‘Hijack’ star Idris Elba: ‘Camera right up my nozzle’ wasn’t sexy
He was People’s magazine’s “Sexiest Man Alive” in 2018 and is regularly floated as the next contender to be James Bond — but Idris Elba didn’t feel very suave filming his new Apple TV+ series “Hijack.”
“Some camera angles are not sexy, man – especially on a plane,” Elba, 50, told reporters at a Zoom press conference.
“Let me tell you, [director] Jim Field Smith has got the camera right up my nozzle. And I’m like ‘Are you sure that’s the angle, bro?'”
Elba stars in and executive-produced “Hijack,” a thriller co-created by Field Smith and George Kay (“Lupin”) that tracks a hijacked plane on its seven-hour flight en route from Dubai to London.
One of the passengers, Sam Nelson (Elba), is an accomplished corporate negotiator in the business world, and tries to step up and use his smarts to save his fellow passengers.
Archie Panjabi, no stranger to plane mystery shows, co-stars as Zahra Gahfoor, a counter-terrorism officer on the ground.
Elba, who said that he’s 6-foot-3, was interested in exploring new territory for this role.
“I’m sure it’s all subjective [and] I’m sure I’m not good looking to everyone, but … with my size and shape, all my life, it’s been like ‘Oh, you’re a big lad,'” he said.
“And I’ve taken roles that feed into that. This time, I was interested in playing against that. Sam isn’t always a hero in that sense. He’s more cerebral. He’s quite vulnerable in … that he’s got lots going on internally with his family. It played against type.”
Still, with his size, skulking around a small space felt challenging – although the plane was in a studio, its top was not removed, Elba said.
“By design, we didn’t take this plane apart to make it easier for us to shoot,” he said. “We designed all the action sequences with what we’ve got. Sam does a lot of sneaking around the plane. Me sneaking on a plane is like ‘Bro, what are you doing – we can see you!’
“So it meant that I had to get lower, or [that] we figured out another way. That really added to the drama and reality of this thing.
“The fight sequences were hard to shoot [and] were choreographed within the space,” he said. “If we hurt ourselves, we just took a breather and carried on. It’s not that we didn’t care, we just didn’t change the choreography not to hurt ourselves.
“One of the memorable [fight scenes] for me was … in this tiny kitchen space. I’m a big man, so it wasn’t easy to maneuver around. Especially if my character is not a fighter; he’s fighting out of desperation. So there’s all this stuff that’s part of the design of the action.”
Elba said that if he ever ended up in a real life plane hijacking situation, he wouldn’t behave in the same way as his character, Sam.
“Well look, I would shut up and mind my own business,” he said. “But I wouldn’t be Sam, for sure. I wouldn’t have thought it out that clearly. But if I had the opportunity to make eye contact with a hijacker and thought for a second that person would listen to me, I would go for that and be like ‘Dude, this is very stupid.’ Or, “Dude, can you get me a drink, please?’
“I don’t think I’d be the hero guy.”
