Henry Cavill, Luke Evans - 'Immortals' Interview Black Film

Immortals: An Interview with Henry Cavill and Luke Evans

by Wilson Morales Black Film

November 8, 2011


Coming out this week is ‘Immortals,’ one of the most anticipated films of the year.

Directed by Tarsem Singh, the film stars Henry Cavill, Stephen Dorff, Isabel Lucas, Freida Pinto, Luke Evans, Kellan Lutz, John Hurt, and Mickey Rourke.

Theseus (played by Cavill) is a mortal man chosen by Zeus (played by Evans) to lead the fight against the ruthless King Hyperion (played by Rourke), who is on a rampage across Greece to obtain a weapon that can destroy humanity.

For Cavill and Evans, the two actors are making the most of the film since their next projects will take each to new heights in their careers. Cavill will playing the latest Superman in ‘Man of Steel,’ while Evans, who played Apollo in ‘Clash of the Titans,’ has a role in ‘The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey.’

While promoting the film in LA, actors Cavill and Evans spoke to Blackfilm.com about their roles in the film.


Everybody loved you in ‘Tamara Drewe.’

Luke Evans: Did they? I’m 30 pounds lighter from that film to this one. How do you answer that question really? It was very fun, wasn’t it? We enjoyed it. Hard, hard work but I think the final product speaks for itself. I’m very proud of it.

Do you feel badass while you’re doing it?

LE: Totally. Absolutely badass.

Henry Cavill: Badass and hungry.

LE: Sore and aching but definitely badass.

Were there any injuries?

LE: I now have a bone that’s raised on my shoulder which I never had before which is like a scapula or clavicle tear. It’s never gone down. I just have this strange structural skeletal problem now, thanks to Immortals.


HC: Nothing dramatic. I mean, a few stones in my feet, the bottom of my feet but nothing which put me out of work.

You took all the safety precautions?

LE: Well, a lot of training, a lot of prep before you start something like this because it was physically demanding. There was no faking any of it and they knew that so we were put through our paces and Henry especially, a huge amount of work.

HC: Yeah, six months of work. Due to the nature of the training, which was a very intense style training from a very talented martial artist called Roger Yuan, part of the training was about flexibility as well because due to the nature of martial arts, you’re going to need flexibility. With all the fight sequences and everything, it was essential to do all the stretching beforehand. Otherwise you would have ended up pulling stuff and doing damage to muscles. So therefore, during shooting, I was prepared if I did sustain any minor injuries, they healed quickly and I did not sustain any major injuries, for the official answer.


Did all that discipline inform your performances?

LE: Yeah, I’d say. I trained for seven weeks and I had to do it in fast paced training. I didn’t have long and it makes you stand differently. You look yourself in the mirror and you look different. I saw my body change in seven weeks. It does definitely do something to inform your character in a sort of subliminal way. It definitely had an effect for me.

HC: Yeah, it’s like wearing a permanent costume. No really, before work when you look in the mirror, or even before looking in the mirror you do feel different. A part of the character is more expressive in you and so when you’re in that kind of shape, I essentially was wearing my costume because I barely had a costume. Yeah, it certainly does help.


Is part of the mythology that it looks effortless when Theseus picks up and kicks ass, when it really takes weeks and months and hours before the scene?

HC: I think like anything which involves fighting, it’s not the actual fight which is the hard work. It’s all the prep that goes into it. Throughout history, there are stories of epic battles where men have dug very deeply and women have dug very deeply into their willpower to continue fighting. But the only reason why they’re there in the first place is the years of training to get to that place and to be told a story about.

LE: And Theseus was trained since a child by old man Zeus. So he sort of has it all there. He has all the capabilities because he has been trained since a child. So when the button is pushed, he just gets up and does it. It’s all there waiting to be used.

HC: Anything physical, it’s all about the prep anyway. You may see the guy in the UFC ring fighting and it may seem effortless, his abilities, his kicks, his punches, whatever, but it’s actually the years of training beforehand where the real work is.


When you first read the script, what jumped out at you?

HC: Tarsem. When I first read the script myself, I read it, wasn’t that convinced initially. The director said, “I’ve spoken to Tarsem, you’ve got to go meet this guy.” And I did and after I walked out of that room, I said, “I want to do this movie. I really, really want it.”

LE: He’s a good salesman. A fantastic salesman.

HC: Went through the audition process. Yeah, he’s made this movie.

How did he sell the movie? What happened in that meeting?

HC: He had his visuals all set. He had his passion.

LE: And a checkbook.


HC: He basically had an idea of what he wanted and that in itself, when you walk into a room and you have a director who’s actually genuinely in charge of what he wants, you feel safe. You think okay, great, I want to be a part of this because I know no matter what, I’m going to get to do my bit, and you’re going to do your bit and we’re going to work together, as opposed to it being “Well, we don’t really know what we’re doing but it’s kind of like this and therefore you’ll fit in here somewhere but we might change a lot of stuff up.”

LE: I think in a movie like this, on paper it can sometimes be a little bit too much to swallow. You’re thinking wow. Then like Henry said, you meet Tarsem and he has all the answers. For me, when he told me that he wanted me to play Zeus, I was like, “That’s always been played by an old man, like Lawrence Olivier or Liam Neeson.” He convinced me, he said, “No, you can do this. This is a new take.” And you just go okay, I surrender, I’ll follow you and you’ll lead me. That’s what we had to do in this film.


