BEVERLY HILLS – He may be part of the so-called “British invasion” in the acting world, but Eddie Redmayne doesn't totally understand it either.
“Gosh, I have no idea,” said the actor backstage at last night's Golden Globes, where he won Best Lead Actor in a Motion Picture Drama for playing Stephen Hawking in “The Theory of Everything.” “When we first came over here, Brits would stick together because LA is such a confusing city when you first arrive. I have no idea why there are so many Brits here, but I am thrilled to be one of them.”
As for his Globes win, Redmayne is a prime example of the rewards that can come when someone is aggressive about pursuing the things they want.
“I fought incredibly hard for the part,” he said. “You do it like you are blindly confident. So when I did get cast, I had a moment of elation and then sort of several months of great trepidation and fear. It was an amazing privilege but an amazing responsibility as well. So yeah, many sleepless nights. But once Stephen and [his ex-wife] Jane [Wilde] saw the film and were kind about it, that was amazing.”
That said, the experience of playing the esteemed physicist – who is afflicted with a rare, slow-progressing form of the muscle-wasting disease known as ALS – certainly wasn't a cakewalk.
“The interesting thing is unfortunately we couldn”t shoot chronologically,” Redmayne said of the challenge. “So the hardest thing was making sure that the performance melded and that you didn”t hopefully look and find the moments or the transitions. The interesting aspect of it for me was when you meet Stephen, even though he can move so few muscles, he has all the facilities of voice and gesture, all of those energies are channeled in those few muscles he can use. And for me the great privilege was being able to do it on film and with a camera be able to see the intricacies and nuances and every part of your face.”