Ralph Fiennes Breaks Down His Most Iconic Characters
Released on 04/01/2019
It has a hook on it so I can hold my hand like that
and the end of it can hook around, I think this finger.
I remember it should feel like an extension of my hand.
Schindler's list, in Schindler's List,
I played Armon Goeth, who was the commandant
of a Nazi labor camp, in outside Krakow, in Poland.
I hadn't done, I'd done maybe
two big feature films before it.
I remember being struck by Steven's extraordinary
knowledge of the technique of filmmaking.
Which in my very limited experience
I hadn't experienced anyone being so vocal
about lenses and how they're gonna shoot.
And we'll do like this, put a dolly down here,
and it was exciting, because it felt like someone
was unashamedly vocal about their processes
as it was happening, and I remember he said to me,
I'm shooting this, I've made no storyboards,
I'm just shooting this, obviously he knew
his script inside out, but he was allowing himself
to be inventive on the day, that's what he said.
He said I've just directed Jurassic Park.
Everything's story boarded to the Nth degree,
this is the opposite, and the energy of that
oppositeness, was his aliveness, you know,
he was very vocal and demanded
a lot of the crew, but it was exciting.
I tried to do as much research as I could
based on Thomas Keneally's book Schindler's Ark,
originally, now it's called Schindler's List.
But in the Imperial War Museum here in London,
there's quite a lot of documentation
about Schindler and Goeth, and I think
what I came away with is this is a man
who drank a lot, Amon Goeth, I think, and he ate a lot.
The scene with Embeth Davidtz, playing Helen Hirsch
in the cellar, I would like so much to
reach out and touch you in your loneliness.
What would that be like I wonder?
I mean, what would be wrong with that?
I realize that you're not a person
in the strictest sense of the word but ...
That was quite a challenging ...
It was a beautifully written scene.
I just remember the challenge of a man
who's suddenly finding, someone designated
in his eyes as unacceptable, he sees,
all that prejudice starts to slightly crack.
Possibly because he's allowing an attraction
or a desire to come to the surface.
To me, it feels very human.
The Harry Potter series, I hadn't invested
the time in reading the books, I knew there was
a Harry Potter, huge thing happening,
but I hadn't seen the earlier film, so I had no sense.
It was only when my sister, who has children said,
don't you realize what they're asking you to do,
it's extraordinary, and then I sort of ...
And then I took it a bit more seriously.
I wasn't that aware of it when it was first
proposed to me, I, do I like this part?
What does it involve, you know,
is it something I'll enjoy playing?
And I did in the end, yeah.
You're a fool, Harry Potter, and you will lose.
She describes the voice in a couple of places at least.
Which was a good indicator of where to go.
The snake-like idea that J.K. Rowling gives him
is someone, that he himself has snakelike elements
to his movement, silky, smooth, silent.
With Stuart Craig, who was the production designer,
and his team, we discussed what the wand would be.
It has a hook on it, so it can hook,
I can hold my hand like that, and the end of it
can hook around I think, this finger.
So it can sort of, I can almost have a hand open.
So you would think it might fall off the hand
but it, I dunno, I just enjoyed,
it could be light in the hand, I didn't have
as much prosthetic makeup as people think I did.
They removed my nose digitally, later on.
So I was covered in colored dots,
and then I had to sit in front of cameras
and at every angle recorded, and for the digital expert
Mark Coulier is the makeup artist for me, and his team
gave me a white, pale, pale, sort of sickly complexion
but then they had these, sort of vein-like paint work
which was actually transfers, so they could have consistency
so they just sponged the transfers onto my scalp
and face to give this sort of slightly translucent
vein-like quality to my sickly pallor.
Scene at the table, when I talk about Muggles,
to her the mixture of magical and Muggle blood
is not an abomination, but something to be encouraged.
And then the snake comes up along,
I love that scene, I think it's the beginning
of the first part of Deathly Hallows.
Nagini.
Dinner.
[melancholy orchestral music]
That was a great scene, and I loved
shooting the death duel, that was cool.
With Daniel in the big courtyard.
That was epic.
[melancholy orchestral music]
You just have to hate Harry Potter with a deep loathing.
[laughs] I'll be pissed if they brought
back Voldemort and didn't ask me.
Coriolanus.
Sort of the decision to direct
came indirectly, I was close to a great producer
called Simon Channing Williams who produced
all Mike Lee films until sadly he died.
