Sam Brigger
Appearances
Fresh Air
The Gutting Of The Department Of Education
Hey, Sam Sanders here with KCRW personally inviting you to check out my new podcast. It's an entertainment show that tries to figure out what makes the culture tick and tell the stories behind creators we love. New episodes are out every Friday, wherever you get your podcasts.
Fresh Air
Mark Ruffalo Hates The Hulk Suit
What about the celebrity from being part of the Marvel Universe? By the time you started being the Incredible Hulk, you were already a very well-known and successful actor. But was the celebrity and the recognition sort of exponentially different? Yeah.
Fresh Air
Mark Ruffalo Hates The Hulk Suit
In that scene, Duncan Wedderburn is looking at Bella Baxter like a cartoon cat who's trapped the canary. What he doesn't realize is that Bella Baxter is no ordinary young innocent to corrupt. She is in fact the result of a Frankenstein-like experiment by a scientist, played by Willem Dafoe, who reanimated a dead woman's body by replacing her brain with the brain of her unborn baby.
Fresh Air
Mark Ruffalo Hates The Hulk Suit
does it take away from simple things like walking down the street or going for a hike or something?
Fresh Air
Mark Ruffalo Hates The Hulk Suit
You know, they got their head down on the phone or in a book, sleeping, whatever. Do you have to do like the cap and sunglasses thing all the time?
Fresh Air
Mark Ruffalo Hates The Hulk Suit
If you're just joining us, our guest is actor Mark Ruffalo. He was nominated for an Oscar for Best Supporting Actor for his role in the film Poor Things. We'll be back after a short break. This is Fresh Air.
Fresh Air
Mark Ruffalo Hates The Hulk Suit
Bella goes through a rapid awakening to the world around her and to her own body, and like an infant who doesn't yet know society's norms, is uninhibited to a degree that both attracts Wedderburn and undoes him.
Fresh Air
Mark Ruffalo Hates The Hulk Suit
This is Fresh Air. I'm Sam Brigger. One of our favorite interviews from the year was with our guest Mark Ruffalo. He was nominated for an Oscar for Best Supporting Actor for his role in the film Poor Things. Some of his other movies include Spotlight, Foxcatcher, The Kids Are Alright, Zodiac, and You Can Count on Me. He's also played the Incredible Hulk in many Marvel movies and TV shows.
Fresh Air
Mark Ruffalo Hates The Hulk Suit
Mark, to prepare for this interview, I watched a lot of your films, and I watched this trio of films that you did, which are all based on historical events. There's actually some sort of similarity between them. This is Zodiac, Foxcatcher, and Spotlight. And I read that for two of those movies, the people you were portraying were still alive, and you –
Fresh Air
Mark Ruffalo Hates The Hulk Suit
Got to spend time with them, got to know them. And this was Dave Tosky, who was one of the detectives investigating the Zodiac killings. And then for Spotlight, you spent time with one of the reporters who was investigating the sexual abuse in the Catholic Church, Mike Resendiz.
Fresh Air
Mark Ruffalo Hates The Hulk Suit
Mark Ruffalo's performance in Poor Things is hilarious and delicious, and he himself describes it as a big departure from his previous work in movies like Zodiac, Spotlight, Foxcatcher, The Kids Are Alright, You Can Count on Me, and of course, several Marvel movies and TV shows where he plays the Incredible Hulk. Well, Mark Ruffalo, welcome back to Fresh Air.
Fresh Air
Mark Ruffalo Hates The Hulk Suit
So when you're portraying a historical figure, an actual person, how much of an effort do you make to try to be as much like them as possible? Let's stick with Mike Rezende. How much time did you spend with him?
Fresh Air
Mark Ruffalo Hates The Hulk Suit
What were some of the mannerisms that you saw that you tried to emulate in your performance?
Fresh Air
Mark Ruffalo Hates The Hulk Suit
It's nice to have you. You said you had some trepidation about taking on this role. What were your concerns?
Fresh Air
Mark Ruffalo Hates The Hulk Suit
Mark, I wanted to ask you a little bit about your childhood. It sounds like your family moved around a bit, like you were born in Wisconsin, but then you spent some time in Virginia and then California, right? That's right. I think your family was Catholic, but it sounds like there were some active seekers of religion in the household. Is that correct? Yeah.
Fresh Air
Mark Ruffalo Hates The Hulk Suit
Well, you actually were saved by the televangelist Jimmy Swigert, right? I was. Was that on TV? No.
Fresh Air
Mark Ruffalo Hates The Hulk Suit
Did you feel bad? Did you feel like you were kind of lying or something?
Fresh Air
Mark Ruffalo Hates The Hulk Suit
If you're just joining us, our guest is actor Mark Ruffalo. We'll be back after a short break. This is Fresh Air.
Fresh Air
Mark Ruffalo Hates The Hulk Suit
This is Fresh Air. Our guest is actor Mark Ruffalo, who was nominated for an Oscar for Best Supporting Actor in the film Poor Things. How did you get into acting? Is that something you felt good at right away? Did it come easy naturally to you?
Fresh Air
Mark Ruffalo Hates The Hulk Suit
Yeah. At some point you decided to make a go of it, right? Like you must have been getting some encouragement from her and then from other people to sort of get you to take a chance and to move to L.A. eventually.
Fresh Air
Mark Ruffalo Hates The Hulk Suit
If you're just joining us, we're speaking with actor Mark Ruffalo. More after a break. This is Fresh Air.
