Exclusive: James Norton on Planet Health Stories and House of Guinness season 2

The Independent

Transcript

00:00It's lovely to be able to come and celebrate a group of filmmakers who have

00:05been given the license, the opportunity to make some really beautiful, heartfelt

00:10personal stories, personal films. They're entertaining, they provide that

00:16escapism which we look for in movies and any kind of story, but they're also

00:20really important because they've been inspired, they've been

00:22galvanized, mobilized by Bupa in this initiative and I know from the point of

00:28view of doing more producing myself, it's hard to get stuff made now and you have

00:32to have an eye on the commercial and the eyeballs and who's seeing it, which means

00:35that there's less space for your work having that social conscience. When you

00:40inspire filmmakers to make something entirely their own and something which

00:45they feel is important and has that imprint, it's a celebration of my craft,

00:50you know, it's magic. I'm from a family of doctors and so I'm constantly having to

00:54like protect my, you know, they go and save lives and they're like, what did you do

00:57today? So I come to this kind of event and I'm like, well, we made a difference, you know,

01:00film can make a difference. Absolutely, man. And the project effectively highlights a

01:05connection between the planet's health and our own. Can you talk to me about your

01:09experience with that yourself? Yeah, I mean, I grew up in the

01:14countryside. I'm definitely sort of country boy at heart who's found myself in the

01:19city. I spend my whole life trying to bring the country to the city. My house is full of

01:23houseplants. I was very lucky to have a garden in London. But I'm also lucky to

01:27have experienced the power and need I have for nature and the natural world.

01:33And, you know, on a very simple level, I'm a type one diabetic. If I go on a walk,

01:40it levels out my glucose. It makes, I can feel my body and it's literally in a

01:45physical, as exercise often does. It levels me out. It calms that particular piece of my

01:50little ecosystem down. But it also helps my mental health. I calm down. I feel, I feel

01:56alive. I feel, I feel content. I sleep better. If I sleep better, my glucose

02:01levels are better the following day. It's this, you know, it's a cycle. And so I, and

02:05also the more I think about my own health, the more I am also contributing to the

02:10welfare of the collective good. You know, if I eat good food, if I, if I'm ethically

02:15minded about where I source my food from, of course that then, so it's, it's, it's a

02:20no brainer that we, we are, we are born of nature. We, we eat food from the soil. We, we

02:26swim in the rivers. We, we breathe from the, you know what I mean? Like it, we, to kind

02:30of cause, talk about this distinction is, is nonsensical. But if you've grown up in

02:36the city, 60% of the world live in cities, people don't even know what the natural

02:40world is. They've never, some of them never even, a lot of people have never even gone on a

02:44walk in beautiful nature. So it's, it's a very forgivable misconception to separate

02:51them off. But of course, well, this is a brilliant initiative to remind us of the

02:55importance of how we're not separate. And, and the more we tend to the collective

02:59good, the more we help ourselves.

03:00Absolutely. It makes me wonder as well, there's probably people with a lot of, you

03:03know, with various health conditions who aren't aware of the link that this

03:08project will, you know, hopefully shine a light on that and then they can go ahead and

03:12realize there's a big, there's a big link and then they kind of change their lives.

03:15I mean, there are initiatives and I think, you know, these kinds of initiatives, like

03:19organizations like Bupa are brilliant at reminding people who, or introducing people

03:25to the power of time spent in nature, mental health wise, finding space to just breathe,

03:32to stop. You know, London is, every, these cities are so fast and they're, they're designed

03:36to like keep us entertained and distracted and moving, always propelling ourselves forward.

03:40And to go into the, you know, you can't but stand and stop and breathe. And yeah, as you

03:46say, there are so many people who aren't even aware of that power and that opportunity. And

03:49so very important. Do you know what the other, these films really made me proud to be a Londoner

03:54because, you know, this city is huge and sprawling and there are many people who haven't had the,

03:59the, the, the fortune to be out in nature, but there are so many organizations as, you know,

04:05highlighted in the film, which exist in this city, you know, and the access to the marshes

04:10or these amazing parks we have, you know, there's a brilliant film, Rude Boy, and he, he sees a bird

04:17in London and it changes his life. You know, the opportunity to find nature in London is there

04:21and it made me very proud to be from this city particularly.

04:23You know, it's quite rare to look at and it'll be like the kind of kitchen sink grimy side of

04:27Yeah. Well, as the stories often tell.

04:28100%. Yeah. For you as an actor, mental health is obviously very important, especially if you're in,

04:34which you have been in roles that can take a lot out of you. So there's obviously an importance

04:39there as well for you to, to maintain that level. Just want to ask you a bit about some of your past

04:44roles. One in particular, you were on stage in A Little Life a few years ago. Yeah. I'm interested to

04:51know, because that's obviously as intense as it comes as an experience, but what have you kind of

04:55carried with you in the roles that you've done since? Has it kind of changed your outlook as an

05:00actor or kind of how you approach the filming experience? It definitely changed me on a level

05:08which I, I probably keep, I'll probably keep sort of discovering as I can, you know, forever I

05:13imagine. It was, it was a massive moment in both as an actor, but as a human being. I mean, I went to

05:19places physically as a diabetic as well, you know, proved to myself I could do a thing, something I

05:25never even thought was possible before it. But yeah, on a personal level, I, it, it took me to a

05:35place of, the story is one of, of, of, of pain. And it's not exclusively about pain, but the man,

05:43the character Jude St. Francis goes through this extraordinary pain and trauma, but comes out the

05:48other side. And really, it's a story about redemptive love and friendship and how with the right

05:54community around you and the right people, you can conquer really anything, you know, as long as there

06:00is good intention and love and, and good people. And so it is a story of hope. And I think that message

06:08I will cling on to, you know, it's beautiful. And knowing that however bad it gets, hopefully there is

06:16someone out there who will hold you and carry you. And, um, yeah, I don't know how it will change me.