We had a project which he tried to make with me
but it didn't work, that initial process
of script conversations and location scouts
and starting to put on the hat of a director,
that gave me a kind of confidence
to reach into an idea in my back pocket
which I had had, if I ever would direct
it would be this Shakespeare play, Coriolanus
which is not often done, not, I would say
one of his most popular plays, a very antagonistic,
confrontational, elitist central protagonist.
But a fascinating play about politics and power and people.
[Man] Your noble consul, Coriolanus.
[clapping]
With Coriolanus, I definitely definitely referenced
Baz Luhrmann's Romeo and Juliet as a very bold
and exciting modernization using Shakespeare's text
but committing to a modern world.
I want, desperately want audiences to feel that
whatever the language might be doing
that the emotions and the actions
and the motivations are ones we carry in us today.
[Man] I will fight against my country.
And then men die.
But it was a tricky sell, my first film
obviously easily labeled as vanity project for this actor
and all that stuff, and it was scary,
directing myself, the challenge was
I mustn't spend too much time indulging myself.
I had a bit of a clock in my head
when I was doing coverage on myself.
I feel the responsibility to nurture
the other actors in their performances.
That's one of the pleasures actually.
Grand Budapest Hotel.
I'd met Wes a couple of times.
He'd been extremely friendly to me, and supportive.
I'd shown him an early mood reel,
or what they call a sizzle reel
of Coriolanus when I was trying to make it
and get funding, he had been very supportive
and encouraging about it as an idea.
But that was in a social situation,
so some years later now, three or four years later,
he's sending me this script,
and he had am eccentric approach
which he said, please read this script
and tell me which character you would like to play.
Well I think this one maybe. [laughs]
That was a very happy experience
with the way Wes works with his ensemble of actors.
Edward Norton, Willem Dafoe, and I think
everyone is there because they love the spirit of his films.
[Man] Many of the hotel's most
valued and distinguished guests came for him.
I love you.
I love you.
She was dynamite in the sack, by the way.
She was 84.
I've had older.
I remember we were definitely thinking
of who do I know that Monsieur Gustave like.
And then there is actually, it's supposedly based on
a mutual acquaintance that I know and Wes knows.
Who came to the set, and I knew,
I don't mimic him but I suppose I'm aware of
this person's energy and demeanor
that I've taken it on board.
Sunshine, Sunshine is directed by a great Hungarian
director, Istvan Szabo, and Istvan asked me to be
in this film, which is a story of a Jewish family's
assimilation in the 20th century in Budapest, in Hungary.
Istvan Szabo said to me, this film is about
the disease of wanting to be accepted.
[Woman] Who are you trying to please?
Well I have to please our family,
and the memory of our rabbi grandfather.
I have to please the government and its opposition.
I have to please our brother who wants to turn
the world upside down, and our father
who wants to keep the world exactly as it is.
[Interviewer] You play multiple characters.
I do, I play three, and there was differences
in facial hair and hair cut I think.
But I thought no that shouldn't be,
if the film is storytelling, and the filmmaking
is clear enough, the audience will know.
It didn't seem at all the sort of film where
the actor completely changes,
and oh my god is it really him, her whatever.
It was no, no, you're meant to know it's me.
You're meant to understand that it's the same family.
The fact that I'm playing all three was the linking element.
The White Crow, The White Crow is about the
defection of Rudolf Nureyev for the events
leading up to his defection, so this great
Russian ballet dancer who was arguably like
a sort of equivalent to pop star
in the world of ballet, and I grew up with,
I never saw him dance, but I grew up
with his name being mentioned as the god of ballet,
of male ballet dancers, I was given the early chapters
of a new biography about Nureyev and I read about him
and it wasn't because I had a love of ballet,
it was because of his spirit, and that's what drew me
to him, a very confrontational spirit.
Often very difficult and abrasive,
and arguably abusive to people, and I found it
a very moving story, and I talked to the screenwriter
David Hare, who you will know from films like The Hours
and the Reader that I did, and David responded
to the idea of writing, so we worked together on that.
I learned from the first one, Coriolanus
to not be afraid of getting a lot of coverage,
to take time to go for a few more takes if I needed to.
Even if it meant pushing the overtime button a bit.
There's a Japanese director called Ozu
who has this very simple, classic frames,
he's probably very unfashionable.
I mean I love films where the camera moves.
But the principle of the frame that can hold the characters
or closeup, on White Crow, we have three time frames.
So that principle of that sort of classic frame
of the camera that either moved on a track
or was locked off, it was applicable to the Leningrad
timeframes where Rudolf Nureyev is a student.