Fresh Air
Mark Ruffalo Hates The Hulk Suit
Well, it is such a fun role. Like, once you accepted it, did you have fun doing it?
Fresh Air
Mark Ruffalo Hates The Hulk Suit
This is Fresh Air. Our guest is actor Mark Ruffalo, who was nominated for an Oscar for his performance in the movie Poor Things. So your big break was the 2000 Kenneth Lonergan movie, You Can Count on Me, which I watched again this week. It's such a terrific movie. You play Terry. You've got a sister, Sammy, who's played by Laura Linney. And you guys were orphaned early in life.
Fresh Air
Mark Ruffalo Hates The Hulk Suit
Your parents die in a car crash. So what did you think of this character when you read the script? He's often a jerk, but he's also a pretty good guy. And and tries to do the right thing a lot. And he's just been damaged by this awful tragedy when he was a kid.
Fresh Air
Mark Ruffalo Hates The Hulk Suit
This is your big break, and you start getting asked to do a lot of roles. But then everything just – you have to go on halt. You've talked about this a bunch, but you were diagnosed with a brain tumor, which turned out to be benign. You had to have this operation. You had to deal with all these side effects. You had to do all this rehabilitation. I mean, fortunately, you were able to –
Fresh Air
Mark Ruffalo Hates The Hulk Suit
to really get through it, but it took a while. And like, it just must've been, I mean, obviously it's a terrible thing to happen in your life, but just in terms of your career, like that must've been so discouraging because like here you are just breaking out and then your body just shuts it all down. Like, did that experience make you forever like suspicious of success? Like,
Fresh Air
Mark Ruffalo Hates The Hulk Suit
You might be good now, but you don't know what's coming around the corner.
Fresh Air
Mark Ruffalo Hates The Hulk Suit
Yeah, well, I was actually really interested in that particular aspect of this because, like, as we said, you know, there's some spiritual searchers in your family, right? Like, your grandmother became an evangelist after being Catholic, right? Your father joined the Baha'i religion. Like did this experience sort of alter the way you thought about spirituality or like even the soul or identity?
Fresh Air
Mark Ruffalo Hates The Hulk Suit
You've been in like romantic comedies and you've been in movies that have comedic elements like The Brothers Bloom and even in the Avengers movies. But I don't think you've ever had a role that was so broadly comic as this one. I mean you even do a pratfall at one point.
Fresh Air
Mark Ruffalo Hates The Hulk Suit
That's what I learned. Well, it's been a real pleasure speaking with you. Mark Ruffalo, thanks so much for coming on the show.
Fresh Air
Mark Ruffalo Hates The Hulk Suit
So can you just sort of compare what it's like to act in something that's comedic like this compared to your more like dramatic roles?
Fresh Air
Mark Ruffalo Hates The Hulk Suit
Yeah, yeah. You're almost like skating up the stairs, like your arms are going back and forth. And then at the landing, you just go flop over.
Fresh Air
Mark Ruffalo Hates The Hulk Suit
In Poor Things, Mark Ruffalo plays a character described in the movie as a cad and a rake. His name is Duncan Wedderburn, and he seduces Emma Stone's character, Bella Baxter, to run away from her home and fiancé and have an adventure with him in Lisbon. Let's hear a scene.
Fresh Air
Mark Ruffalo Hates The Hulk Suit
The character in the movie is described as a cad and a rake, and he's disreputable, but he's definitely working within the boundaries of society. And he's challenged and finally undone by Emma Stone's complete uninhibitedness. Can you talk about that?
Fresh Air
Mark Ruffalo Hates The Hulk Suit
Well, let's hear a clip of him sort of getting undone by Emma Stone's behavior. This scene takes place. The two characters have been put ashore in France and Paris, penniless, and you're completely dispirited. And Bella Baxter, Emma Stone's character, decides to go find money. And so she prostitutes herself to get money and then comes back eating like pastries. I can't remember. It's an eclair.
Fresh Air
Mark Ruffalo Hates The Hulk Suit
Yeah, an eclair. Eating eclair. And you're like, where did this come from? So let's hear some of that scene.
Fresh Air
Mark Ruffalo Hates The Hulk Suit
That's Mark Ruffalo and Emma Stone in Poor Things. As Mark Ruffalo's character, Duncan Wedderburn, sort of falls apart in just the onslaught of Emma Stone's uninhibitedness. So, you know, there's a sex scene montage in Poor Things that I wanted to talk to you about. Like, you've done sex scenes before, but this is sex played for comedy. Like, it's not supposed to be sexy.
Fresh Air
Mark Ruffalo Hates The Hulk Suit
I mean, it's meant to make the audience laugh. I mean, the characters are having a good time, but it's filmed to look awkward and rutting, and your character's even wearing a corset. So can you talk about, like, doing that kind of scene for comedy? Sure.
Fresh Air
Mark Ruffalo Hates The Hulk Suit
So, Mark, I have to ask you about the big green guy. Yeah. Since 2012, you've been playing the Incredible Hulk and, as I said, a bunch of different Marvel movies and TV shows starting with the first Avengers movie. So in 2012, there were just a lot of superhero movies out there and a lot of really good actors were being swept up in them, particularly Robert Downey Jr. playing Iron Man.
Fresh Air
Mark Ruffalo Hates The Hulk Suit
But did you ever think you were going to play a superhero? No.
Fresh Air
Mark Ruffalo Hates The Hulk Suit
To play the Hulk, you have to spend a lot of time acting in a motion capture suit. Did you have any apprehensions about doing that? I hated it.