How did the script change when you were on the set?

HC: There were a lot of changes, yeah, and I think as Luke said earlier on today, it was an organic process. That in itself is the nature of these things. When you’re dealing with creative minds, it should be organic and it should have the opportunity to evolve as necessary. Working with someone like Tarsem and other actors like Luke, it makes it a wonderful process and exciting and interesting.

LE: He was very open to the dialogue. There was always a constant dialogue between the actor and the director. He was open to that. He wanted us to feel natural in what we were delivering off the page and if it didn’t sound right, or if there were certain words we wanted to change, he was actually happy for us to do that.


This and your future projects are interpretations of myths. How do you wrap your brains around playing large archetypal characters?

LE: It’s just a role at the end of the day. It’s what we do for a living. When you see it on the screen you’re like, ‘Wow,’ you’re overwhelmed by the role that you’ve played. But at the end of the day it’s a role and you approach it as a new challenge, as a new role.

HC: You can’t look at it from the external viewpoint because it can be crushing.

LE: Daunting as well.

HC: You’ve got to go, okay, ‘I’m playing a role.’ And if you approach it any differently from playing any other role — and I’m talking from the place of we approach any role with the same kind of dedication no matter what — if you approach it any differently than any other role then you’re not going to do a good enough job. Because you’ll be worried about what everyone is thinking about everything as opposed to just acting. Which is what it is.


We’ve seen both of you at Wondercon and Comic-Con and as we’re getting ready to do “Superman” we asked most of our questions of you then but since you’ve actually been on the set and shot has it met your expectations?

HC: It’s been wonderful. Very hard work, exciting and fun, all of those things. I can’t really say any more.

What would each of you personally take away from this experience of working on “Immortals?”

LE: A few things. One of them is a great friendship. That was a fantastic gift that I wasn’t expecting and we’ve remained friends since. Working with Tarsem is really special. The guy is a wonderful human being and invests a lot of energy and passion both off-screen and on-screen. He’s just a really great person, so that was a wonderful thing to get in touch with him too.


HC: Yeah, friendship and any experience on an acting job is good experience because you can take it to the next one. The physical experience was obviously wonderful because it’s prepped me for this physical experience. Which I’ve learned that when you go to this kind of level, it’s no longer about the physical, it’s more about the mental. It’s about the will power to push yourself into that very dark place. You’re standing neat to the precipice and you’ve got that weight on your shoulders and you’re only halfway through the workout and you need to push yourself off and just go into that big fuck-off black hole and keep on pushing and “Immortals” prepped me for that emotionally and mentally in the physical sense — if that makes sense. So, I’m very grateful for that. But besides that, friendship, acting experience and great working with Tarsem.

Well, all this talk about physical prep that pays off, is acting the same way? What sort of prep have you build up at we see on the screen? What has been your prep in developing your acting style?

LE: Learn the lines for a start. Get off the page, that’s the first thing. Then it’s an organic experience isn’t it? You’re working with a director who hopefully has plenty to say about the role that you’re going to play. So you get that information and then create your own back-story and work out the journey that your character is going to go on. I mean when I played Zeus I was playing a father. A father, a God who was thousands of years old, a king. So I just challenged my Granddad and a few older gentlemen that I know and respect and sort of used those things. I think you always pull things from life and it’s good to come from a personal point of view when you take on a role. I think it makes the character way more interesting and believable if you do that.


HC: True. A lot of it is very instinctual as well. So it’s like asking a golf player so what do you do when you swing a club? A lot of it happens as it happens in the moment and as you’re doing it and if someone is saying, ‘So. what choices did you make during that take?’ You wouldn’t be able to answer the question. You’ve got to look back and say, ‘Oh, yeah I see what I did there. You see on the monitor. I did that, and I did this.’ But, as I say, it’s instinctual. There is a certain amount of prep involved with a character which is far from one’s own personality and character, but otherwise, you go with what you’re feeling. Because you can often trust that in the moment.

What was it like working with Mickey in your scenes?

HC: Working with any actor that has that kind of experience is good because you can learn as much as you possibly can from him.

What did you learn from him?

HC: Goodness, I learned that there’s a certain gravitas you can have by doing the smallest things and things you do in your everyday life you often don’t do when you’re acting because you’re concentrating so hard on doing something that you’re actually not doing the natural things. Mickey is pretty good at that.


How are you guys handling the transition between being working actors on projects to being stars of these films that have such intense curiosity and excitement around them. That’s got to be a different experience.

HC: We’re still working actors.

LE: We’re still the same people.

HC: Is it any different? No. There is no difference you’re still doing a job. You’re turning up to work, it’s still a horrible time in the morning, it’s dark when you turn up to work, it’s dark when you leave work and you’re tired and you’re hungry. It’s like any job.

LE: It’s a great job, but it’s a job.

HC: The fact that there is more public attention towards them certainly doesn’t make a difference. There might be more money in the job and so therefore there are a few more luxuries here and there. Which does make a difference. It’s nice when you turn up and you’ve got a proper trailer as opposed to a sort of small very cold box to get dressed in. But it’s still a job, you’re still doing the acting stuff. Just because it’s bigger doesn’t make it any different. And it shouldn’t do either.