One Life: What Johnny Flynn learned from Sir Anthony Hopkins

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The stars shared the role of war hero, Nicholas Winton, in their new movie. Report by Nelsonj. Like us on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/itn and follow us on Twitter at http://twitter.com/itn

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00:00 Johnny Flynn. I'll start off with the more serious stuff with this. One Life, it's a

00:05 really affecting movie, I really enjoyed it. And it gave me a thought that I hadn't had

00:10 for a long time, which I think the older I get the more uncomfortable I feel with the

00:16 subject matter of some movies like this. And I don't know whether it's because it's harder

00:21 to separate the kind of sepia-toned history of events like this in movies, the older you

00:29 get and the more you're bombarded with the real world copy and paste monstrosities which

00:36 seem to be just going on all the time. It's harder to kind of go, "Oh, this is a nice

00:40 film that reminds me of a thing we've got through." And I just wondered from an actor's

00:44 point of view, does that kind of stuff stay with you? Is that more difficult when you

00:49 do something like this to kind of shake off?

00:52 Yeah, well, I was just talking about how in between doing the scenes for this film, which

01:02 were if we were in a refugee camp and portraying children being kind of ripped from their parents,

01:11 it's so upsetting. And it's hard to know what to do with yourself in the evenings or in

01:18 between takes. And normally actors kind of huddle together and crack jokes and everything

01:21 felt inappropriate doing this. So there was not a solemn, but there was a sort of sanctity

01:35 around the way we were holding that space to tell this real story and that felt appropriate.

01:43 And it has stayed with me and I found it really affecting watching the film. Normally, when

01:50 you watch your own movies or shows or whatever, you can sort of almost see the edge of the

01:54 set and you remember what it really looked like. But everything like that vanished for

02:00 me. Just a real emotional story came through and I found it very moving.

02:08 Yeah, it reminded me, a lot of people make the comparison to something like Schindler's

02:11 List. I remember watching that as a youngster and thinking, "Oh, this is a really sad thing

02:15 in history and this is a really affecting story." And then I watched this in my 30s,

02:20 having been bombarded with everything that's been going on in the news, Ukraine, Palestine

02:25 and everything. It feels like you're just watching something which we're doomed to see

02:30 forever and ever and ever.

02:31 Let's talk about Nicholas Winton. He's an unconventional hero because he's not meant

02:37 to be this charismatic kind of Hollywood hero type. And I wondered, was that a fun challenge

02:46 as an actor to try and keep that character understated, remove the twinkle, which you

02:54 may be tempted to do when all the cameras are on you?

02:57 Yeah, he's not Errol Flynn. Yeah, absolutely. I think the beauty of this story is that he's

03:06 quite an everyday hero. He looks very unassuming and he was working as a stockbroker in the

03:13 30s in London and he got a call from a friend to go out and see the situation in Czechoslovakia

03:19 and he was horrified. And just because of his principles, he felt compelled to help

03:26 and especially to think about these children. And so it just feels like a very, very important

03:35 story to tell that we need everyday heroes, we need maverick thinking, we need rule breakers.

03:41 And he manipulated the system. He had to play the Nazis, the Czech government and the British

03:48 government to get the visas approved. But he did it. He saved so many lives.

03:55 And sharing a character with Sir Anthony Hopkins, which must be kind of a bizarre, exciting

04:01 privilege for any actor. I heard that he filmed his block first and you came and kind of observed

04:09 and saw some of the mannerisms. I wondered how kind of collaborative was it with you

04:14 guys to create this man on screen? Did you just try and reverse engineer the bits you

04:18 liked or did you guys discuss how you were going to give the same energy?

04:25 We did talk a bit. There wasn't very much time. We didn't have a huge amount of money

04:33 or time. So when I was watching him on set, they were under pressure to make the day and

04:41 do what they needed to do. But it was really, really useful to just watch him. And I've

04:48 done other projects where I'm sharing a character with another actor and we're doing alternate

04:54 scenes or different days, but we're there in the same place together and we can spend

04:58 more time together. There wasn't that much time, but it was invaluable to watch him.

05:04 And then after they'd finished that block with him, James, the director, sent me everything

05:11 that they'd shot of Anthony so I could just watch it. And when I was out in Prague doing

05:16 my stuff, I'd have that on my phone in the mornings on the way to work. And it was just

05:22 really useful to keep a hold of a sense of him.

05:26 And not the only great actor. You obviously act alongside Alan Bonham Carter, two of our

05:31 finest from these aisles over the last few decades, really. You're still a young actor

05:40 but with a wealth of experience. But did you feel like you learned something or you took

05:45 some kind of golden nuggets away from that experience?

05:48 Yeah, you always learn from anyone, from other brilliant actors, but especially two such

05:56 fantastic people as them. I mean, Helena's just tremendous fun. She creates an atmosphere

06:05 of laughter and fun wherever she is and she brought that to her character as well. Anyway,

06:13 it was just such a privilege to be involved.

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