06:22It was, it was a mad one. It was a mad one. And it's still, and it's still, and the weird thing is

06:25I still have an appetite to do it again, which is the weird, I don't know why. I mean, I kind of,

06:29I sort of hated it on one level when I was doing it because it was so hard on everything. It took my

06:33whole life, but I also knew the importance it had and how much it was affecting people. And again,

06:39like tonight, you know, it's so wonderful to be able to celebrate our craft and know that it's,

06:46it's having an impact. And I knew that a little life was having an impact every single time I was

06:51on that stage. And that was, yeah, it just felt very humbling and important. I don't mean it's

06:55lost anyone like the, I mean, just the commitment to doing that multiple times a day. Yeah. Every,

07:01I mean, I don't know how, I just want to sit back and watch TV and films at night. And then you're

07:05like, I got to go on stage. I know, sometimes for eight hours a day, it was mad. I don't know.

07:09I mean, I think the one, I think one thing I learned is I want, I could, I wanted, and also

07:13that the addiction to that flow state was mad, you know, I sort of, I want that back again,

07:18that high. Yeah, I bet, I bet. So, so just after that, you were in something that was a very much

07:24lighter, let's say, but a massive hit for Netflix, House of Guinness. Yeah. That ended on a cliffhanger.

07:30It did. And I kind of, I know Stephen Knight's been giving the big chat, it's going to come back

07:33for multiple seasons. No official announcement yet. Do you know anything? I don't know for

07:38certain. I mean, the, the, you know, the, the, the reaction was very positive. You know,

07:43we had, we had lovely, uh, we, we, we, we screened it in Ireland and Dublin and, and I,

07:48that was the one I was nervous about, you know, taking it as, especially as a man not from Dublin.

07:53A lot of the cast are Irish and, um, we had a lot of their family and friends come and see it as a man,

07:58um, you know, pretending to be, uh, from Dublin. It was, I felt nervous about the reaction of the

08:05Irish and actually to have their, generally most of their commendation was massive. Um, and, you

08:11know, generally across the world, it felt like it was, it felt like the people who found that show

08:15loved it. So I think there's an appetite for a second series. I unfortunately will be the last

08:18person to find out. So, but fingers crossed. Yeah. From where you'll start, you've started a lot of

08:24things. Some have had more success than others. Is there anything that you would like to draw

08:28people's attention to, like a project of yours that maybe didn't get the love that it deserved

08:33at the time or that you view as kind of being a bit underrated? Uh, my whole career, um, every single

08:40week. Could everyone go and watch everything again, please? Um, yeah, there's a, there's a couple.

08:45I mean, I think the one which comes to springs to mind, um, and it was, it was very loved in,

08:52in the kind of community of, uh, of filmmakers within my industry. Um, it was a film called

08:59Mr. Jones and it was directed by Agneska Holland. And Agneska is a powerhouse director. She's

09:04a real author. She's like, you know, one, one of, if not the most celebrated respected

09:08Polish directors of our time right now. And she's like a sort of a pupil of Zanussi and

09:14invited these amazing Polish greats. And she's in, I think she's in, she's older than me.

09:22I don't want to expect how old she is, but she's got this incredible catalog of work.

09:25And I was so lucky to work with her. And when we shot that film, it's basically about a young

09:30man, true story about a young man called Gareth Jones, who, who blew the whistle on the, um,

09:36on the Soviet union when they were enforced collectivization. They were, they were bringing

09:40about forced collectivized farming in Ukraine and as a result caused widespread famine, which

09:46was then called the Holodomor, which killed somewhere between like seven and 15 million

09:51people. It was systematic famine, but because it wasn't, it was, it was sort of, um, it was

09:57about taking food. It's hard to, um, the international community don't recognize it as genocide. And

10:03so it's wild and it's a huge, huge story. And when we shot it, we didn't know how pressing

10:09it was going to be jumped a few years later. We jumped a few years later and there were

10:12images of Russia removing grain from Ukraine. And, and we shot the film, which is set in

10:17the fifties. And it's all, as I say, totally true. Gareth witnessed Russia removing grain,

10:22which then causes famine in Ukraine. The, we shot it in Ukraine. The Ukrainians were so grateful

10:27for that film, that story being told, and it did get seen, but what with the world in the

10:32state that it's in and what's going on in Ukraine right now, the film is more pressing than ever.

10:36And I would love for people to return to it because it's, it's both an inspirational story

10:40about a man's tenacity and courage. There's also a story about the history of that country

10:44and how this thing we're seeing happen has happened before. And it's a cycle and it seems

10:48to keep happening to Ukraine. And, um, so I'm very proud of that on many levels and would

10:53love people to see it again. It's a cracking answer and topical one as well, but thank you

10:57so much for your time, James. Not at all. Great pleasure. Thank you. Nice one. It was good.

11:00Thanks.

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