Fresh Air
Mark Ruffalo Hates The Hulk Suit
That's really interesting. What about just in terms of being expressive with your face? Because Your face is obviously a big tool for an actor. Were you concerned that you would be doing all this work and it wouldn't be accurately captured by the animation?
Fresh Air
Remembering The South African Playwright Who Defied Apartheid
Hey, Sam Sanders here with KCRW, personally inviting you to check out my new podcast. It's an entertainment show that tries to figure out what makes the culture tick and tell the stories behind creators we love. New episodes are out every Friday, wherever you get your podcasts.
Fresh Air
Remembering The South African Playwright Who Defied Apartheid
The consequences for the country would have been enormous.
Fresh Air
Maggie Rogers / Kathleen Hanna
That's Maggie Rogers' song Alaska. You know, Maggie, I'm not sure if it's because the song is called Alaska, but there's always something about the song that like for me feels like there's a coolness to it, like there's cold winds blowing. And I don't know if it's related to this, but you've said that you have synesthesia and the music has a color to you.
Fresh Air
Maggie Rogers / Kathleen Hanna
And so you often when you're writing, you create these like color mood boards for your songs. Could you describe that?
Fresh Air
Maggie Rogers / Kathleen Hanna
Did that also help in order to assert yourself in those situations? Would people try to get you to record things in different ways, but you had all these different ways of showing that you were really in command of these songs and that these were your creations and you knew what was best for them?
Fresh Air
Maggie Rogers / Kathleen Hanna
Well, Maggie Rogers, thanks so much for coming on Fresh Air.
Fresh Air
Maggie Rogers / Kathleen Hanna
Our next guest is the co-founder of the Riot Grrrl movement, musician, writer, and artist Kathleen Hanna. Her new memoir is called Rebel Grrrl, which is also the name of one of the best-known songs by her band Bikini Kill. Kathleen Hanna recently spoke about her life and work with Fresh Air's Anne-Marie Baldonado.
Fresh Air
Maggie Rogers / Kathleen Hanna
This is Fresh Air Weekend. I'm Sam Brigger in for Terry Gross. While in college at NYU, getting a degree in music production, singer-songwriter Maggie Rogers met Pharrell Williams. During his visit to her class, Pharrell heard an early version of Maggie's song Alaska and was stunned by it. The interaction was captured in a video that went viral and propelled her to fame.
Fresh Air
Maggie Rogers / Kathleen Hanna
From WHYY in Philadelphia, this is Fresh Air Weekend. I'm Sam Brigger. Today we continue listening to some of our favorite interviews of 2024. First, we'll hear from singer-songwriter Maggie Rogers. In 2021, Rogers felt burnt out and took a break from music to go to Harvard Divinity School.
Fresh Air
Maggie Rogers / Kathleen Hanna
In 2021, Burnout from the Road, Maggie Rogers took a break and got a master's degree from Harvard Divinity School, where she explored public gatherings and the ethics of power in pop culture. She's been trying to find a way to make the life of a touring musician more sustainable. Let's hear a track from Maggie Rogers' latest album, Don't Forget Me. This is So Sick of Dreaming.
Fresh Air
Maggie Rogers / Kathleen Hanna
We're listening to the interview Fresh Air's Anne-Marie Baldonado recorded with Kathleen Hanna, co-founder of the bands Bikini Kill and La Tigra. Her new memoir is called Rebel Girl. We'll hear more of their conversation after a break. I'm Sam Brigger, and this is Fresh Air Weekend.
Fresh Air
Maggie Rogers / Kathleen Hanna
This is Fresh Air Weekend. I'm Sam Brigger. Back with more of our interview with Kathleen Hanna. She's the frontwoman of the bands Bikini Kill and La Tigra. She helped form the Riot Grrrl movement, challenging the sexist punk scene in the 1990s. Her songs took on sexual assault, misogyny, and female empowerment. Her memoir is called Rebel Girl, My Life as a Feminist Punk.
Fresh Air
Maggie Rogers / Kathleen Hanna
That's So Sick of Dreaming from Maggie Rogers' new album Don't Forget Me. Maggie Rogers, welcome to Fresh Air.
Fresh Air
Maggie Rogers / Kathleen Hanna
So you said that in this album, this is the first time where some of the material doesn't come from your own life, that you're playing with a persona. And I was wondering if that's freeing, because I imagine if you're writing songs about your own life, there'd be this self-imposed pressure to get it right, to be precise with the details, to be authentic to the experience. Yeah.
Fresh Air
Maggie Rogers / Kathleen Hanna
Kathleen Hanna spoke with Fresh Air's Anne-Marie Baldonado. Her memoir is called Rebel Girl, My Life as a Feminist Punk. Fresh Air Weekend is produced by Teresa Madden. Fresh Air's executive producer is Danny Miller. For Terry Gross and Tanya Mosley, I'm Sam Brigger.
Fresh Air
Maggie Rogers / Kathleen Hanna
So without revealing, like, is it that there are certain songs that are more autobiographical than others or that this persona and your own life are sort of woven through each of the songs?
Fresh Air
Maggie Rogers / Kathleen Hanna
You've said that you write songs as a way of processing your life. Does that mean that like once you've written about something that It helps you come to a resolution, like you don't have to think about that part of your life as much.