[violin music]
And then when he's in Paris, it's more immediate.
So then with Mike Healy, the brilliant cinematographer
who shot that, we, a lot of it's in the hand
so it sort of caught moments or found
and the camera has permission to be a bit messy
as it looks for the best way
to discover a scene between characters.
My name is Rudolf Nureyev, I want political asylum.
No.
Shooting ballet, which was way out of my comfort zone,
wanted an unknown to play Nureyev, and I wanted
a dancer to play Nureyev, but it was principally
an acting part, so persuading people to cast
a total unknown who's not even an actor by training
in the lead, that was really difficult.
This was never a film about his dance career.
It was always about what it is in the person.
I suppose in an artist or performer that makes him,
to turn him to go there and often necessarily ruthless
in their pursuit of excellence.
A Bigger Splash, Harry Hawkes is the character
of a great script by David Kajganich, Luca Guadagnino
directed myself, Tilda Swinton, who plays
a rockstar with whom I have been in love.
She's with her current boyfriend, Matthias,
played by Matthias Schoenaerts, and set on an island
called Pantelleria, and we shot on the real Pantelleria
which is an island between Sicily and Tunisia.
But I love this part, this sort of,
he's a music producer of a certain type.
Quite mouthy, and in your face.
[Interviewer] Was there anyone from your life
that you used as inspiration for Harry?
[laughs] A little bit, my brother Magnus
who is a [laughs] music producer and composer.
But a little bit of Magnus, but also just,
it leaped off the page about who Harry was.
And I just love Luca's approach, and when I
first met Luca and he talked about it
and the part was great on the page.
And I just like Luca's filmmaking intelligence
and his inquiry and he's properly creative
on a set and he thinks very beautifully filmically.
He respects the journey of the characters whilst,
I mean there's some filmmakers the direction
sort of smothers the life of characters
with fancy camera work or funny editing choices, or ...
The English Patient, on the English Patient
we all, meaning the actors, with Antony and the crew,
we all believed in the emotional breadth
and scope of it, it all felt like a drama
that had visual scope and emotional scope
but at the time it was hard to finance.
Because none of the protagonists were,
in the eyes of the Hollywood establishment,
none of us were insurance stars,
we were all up and comers, so it didn't jump out
at the people with the purses, it was in fact
Harvey Weinstein who saved it, through Miramax.
He came in and saved it because it was going down
just before we were due to start.
I have a happy memory of being in great locations
and being in Rome for a while, then going to Tuscany
then going to Venice for a short time,
then going to Tunisia, going to the Sahara.
So it's suddenly in this desert landscape.
[Man] Clifton offered to fly down from Cairo
and collect me, he flew like a madman always.
I took no notice.
I don't think now, with the way independent films
or that sort of adult drama character led films,
the sort of budget would be hard now.
You'd probably have to shoot it in half the time.
We shot from September to January, 1995 to January 1996.
The Constant Gardener.
John le Carre story produced by Simon Channing Williams
who I talked about earlier who came to me with the project.
Simon brought in Fernando Meirelles who's very,
he was being talked about for the City of God.
And I thought that was an inspired choice
because there's a kind of Englishness that sits
with John le Carre's work which is great.
I could see how an English director
would confirm certain stereotypes.
I mean the whole thing has a looseness
and a documentary-like feel which
I think shook it away from the pages of a book.
Which is what, you need that.
[Woman] How are you, how are you?
We can't involve ourselves in their lives, Tess.
There are millions of people that all need help.
Justin Quail, his name, he's a certain type
of self effacing Englishman of a certain sort of
middle class-ness I suppose, well mannered, charming,
possibly thought of as ineffectual.
And you know, not someone to shoulder their way
to the front of a queue, not someone who
pushes forward their ambition, but is decent
and reveals himself to have a core of steel
and determination in trying to avenge
or get at least to the secret of his wife's murder.
The appeal to me was, here was a guy
that everyone thinks is a bit soft,
actually has an extraordinary courage.
And I love that, it moved me, you know this is someone
who no one thinks, but he pursues and pursues and pursues.
I'm not conscious that I have the same approach
to every part because often the director
you're working with informs the approach you might take.
A lot of the time I feel things intuitively.
I think about who they are, I think about their inner life.
Where are they from, who are their parents,
you can give yourself imagination exercises.
People ask about research, there is research,
but actually a lot of it I think
is just intuition and imagination.
[violin music]
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