Im curious what you knew about him…
Ad content continues below
Jeremy Irons:I knew nothing.
Until I talked to a friend of mine.
He said, Oh, yes.
He only retired from the Olympic Committee in the 90s.
And he was not much liked.
He was, I think, quite aggressive and self-opinionated.
Well, that was later in life.
We werent playing that period.
I read about where he came from and what he did.
He was a construction mogul in Chicago.
Obviously, he was a big forceful man who was ideal for the job, had been a sportsman.
Wanted to protect sport.
So I thought he was a pragmatic man.
That he did what he did, that was enough to tell me about him.
Certainly that wasnt in the script.
Yeah, I believe he did.
I believe he cared passionately about sport, about international sport, and about amateur sport.
And we see whats happened with professional sport now.
Its not quite the same.
Theres a great thing about amateur sport; it is purer.
And the athletes are not open to so much pressure with amateur sport.
I do, actually, yes.
I dont know enough about American sport.
I dont actually know about Olympic sport.
I mean everything seems to be taken over by the commercial.
You know, even in the music business.
TakeGlastonbury, for example, how that was when it started and how it is now.
Its this massive thing.
And the whole world seems to be going that way.
I mean travel now, its very hard to find intensely pure places that havent been commercialized.
Commerce seems to be covering every aspect of our lives now.
Which me, because Im a romantic, is sad for me to say.
You said you leaned on Stephen Hopkins and the script for this role.
I may not choose to go that way.
And I started speaking and he said, You cant sound like that.
I said, Well, why not?
He said, Because people just wont accept it.
You sound an absolute prick.
I said, But thats how they talked in the late 40s and 50s.
He said, Yeah, but things have changed.
So one has to be careful.
And those attitudes are very different than now, because now weve got the Holocaust.
In every country thats what the philosophers and the scientists were concentrating on.
We thought, Well, we cant do that.
Suddenly, people say, Oh, no.
we never discussed that.
It was just the Germans.
But, actually it was in the air.
So I said to Stephen, We mustnt make this film knowing whats going to happen.
We must try and make it with the naivete those people had at that time.
I read that this is the first time you two have worked together.
First time I worked with Bill, yeah.
Hes a complete and absolute pleasure.
Id admired him all my life.
Id known him for about the last 30 or 40 years, but not well.
I mean I basically sort of met him at dinner a few times.
Ive always loved his work.
It was an absolute joy to be able to spend the three or four days that we did working.
I was able to watch him and really admire how he works.
How are the two of you different, would you say, in working methods?
Bill is very intellectual.
Hes a bit more neurotic, maybe, than me.
He needs to talk around things a lot.
I tend to be a little bit more instinctive.
And I love that.
Its too easy just to do it on your bottom.
Do you know what I mean?
And hes always a very fine actor.
Well, I put myself in the hands of Zack Snyder, who had helped write the script.
He wanted a very different sort of Alfred.
And I was happy to go along with that.
Michael Caine is wonderful, but hes Michael Caine.
I am a different sort of actor.
I was glad with the choice he made.
Once again, very different.
And I was pleased to take it in a slightly different direction.
What do you see as Alfreds role in this?
To me it seems like hes sort of the grounded one with all these super beings whizzing around him.
And he has many skills, Alfred.
But youll wait and see the film.
Did you enjoy working with Ben?
Yeah, I loved it.
With Zack Snyder, too.
You played the brother of the late Alan RickmansDie Hardcharacter inDie Hard with a Vengeance.
You even played Severus Snape in a parody ofHarry Potter.
But did you know Alan?
I never worked with him.
But I was a great admirer of his work, both as an actor and a director.
I saw a wonderful production he did at the Brooklyn Academy.
I cant remember the name of the play now.
But he was a very fine man and an interesting actor with a great individual quality about him.
Its awful when people your own age suddenly start falling off the perch.
Were you ever aware of that study?
I did hear something about it, yeah.
I dont know what that is, the perfect male voice.
But its nice to hear.
You are also inHigh-Risethis year.
How was working with director Ben Wheatley?
And the film is extraordinary.
I think thats the only way to describe it.
It was a pleasure.
I mean Ballard is not to everyones taste.
But I think the film is very true to the spirit of the book.
And I think probably its better than the book, actually.
So I hope we get distribution here, which Im not sure they have yet.
But it was great to work with him.
And Jeremy Thomas, who is a friend of mine, produced this.
So I was very pleased to do it.
How busy do you like to stay?
I got a bit busy last year.
Ive just finishedAssassins Creed.
And now Im going off to do a play.
Im going off to do ONeillsLong Days Journey into Nightin Bristol at the Old Vic.
And then I go back to do the next Batman.
I hope Ill have a bit of time off.
The older I get, the less busy I like to be.
Raceis out in theaters this Friday (February 19).