Fresh Air
Maggie Rogers / Kathleen Hanna
Well, you mentioned nostalgia, and I wanted to ask you about that. When I first listened to the album, I was like, oh, this is really nostalgic. This is interesting. But then I listened to so much over the last two weeks, and you've been writing nostalgic songs since you were like 16 or 17 years old.
Fresh Air
Maggie Rogers / Kathleen Hanna
So I was wondering, do you think that that's just you're inherently a nostalgic person, or do you think it's this process that you have of making sense of your life is inevitably going to have like a nostalgic aspect to it.
Fresh Air
Maggie Rogers / Kathleen Hanna
Also punk pioneer Kathleen Hanna. With her band Bikini Kill, she helped form a movement challenging the misogyny and punk in the 90s.
Fresh Air
Maggie Rogers / Kathleen Hanna
So Maggie, you know, you're just one of a handful of pop stars who've gotten their master's degree from Harvard Divinity School. What was it that you were hoping to get from this program? I mean, it's not a theology school at this point.
Fresh Air
Maggie Rogers / Kathleen Hanna
But clearly it has to do with some sort of element of spirituality, and that seems tethered to your understanding of what music is like and performance. So what were you hoping to sort of figure out when you were writing your thesis?
Fresh Air
Maggie Rogers / Kathleen Hanna
If you're just joining us, our guest is Maggie Rogers. Her new album is Don't Forget Me. We'll hear more of our conversation after a break. I'm Sam Brigger, and this is Fresh Air Weekend.
Fresh Air
Maggie Rogers / Kathleen Hanna
This is Fresh Air Weekend. I'm Sam Brigger. Let's get back to my interview with singer-songwriter Maggie Rogers. This interview was recorded in May, soon after the release of her album Don't Forget Me. Rogers took a break from the touring life of a musician in 2021 to attend Harvard Divinity School, where she graduated with a master's in religion and public life.
Fresh Air
Maggie Rogers / Kathleen Hanna
She was interested in examining the spirituality of public gatherings and the ethics of power in pop culture. So Maggie, you know, the moment of your discovery was filmed and went viral. You were a student at NYU majoring in music production. Your class was visited by Pharrell Williams. He came to sort of listen and give you some notes about what you guys were doing.
Fresh Air
Maggie Rogers / Kathleen Hanna
You played him an early version of your song, Alaska. And he was blown away by it. It's sweet because you both look kind of nervous and shy and like you're not sure whether you should like be seeing what he's thinking about your music. Right. Like obviously that's such an important moment in your career and partly fomented your success.
Fresh Air
Maggie Rogers / Kathleen Hanna
But like is there a part of you that sometimes wishes that that video hadn't gone viral, that that was a moment that was more yours than everyone else's?
Fresh Air
Maggie Rogers / Kathleen Hanna
Right, because you've been performing for a long time. You've been writing music for a long time.
Fresh Air
Maggie Rogers / Kathleen Hanna
Would you still be wearing that necklace that's made of elk hair?
Fresh Air
Best Of: Amanda Knox / 'Adolescence' Co-Creator & Actor Stephen Graham
In the historical drama A Thousand Blows, Stephen Graham plays a bare-knuckle boxer in Victorian London, prone to rage and more likely to beat you up than have a conversation with you. The show was created by Stephen Knight, who also created Peaky Blinders, something you may have caught Stephen Graham in in its final season, playing the character of Union Man Hayden Stagg.
Fresh Air
Best Of: Amanda Knox / 'Adolescence' Co-Creator & Actor Stephen Graham
The other show that Stephen Graham is in is Adolescence, one he co-created. It's a four-part miniseries following what happens to a family when their 13-year-old son is arrested for murdering a girl from his school. It's a devastating show, very difficult to watch, and very difficult to stop watching. Graham plays the father, Eddie, trying his best to be a good parent, but maybe not doing enough.
Fresh Air
Best Of: Amanda Knox / 'Adolescence' Co-Creator & Actor Stephen Graham
Adolescence as a show is not interested so much in who is guilty, but why do these kinds of things happen? Is it the family's fault? Is it bullying? Is it part of a kind of toxic masculinity young boys can find on social media while they're sitting alone, supposedly safe, in their own bedrooms? The show is remarkable in many ways, but one of them is technical. Each episode is a one-take.
Fresh Air
Best Of: Amanda Knox / 'Adolescence' Co-Creator & Actor Stephen Graham
There are no edits. The camera is turned on at the beginning of the episode and turned off at the end. They're like plays but moving throughout different locations and scenes. It adds an urgency to the drama. Before we start talking, let's hear a scene from Adolescence.
Fresh Air
Best Of: Amanda Knox / 'Adolescence' Co-Creator & Actor Stephen Graham
This is from the first episode, where the police have raided the family's home, arrested the son Jamie, and taken him to the police station. Here's Stephen Graham, who is in shock, is asking Jamie's court-appointed lawyer, played by Mark Stanley, what he can do in this moment of crisis.
Fresh Air
Best Of: Amanda Knox / 'Adolescence' Co-Creator & Actor Stephen Graham
That's a scene from Adolescence starring my guest Stephen Graham. Stephen Graham, welcome to Fresh Air.
Fresh Air
Best Of: Amanda Knox / 'Adolescence' Co-Creator & Actor Stephen Graham
Thank you. Thank you.
Fresh Air
Best Of: Amanda Knox / 'Adolescence' Co-Creator & Actor Stephen Graham
Stephen Graham, thank you so much for coming on Fresh Air.
