Last month I had an opportunity to interview Joseph Fiennes, the star of such movies as Shakespeare in Love, Luther, and RISEN (in theaters this Friday). He will also — somewhat controversially — play Michael Jackson in a upcoming Sky TV comedy calledElizabeth, Michael, & Marlon (his announcement came after we spoke, so I didn’t get to ask him about this role). Instead we spoke about RISEN, his favorite roles, and Jesus. This interview has been edited for clarity and length.
JV: I know people have said when they’ve played Jesus, they have felt something particularly deep. But just even as participating in that story [RISEN] was there some kind of sense of that?
JF: I’ve walked into a place of worship — you walk into an atmosphere. I don’t know what it is. I don’t know if it’s the incense, the quiet, or it’s centuries of prayer — but it’s filled with something potent. There’s an atmosphere. And some places it hits you — you walk in and you settle. And it’s the same with this narrative. You’re dealing with something that is potent. … I don’t know how or why but I guess it’s infused with human dedication at every level. Life-giving dedication. People have suffered and fought and prayed and fought and died. And so you realize that there’s nothing light about it. … It’s mysterious, but if you want to key into it sensibly, you’re walking into a place of worship, if you know what I mean. … Not only the narrative, but when you inhabit even your version of the narrative you are coming into contact with a powerful conversation.
JV: Did you have any sense of what you’d hope just an average moviegoer would leave the theater thinking?
JF: … you can’t control [the success of] it. … So of course you’re only dedicated to one word and that’s “truth.” And that works quite well with the Bible, but it’s also — for an actor — it’s your mantra. And that’s all you’re trying to do — you’re trying to strip down and you’re trying to deliver it honestly to those actors around you. You’re not acting; you’re all reacting. And I think that’s what we got wonderfully in the disciples and Jesus. We’re all working off each other’s energy and that energy is based on searching for truth. … You’re just only dealing with that kind of present situation. You’re reserving all your energies for that present situation. And hopefully those all add up and mean something for the audience, but I have no control.
…Of course there’s always a desire for something to work, but desire is very kind of egotistical and it’s always on my terms and successful and everyone’s got to love it and do that. But you know, you can think all of that and people can find it appalling and not want to watch it and walk out … and it doesn’t mean anything. It doesn’t have any value. The only thing that has value is that in that moment whether it works or not you’re true to the process and the situation. That’s all I’m governed by.
JV: In a movie that could very well seem like you’re pushing people to an agenda, it never feels that way, it just feels like laying out the story very clearly. I appreciate that … there is actually something to give people and say, “this isn’t going to be some heavy-handed, ‘this-is-why-you-should-love-Jesus-movie.’”
JF: … I think the component of introducing a non-believer takes [away] the curse of trying to get it right for everybody, because he’s a non-believer. So let’s see how this works out. But we’re not portraying Christ head-on. We’re coming at them at such an angle that it’s easier to absorb and not be either threatened or challenged or for a lot of people that might not be what it is in Scripture, or their portrayal or their image of Christ or that moment it might not be what the filmmakers have done. … It’s a gentle way in, because you could find him an awful, destructive, murderous Roman soldier. You don’t have to like him; he’s not set up to be liked. … I just think that angle stops it being too head-on for people and then it grows out of that. Just getting a glimpse of Jesus makes us want to get there again and see it again. It’s kind of like in our lives … it’s kind of like faith is strong one day and it’s weak the next. We’re visited and it disappears…it’s not full-on.
JV: Yes! How could anyone actually live that way?!? (laughs)
JF: Yeah — how could you? How could you? Exactly! It’s question and doubt. I think it’s like a wonderful piece of music. It’s in focus, and out, and the orchestra plays another part and other kind of emotions evolve. And I think Kevin’s [Reynolds, director] both design and camera movement — very wide in some sense and very close in others. It just allows us to breathe and have that conversation as we’re watching it. I’m riffing a bit. But yeah, it’s that unique angle which somehow works.
JV: Just a general question — you’ve played Shakespeare, and you’ve played Martin Luther, and you’ve played Jesus and you’ve played big people — Eric Liddell, this guy. What would you say was your most favorite of all of the — “inhabiting other people” roles?
JF: They’re all like sort of friends that you’ve visited and had a great evening with and they give you different bits of advice and you’ve had great laughs with them and you get to know their inner secrets and you feel very connected with them — they’re all best friends. This is sort of an easy way out on answering this — but I don’t know if there’s one. I loved Shakespeare in Love just in the sense of the community of actors that we had. I think the film was made by all of the smaller parts for me … it was so rich in that sense. It was a sheer joy, it was just fun to do.
Eric Liddell was spiritually very interesting and I felt very drawn by his journey. Clavius by his, kind of caught between two worlds, leaving one behind and entering another and the sort of isolation, and yet the kind of waking up to a life beyond his past conditioning … . Christ because I love the idea that if God chose to bring a representative to the earth, that he should be in the body of a man, then he has all the fallibilities of a man, and how amazing that he’s not this kind of God on earth, he’s a man on earth. So he has doubt and he has anger and he cries and he’s just like us — and he bleeds. There’s nothing special. And so I felt like that was really exciting because as a man I could connect with — as a man — to the fallibilities and frailties of another man. But still he’s going to commit to the mission. How amazing is that?
Luther, he’s bringing the Reformation in the face of all the obstacles — a hundred years probably before it would have ever happened — bringing language to the people ... taking what was in precious and in Latin and giving it to the masses. I mean, incredible. I guess he, before Zuckerberg brought the “faith book.” How amazing was that? I guess they allowed me to evolve through kind of jumping into their own shoes rather cheekily, even if it’s just in film.
It’s still — I get to kind of hang on the coattails of some essence of people who have gone on beyond that have shaped and changed things for the better.
Juliet is a freelance writer and consultant and full-time mom. A transplant from New York City, she has lived in DC for over seven years, but still walks too fast and wears too much black.
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