Finding Out The Truth Is Through Fantasy.

Finding The One

There Are Always Going To Be Times When It Doesn't Flow As Much As You Were Hoping. So Of Course I'm Going To Fail. And When I Do Fail I Hope I Fail Better And Better, Again And Again. I Am Happy To Fail.

Again And Again

He Challenge Is Finding The Modern Conduit For The Audience, Having Fun And Really Looking At The Duality Of This Particular Character, That Is Both Devil And Angel, And On The Cusp Of Losing Control Of The Pagan Background, To This Newfangled Religion Called Christianity. There's A Great Backdrop There, And Just A Whole Dark Side With The Magic.

I Think Religion Might Throw Up A Kind Of Resistance, But I Think If One Talks About Conditioning We Can All Kind Of Understand That.

I Read As Much As I Could, But Really Just Spoke To Chris Chibnall And Asked All The Pertinent Questions. That Made Me Feel Like We Weren't Going To Do An Off-the-peg Camelot, Which Has Been Touched Upon In Many Films And Tv Series Before. I Really Just Picked His Brain And, In Doing So, I Got Fired Up By Tackling Merlin In A Fresher Angle.

Pertinent Questions

Merlin Is Really At The Forefront, In That Regard. We Get A Glimpse Into The Dark, Machiavellian Corridors Of Power. I Like The Fact That, Although He Has Powers, His Powers Are Almost In His Political Guile As Much As What He Relies On, In Darker Forces.

When I Was Offered The Part In Shakespeare In Love A Voice In My Head Said 'not Another Tights Role!

He [merlin] Is Slightly From Another World And Place, So It [challenge In Bringing The Role To Life] Is About Having Fun And Presenting It In A New Way. He's More Of A Politician, And Slightly Machiavellian, But There's Also A Lovely Relationship Going On Between Merlin And Arthur. There's So Much To Be Had, Really.

But It's A Strange Thing When People Judge You Because You're Not Doing Some Big Hollywood Film. Are You Suggesting I Should Be In The Dukes Of Hazzard? I Mean, Hello?

Hollywood Films

From The Age Of About Five To Twelve I Was Very Bad, A Hideous Little Terror Who Beat People Up. I Was A Member Of A Rough Gang - We Went Around And Terrorised All The Pupils In School.

The Great Thing About Films Is That You Have Access To This Whole World Of Experts Who Teach You The Skills Your Character's Supposed To Have.

'how Do You Balance The Creative With The Biblical?' One Could Pick Up The Scripture And Read It To Oneself And You Would Be Communing Directly With That Information. As Soon As You Go Into Film, As Soon As There's A Camera, And There's An Angle, And There's Lighting, And There's Editing, You're Into The Adaptation.

I Don't Know What My Limitations Are Until I Reach Them. I Look For The Challenge.

I Think Everything I Do Is My Early Work. I Can't Wait To Get On To The Later Stuff.

There Are A Couple Of Films That I've Done, Where I've Had To Get On A Horse And Wear A Pair Of Tights, So That Helped. But, Nothing Could Have Prepared Me For The Fun Of Wielding Magic Like Merlin Does, Especially In The Perverted Mind Of Chris Chibnall.

I Like The Fact That We're Stripping The Icons Away. They're The Wikileaks For The Age That We're Revealing, With The Transparency Of The Characters. We're Unearthing The Truth Beyond Or Underneath The Myth. I Love That Aspect.

It Takes Years To Establish Yourself, And Then You Have One Big Film And Everyone Calls You An Overnight Success. You Think, 'christ, I've Been Sweating And Crying For Seven Years.'.

I've Got A Vendetta To Destroy The Net, To Make Everyone Go To The Library. I Love The Organic Thing Of Pen And Paper, Ink On Canvas. I Love Going Down To The Library, The Feel And Smell Of Books.

I Can Only Put Myself In The Process And Try To Learn Through The Process. Sometimes It Will Go Well And Sometimes It Won't.

So Getting That Balance Between What Is Honoring Scripture And The Word And Also Acknowledging The Fact That By The Virtue Of Putting It On Film There's Going To Be A Variation And Adaptation, I Mean, It's A Fine Dance And A Balance. Our Producers And Directors Have Worked So Hard To Get That Right And I'm Really Proud. I Think It's A Pretty Good Job.