Fresh Air
'Adolescence' Co-Creator/Actor Asks Not Whodunnit, But Why
Like, as an actor, how hard is that to go through? I guess, like, is there an aftermath that you have to reckon with after doing that kind of performance?
Fresh Air
'Adolescence' Co-Creator/Actor Asks Not Whodunnit, But Why
There are no edits. The camera is turned on at the beginning of the episode and turned off at the end. They're like plays but moving throughout different locations and scenes. It adds an urgency to the drama. You may have first seen Stephen Graham in the Guy Ritchie movie Snatch, playing the role of Tommy, Jason Statham's sidekick.
Fresh Air
'Adolescence' Co-Creator/Actor Asks Not Whodunnit, But Why
His breakout role was playing Combo, a white nationalist skinhead in This Is England. He's been in lots of other movies and TV shows, but some recent memorable ones were his portrayal of Al Capone in Broadway Empire and as a mafia and union head in Martin Scorsese's movie The Irishman, where he steals some scenes from no less an actor than Al Pacino himself.
Fresh Air
'Adolescence' Co-Creator/Actor Asks Not Whodunnit, But Why
If you're just joining us, we're speaking with actor Stephen Graham, who stars in two new shows, Adolescence on Netflix and A Thousand Blows on Hulu. He'll be back after a short break. I'm Sam Brigger, and this is Fresh Air.
Fresh Air
'Adolescence' Co-Creator/Actor Asks Not Whodunnit, But Why
Stephen, I wanted to talk briefly with you about A Thousand Blows. You're playing actually a real-life person named Henry Sugar Goodson, who was a bare-knuckle boxer in Victorian London. And I just wanted to play a scene from the show. You have been undefeated, but there is this newcomer from Jamaica named Hezekiah Mosko. And...
Fresh Air
'Adolescence' Co-Creator/Actor Asks Not Whodunnit, But Why
When you're fighting him, it looks like you're going to lose but someone in your corner trips him and you're declared the winner even though it was unfair. But you're really shaken by this – the fact that you thought you were going to lose so you want to fight him again. So in this scene, Hezekiah who's played by Malachi Kirby comes into your bar.
Fresh Air
'Adolescence' Co-Creator/Actor Asks Not Whodunnit, But Why
You're training in the back and he talks to your brother who says like, look, if you fall in the third round, I'll pay you. And Hezekiah doesn't like that so he calls to you out in the back.
Fresh Air
'Adolescence' Co-Creator/Actor Asks Not Whodunnit, But Why
Before we start talking, let's hear a scene from Adolescence. This is from the first episode, where the police have raided the family's home, arrested the son Jamie, and taken him to the police station. Here's Stephen Graham, who is in shock, is asking Jamie's court-appointed lawyer, played by Mark Stanley, what he can do in this moment of crisis. Excuse me, mate.
Fresh Air
'Adolescence' Co-Creator/Actor Asks Not Whodunnit, But Why
That's Stephen Graham in the show A Thousand Blows. Stephen, you know, this character you're playing, Sugar Goodson, is an incredibly closed-off person. He's prone to rages. Like, he's... Something will click in him and he'll beat people to death, even if they're people he loves. And, you know, this could have been a pretty one-dimensional character. Like, play them as just a monster.
Fresh Air
'Adolescence' Co-Creator/Actor Asks Not Whodunnit, But Why
But you bring out... And some humanity in him. And I just, can you just talk about like finding the complexity of the character?
Fresh Air
'Adolescence' Co-Creator/Actor Asks Not Whodunnit, But Why
You were probably on a very restrictive diet, probably like a lot of proteins and stuff like that and eating the same things day after day. It sounds like you've kept your physique up, so congratulations on that. But when you were done filming, do you remember like the first thing you ate that was like a milkshake or something like that?
Fresh Air
'Adolescence' Co-Creator/Actor Asks Not Whodunnit, But Why
You also said that shoes are really important to your characters. Yeah.
Fresh Air
'Adolescence' Co-Creator/Actor Asks Not Whodunnit, But Why
Well, if you're just joining us, we're speaking with actor Stephen Graham, who stars in two shows right now, one on Netflix, Adolescence, and the other on Hulu, A Thousand Blows. We'll be back after a short break. This is Fresh Air. Steven, I wanted to go back a little bit to one of your early successes, which is the movie This Is England from 2006.
Fresh Air
'Adolescence' Co-Creator/Actor Asks Not Whodunnit, But Why
And you play a racist and violent prone skinhead named Combo. And there's a pretty famous speech in the movie that's heavily infused with white nationalist ideology. We're not going to play it because I think there's an F word in every sentence. So there'd just be lots of bleeps.
Fresh Air
'Adolescence' Co-Creator/Actor Asks Not Whodunnit, But Why
But I imagine in an acting career, there's a lot of times where you have to espouse beliefs as a character that you don't hold yourself. But I was wondering if this one... may have been particularly hard, obviously in part because it's just racist, but also because you have a multiracial background and one of your grandfathers is from Jamaica.
Fresh Air
'Adolescence' Co-Creator/Actor Asks Not Whodunnit, But Why
Did that make playing this character particularly difficult for you?
Fresh Air
'Adolescence' Co-Creator/Actor Asks Not Whodunnit, But Why
You grew up just outside of Liverpool in Kirby. And did you have to deal with issues of racism as a child coming from a mixed family?
Fresh Air
'Adolescence' Co-Creator/Actor Asks Not Whodunnit, But Why
That's a scene from Adolescence starring my guest Stephen Graham. Stephen Graham, welcome to Fresh Air.
Fresh Air
'Adolescence' Co-Creator/Actor Asks Not Whodunnit, But Why
You said your stepfather helped you sort of with your cultural and racial identity. He also helped you when you told your family you wanted to be an actor. Do you have this great story of him taking you to the video store and renting like all these great movies? Yeah. Yeah, he did.
Fresh Air
'Adolescence' Co-Creator/Actor Asks Not Whodunnit, But Why
So the show Adolescence was actually your idea. You came to your co-creator, Jack Thorne, with the idea. What was it that you were thinking about that you wanted to explore on the screen?
Fresh Air
'Adolescence' Co-Creator/Actor Asks Not Whodunnit, But Why
And I guess that one of the things is that you're exploring why, but it's not a didactic show. You sort of let the feelings and the issues sort of stew there, but you're not resolving them.
Fresh Air
'Adolescence' Co-Creator/Actor Asks Not Whodunnit, But Why
In the historical drama A Thousand Blows, Stephen Graham plays a bare-knuckle boxer in Victorian London, prone to rage and more likely to beat you up than have a conversation with you. The show was created by Stephen Knight, who also created Peaky Blinders, something you may have caught Stephen Graham in in its final season, playing the character of Union Man Hayden Stagg.
Fresh Air
'Adolescence' Co-Creator/Actor Asks Not Whodunnit, But Why
So your character, Eddie, is a successful businessman. He has a plumbing business. He's lifted himself up in the world. He's trying to be a good husband and a good father. And you say that you based him to some degree on your uncle's and your friend's fathers. What was it about them that you took?
Fresh Air
'Adolescence' Co-Creator/Actor Asks Not Whodunnit, But Why
So Eddie is an interesting character because he can be very emotional, but he's also not really in touch with his emotions. Like they kind of have their way with him.
Fresh Air
'Adolescence' Co-Creator/Actor Asks Not Whodunnit, But Why
The other show that Stephen Graham is in is Adolescence, one he co-created. It's a four-part miniseries following what happens to a family when their 13-year-old son is arrested for murdering a girl from his school. It's a devastating show, very difficult to watch, and very difficult to stop watching. Graham plays the father, Eddie, trying his best to be a good parent, but maybe not doing enough.
Fresh Air
'Adolescence' Co-Creator/Actor Asks Not Whodunnit, But Why
So just talking about the sort of technical issue, as I said, like each of these episodes is one take. There's no editing. This is similar to a movie that you did a few years back called Boiling Point, which takes place in a restaurant. It's a great film. But it's one location. But here, like in this first episode, you – Start in the family home and then you drive to the station.
Fresh Air
'Adolescence' Co-Creator/Actor Asks Not Whodunnit, But Why
The camera's following you and then you have to get all the other actors from the house to the station. Like talk about some of the technical things that you had to figure out.
Fresh Air
'Adolescence' Co-Creator/Actor Asks Not Whodunnit, But Why
Because they are kind of like little plays.
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'Adolescence' Co-Creator/Actor Asks Not Whodunnit, But Why
Owen Cooper, who plays your son, Jamie?
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'Adolescence' Co-Creator/Actor Asks Not Whodunnit, But Why
Which was an actual location with hundreds of kids walking around. Yeah.
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'Adolescence' Co-Creator/Actor Asks Not Whodunnit, But Why
Adolescence as a show is not interested so much in who is guilty, but why do these kinds of things happen? Is it the family's fault? Is it bullying? Is it part of a kind of toxic masculinity young boys can find on social media while they're sitting alone, supposedly safe, in their own bedrooms? The show is remarkable in many ways, but one of them is technical. Each episode is a one-take.
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'Adolescence' Co-Creator/Actor Asks Not Whodunnit, But Why
Would you know after doing all your takes that you were kind of leaning towards one that you would eventually use or?
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'Adolescence' Co-Creator/Actor Asks Not Whodunnit, But Why
I wanted to play another clip from the show, and this comes from episode four, which is really about the fallout that the family is dealing with having their son accused of murder. It's a really devastating episode, and I wanted to play a part of – a scene between your character and your wife, who's played by Christine Tremarco.
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'Adolescence' Co-Creator/Actor Asks Not Whodunnit, But Why
And, like, you're basically trying to figure out, like, how did we get here? How did things go so wrong? And what could you have possibly done differently? So let's hear that scene.
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'Adolescence' Co-Creator/Actor Asks Not Whodunnit, But Why
That's from Adolescence, the final episode of the show. This episode is devastating. And the show is going to stay with me, I think, forever, a very long time. And it's really hard to watch. It's really well made. It's really compelling. But you go through a lot of very intense emotions in this episode. Like you have a complete breakdown at one point.
Fresh Air
At 3 Years Old, David Tennant Knew He Wanted To Be Doctor Who
He also hosted the BAFTA Awards for the past two years, Great Britain's version of the Oscars, this year opening the ceremony singing the song 500 Miles in a bespoke black jacket and kilt suit. And he was hilarious to watch playing a version of himself in the streaming comedy staged with Michael Sheehan, one of the few good things to come out of the COVID pandemic.
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At 3 Years Old, David Tennant Knew He Wanted To Be Doctor Who
signify nothing okay so that's from the film version of Macbeth um so you know I'm wearing headphones now so I feel like I'm sort of experiencing what that would have been like for the audience because you are really whispering and I guess I was wondering like if you were doing that in a more traditional theater sense and you had to project to the cheap seats like how do you approach that same speech in those sort of two different scenarios
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At 3 Years Old, David Tennant Knew He Wanted To Be Doctor Who
And how many times did you do the play? Oh, 150 or something. So every time it feels different?