I Think All Experience Is, In Some Way, Shape Or Form, Filtered Down To Help You, In Your Present Moment. With Shakespeare, You're Trying To Act With A Fairly Archaic Language, Although In Certain Aspects, It's Deeply Modern.

Youth Is A Predominant Factor. We Are Seeing A Young King Arthur, And Thereby A Young-ish - As I'm Into My 40s - Merlin. It Was About How To Tackle It, From That Point View.

I'm A Huge Admirer Of Pope Francis And Everything He Stands For. I Think He's An Incredibly Connected Spiritual And Authentic Being.

I Also Wanted To Have Fun With It. I Wanted To Have The Scope, Which I Felt Merlin Has, In His Machiavellian Bi-polar Way. He's Not To Be Trusted, Yet He Is Fighting For This Great Power And Is Really A Master, To Some Degree, In Orchestrating Camelot And King Arthur. He's A Strange, Dark Devious Character, And I Just Wanted To Have Fun, And Get Away From The Cloak And Long Beard And Pointy Hat.

I Fall In Love With Contradictions Without Understanding. I Can't Really Portray Them Unless I Do. So In A Roundabout Way I Have To Fall In Love, It's My Duty. If Love Is About Understanding And Understanding Is Compassion And Compassion Is Love, I Have To Have Compassion Towards The World.

Falling In Love

There Is A Bit Of Me If I'm Pushed In One Way I Might Bounce Back And Go The Opposite.

I've Always Believed That You Shouldn't Want To Mend A Broken Heart, Because That's Someone You Don't Want To Forget. Scars Can Be Good.

It's All About Human Condition, Ultimately. That's What You're Looking At. You're Also Looking To Have Some Fun, As Well, Because That Also Translates. Maybe Wearing Tights Once In Awhile Helped. Getting Up On A Horse A Couple Of Times Before Might Have Helped.

I Guess There's Nothing I Don't Like About Merlin, In This Presentation. I Love Everything, Even The Things I Find Despicable And Abhorrent In Merlin. They're Actually A Joy To Ride On The Tailcoats Of.

Maybe We Need More Dialogue In Terms Of Our Faith, In Terms Of Those Who Are Believers, Or Even Nonbelievers, About That Aspect, And What That Might Mean If You Were Interpreting. You Don't Have To Believe It; Maybe You Could Draw A Metaphor From It.

Pretty Much All Films I've Seen That Depict The Life Of Christ End With The Crucifixion, Almost Like The Filmmakers Don't Know What To Do After.

Conditioning Can Be Not A Big Heavy Thing. (for Instance:) I've Got A Brand New Pair Of Shoes, By Mistake You Step On It And You Make Them Muddy And Dirty, I'm Conditioned To Go "hey, What Are You Doing?" That's My Conditioning, I Have A Response. So, Maybe We Have To Learn To Find The Pause Before We React, Because Reaction Is Our Conditioning.

I Wanted To Say, "hey, Pope Francis," But I Cried Like A Baby. I Was Reduced To A Very Humble Set Of Feelings, Because It Was Not About What Was Said: There's A Presence. That Was A Blessing For Myself And My Family And Everyone There To Be A Part Of That.

I Love New Writing, New Blood, Modern Works By Unknown Writers.

A Large Part Of How An Actor Works And Their Process Is The Stimulation Of What's Around You, And None More So Than In A Period Piece. This Is A Modern Piece, As Much As It Is Set In A Different Time, Age And Myth. If It Wasn't Relevant, It Wouldn't Have Been Made And We Wouldn't Be Putting Our Energy Into It. It's Relevant For Us Today Because, In Some Ways, It Throws Up A Mirror To All Of Us. As An Actor, You Get Stimulus And You're Effected By That, Whether It's Costumes Or Funny Beards Or Castles.

It All Felt Like A Terribly Long Time. It Would Have Meant That I Had To Make Five Movies In Five Years And If You Don't Like The Movies, Too Bad. I Guess I Just Wanted My Freedom, And I Think My Life Has Been Incredibly Enhanced As A Result.

Whether You're A Believer Or Not, I Think There's A Huge Value In Understanding The Quality Of Redemption.

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