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At 3 Years Old, David Tennant Knew He Wanted To Be Doctor Who
Our guest is David Tennant. He'll be back after a short break. I'm Sam Brigger, and this is Fresh Air.
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At 3 Years Old, David Tennant Knew He Wanted To Be Doctor Who
David Tennant also has a podcast called David Tennant Does a Podcast With, where you fill in the name of the guest from that episode, often an actor he has worked with. A third season of the podcast released this year, and while we might have said, hey, David Tennant, stay in your lane. There's enough long-format interview shows out there.
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At 3 Years Old, David Tennant Knew He Wanted To Be Doctor Who
So, David, you grew up outside of Glasgow in Paisley. Your father was a Presbyterian minister. So do you remember your father's sermons? Were they fiery or more contemplative?
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At 3 Years Old, David Tennant Knew He Wanted To Be Doctor Who
But he was a good preacher, yeah. Well, he must have been because for a year, he served as the moderator of the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland, which is basically like the highest position in the church.
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At 3 Years Old, David Tennant Knew He Wanted To Be Doctor Who
He also had a TV show called That's the Spirit that he co-hosted.
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At 3 Years Old, David Tennant Knew He Wanted To Be Doctor Who
Instead, we decided that this would be a good opportunity to have him on our long-format interview show to ask him about his life and career. So David Tennant, welcome to Fresh Air. Thank you very much for having me. You did two seasons of your podcast ending in 2020, but then you came back last month with the third season. Why did you come back now?
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At 3 Years Old, David Tennant Knew He Wanted To Be Doctor Who
I have a hard time believing the story, but it's been told many times. Oh, come on. What's this? At the age of three, you told your family that you wanted to be an actor because you wanted to play Doctor Who.
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At 3 Years Old, David Tennant Knew He Wanted To Be Doctor Who
Well, first of all, just the wish fulfillment that you were able to achieve in your adulthood playing one of the most famous Doctor Whos. But also, like, did you at the age of three understand that Doctor Who was an actor? Like, did you want to act as Doctor Who? Did you want to be Doctor Who? Yeah.
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At 3 Years Old, David Tennant Knew He Wanted To Be Doctor Who
Do you remember what was so captivating about the show to you?
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At 3 Years Old, David Tennant Knew He Wanted To Be Doctor Who
So where I grew up, you couldn't just get Doctor Who on the 13 channels that we had.
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At 3 Years Old, David Tennant Knew He Wanted To Be Doctor Who
I don't know if televisions were the same.
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At 3 Years Old, David Tennant Knew He Wanted To Be Doctor Who
We had three. But there was this other dial where you could – it was kind of like a radio dial where you could dial in – like farther television stations and sometimes I could dial in like the out of state public television show that did have Doctor Who and the things that I remember about it was first that it was really scary like the monsters were scary and the theme music terrified me
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At 3 Years Old, David Tennant Knew He Wanted To Be Doctor Who
But then the thing that I also noticed was like sometimes I would notice how cheaply made the show was. Like why are all these sci-fi futuristic characters wearing clothes that look like they were borrowed from like Masterpiece Theater? And then in all of these science fiction or futuristic sets, there are always these drapes everywhere like blocking off sections of the stage. I don't know.
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At 3 Years Old, David Tennant Knew He Wanted To Be Doctor Who
So those were my early memories of it.
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At 3 Years Old, David Tennant Knew He Wanted To Be Doctor Who
Well, let's hear you from Doctor Who. This is from your first big scene. You've just been regenerated. This would happen. It's sort of like the character would be reincarnated, which was a convenient way to have new actors play this role. And so you're reintroducing yourself to your traveling companion played by Billy Piper and some other characters.
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At 3 Years Old, David Tennant Knew He Wanted To Be Doctor Who
And you're also surrounded by some pretty tough looking aliens. Let's hear this. Now, first things first. Be honest.
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At 3 Years Old, David Tennant Knew He Wanted To Be Doctor Who
That's our guest David Tennant as Doctor Who in his first big scene. So you're asking, you're like, who am I there? One of the things that I really liked about your portrayal of of the Doctor was this unbridled enthusiasm that you brought to the character.
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At 3 Years Old, David Tennant Knew He Wanted To Be Doctor Who
But here you are at this point, you've been classically trained, you went to the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Dance, and now you're playing this important British pop figure. How did all of the things that you had learned and the ways that you've trained help you sort of embody this role?
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At 3 Years Old, David Tennant Knew He Wanted To Be Doctor Who
Well, it's pretty remarkable how much the show has given you. Again, like it's sort of this great wish fulfillment. You also met your wife, Georgia, on the show. She actually played your daughter in an episode.
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At 3 Years Old, David Tennant Knew He Wanted To Be Doctor Who
She's an adult character in the show. She's an adult character, yes, exactly. And George's father, your father-in-law, was a different incarnation of Doctor Who.
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At 3 Years Old, David Tennant Knew He Wanted To Be Doctor Who
When you go into these interviews, like, do you have a specific agenda? Like, are you when you're like, oh, Olivia Colman, I've always wanted to know this about her? Or do you sometimes think about things in your own career which have puzzled you that gives you an opportunity to ask someone else who does the same work?
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At 3 Years Old, David Tennant Knew He Wanted To Be Doctor Who
Our guest is actor David Tennant. More after a short break. This is Fresh Air.
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At 3 Years Old, David Tennant Knew He Wanted To Be Doctor Who
You've also played a bunch of villains in your career. And one that particularly stays with me is the supervillain Kilgrave from the Marvel TV show Jessica Jones. And Kilgrave basically can have people do whatever he wants. He can just command them. He abuses this ability and Very sadistic ways, taking away consent from women, like telling people, like, if I'm late, carve your face off.
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At 3 Years Old, David Tennant Knew He Wanted To Be Doctor Who
And, you know, this character is charmless and like really repugnant. Can you talk about how you found a way to play him?
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At 3 Years Old, David Tennant Knew He Wanted To Be Doctor Who
Speaking about coping with being a celebrity, you tell a story that someone asked you for an autograph while you were naked in a shower at the gym.
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At 3 Years Old, David Tennant Knew He Wanted To Be Doctor Who
on three seasons of the show staged with Michael Sheen.
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At 3 Years Old, David Tennant Knew He Wanted To Be Doctor Who
Oh, yeah. This show largely takes place, at least it seems to, I don't know if it was filmed this way, but as a series of Zoom calls between you and Michael Sheen and your respective spouses and other people. At least in the first season, you're rehearsing this play. during COVID, hoping that when the lockdown is over, you'll have this thing ready to go.
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At 3 Years Old, David Tennant Knew He Wanted To Be Doctor Who
And of course, that doesn't work out so well. So how did this show come about?
Fresh Air
At 3 Years Old, David Tennant Knew He Wanted To Be Doctor Who
Scottish actor David Tennant's list of accomplishments is as long as it has varied. Perhaps best known for playing Doctor Who, he is also considered one of the finest Shakespearean actors of his generation, as you can see now in the film of his Macbeth, which was staged in 2023, with Tennant playing the lead and Cush Jumbo as Lady Macbeth. It's now streaming on Marquee TV.
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At 3 Years Old, David Tennant Knew He Wanted To Be Doctor Who
He was quite funny in the show.
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At 3 Years Old, David Tennant Knew He Wanted To Be Doctor Who
I have to say that when I first heard about the show, I didn't think I was going to enjoy watching it. Oh, no. It sounds desperately dull.
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At 3 Years Old, David Tennant Knew He Wanted To Be Doctor Who
We were all living our lives on Zoom. And the last thing I wanted to do was watch a TV show about Zoom. However, it quickly won me over because it's so funny. I thought we would play a scene from the show. Oh, good. To set this up, Michael Sheehan is irritated with you at this point. That's that track. Yeah. Because originally you were going to do this play with someone else.
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At 3 Years Old, David Tennant Knew He Wanted To Be Doctor Who
So he was the second choice. So you guys are doing a reading. And I think we'll also hear Simon Evans in this. And he's desperate to keep things on track. But Michael Sheehan is basically trying to pick a fight with you. And you have had a line where you use the word heard. And he's questioning how you're saying that word. So let's hear that.
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At 3 Years Old, David Tennant Knew He Wanted To Be Doctor Who
That's a scene from the show staged with Michael Sheehan and our guest David Tennant. David Tennant, there's so many times watching that show where I just laughed out loud. You guys have such a great rapport. Can you talk about the version of yourself that you're playing in the show?
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At 3 Years Old, David Tennant Knew He Wanted To Be Doctor Who
He is also memorably played Hamlet and Richard II. You probably watched him as the haunted and brooding detective in the British crime drama Broadchurch, and maybe even in the American adaptation called Grace Point, where he plays more or less the same role but with an American accent.
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At 3 Years Old, David Tennant Knew He Wanted To Be Doctor Who
Well, it's so funny. Just your look on the show, you just look stupefied with boredom the whole time. Your mouth is hanging open. Well, it was a particular time, wasn't it? It certainly was. One of the funny sight gags is that you keep getting caught drinking out of this mug with your face on it. And they keep saying, is that you on that mug?
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At 3 Years Old, David Tennant Knew He Wanted To Be Doctor Who
So you said you were home. You and your wife, Georgia, have five kids. I have two kids. And it was very tough to sort of keep them busy, keep them on their schooling during COVID. What was it like with five? Like, was your house just crazy all the time?
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At 3 Years Old, David Tennant Knew He Wanted To Be Doctor Who
David Tennant has also been his share of screen villains, including real-life serial killer Dennis Nilsen in the miniseries Dez, Kilgrave in the Marvel TV show Jessica Jones, one of the most repugnant characters I have ever seen, as well as the smaller but memorable, lip-licking Barty Crouch Jr. in Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire.
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At 3 Years Old, David Tennant Knew He Wanted To Be Doctor Who
So I wanted to talk to you a little bit about your work doing Shakespeare. Your version of Macbeth that I think was originally staged in 2023 is now available to stream on Marquee TV. And you star with Kush Jumbo as Lady Macbeth. Yeah. This is a very minimalist staging. The stage itself is pretty much like this white platform.
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At 3 Years Old, David Tennant Knew He Wanted To Be Doctor Who
And the audience is sort of around the stage. And I noticed watching the film of it that all the audience members were wearing headphones. Why was that?
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At 3 Years Old, David Tennant Knew He Wanted To Be Doctor Who
Let's hear what one of those soliloquies sounds like. This is the famous tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow soliloquy from the end of the play. And you have just discovered that Lady Macbeth has been killed.