Addicted to Eddie: Eddie in the Interview Magazine 2015 February Issue

Wednesday, January 14, 2015

Eddie in the Interview Magazine 2015 February Issue - interview by Jennifer Lawrence

I’m just one gigantic ball of rancid fear and self-consciousness. I’m entirely fueled by fear, so the fact that

I knew it could be a catastrophic disaster made me unable to sleep, and made me work quite hard.

—Eddie Redmayne

There’s an old saying, the kind you might find in the office of a high school guidance counselor, that goes something like, “Shoot for the moon, and even if you miss, you’ll end up among the stars.” Eddie Redmayne is an actor already

on the rise, but with his performance as a young Stephen Hawking in search of the secrets of the universe in this

past fall’s The Theory of Everything, he shot past the moon and may well end up with interstellar stardom.

Or at least an Oscar...

.....the Oscar winner called Redmayne, who was in Turin, Italy, to talk about running on fear,

Real Housewives addiction, fake falls, and bad salmon.

JENNIFER LAWRENCE: I watched The Theory of Everything with my jaw dropped the entire time. You were so fantastic! I didn’t even know some of that was possible.

EDDIE REDMAYNE: Well, thank you. When I was cast, my mate Charlie Cox, who plays Jonathan in the film, said,

“If you get the opportunity to play Stephen Hawking, you have no option but to give it your everything.

You have to give 8,000 percent.”

REDMAYNE: Did we impress with the head smack? I don’t want to give away my trick.

LAWRENCE: I have to know it! I’ve been hit too many times.

REDMAYNE: [laughs] Okay, so the stunt guy—you can imagine he didn’t have much to do; it wasn’t The Hunger Games—he was so excited for the fall. He put out a crash mat and tied my hands behind my back and said, “Just fall!” I was like, “What?!” But for the close-up, he had me on my knees with my hands tied behind my back and there was a very subtly matted, painted pavement.

LAWRENCE: How did you get your head to bounce like that?

REDMAYNE: Because it was slightly soft.
LAWRENCE: Can you tell I do action movies? [laughs]

REDMAYNE: So you’re a lady of leisure now? Are you finally having a moment off?

LAWRENCE: I am and I’m miserable. I was so excited to get time off, and now I don’t know what to do with myself. What do you do when you have time off?
REDMAYNE: Someone asked me today what I’ve been doing, and I felt like I had to really make up something to justify my-
LAWRENCE: Yeah. I’m like, “I paint—I’m a painter!” [laughs]
REDMAYNE: What do I do? I don’t know. I’m really shit at the piano. I play the piano.
LAWRENCE: I’m so happy you don’t have an answer.
REDMAYNE: And then I occasionally try to pretend to paint, again, badly. But this is the great luxury of not working: the moment you read a book that has nothing to do with work, you know you’re really relaxed. And I have a shit attention span. I can’t concentrate for more than five minutes.
LAWRENCE: Me too. I read two pages and I’m like, “Maybe I’ll just watch TV until the commercial break, and then

I’ll finish the chapter.”

LAWRENCE: Yeah. Where are you?

REDMAYNE: I’m in Turin. There’s a film festival here, and I’ve just arrived from Munich. But now I’m inspired by your Chinese food to go and have a shitload of pasta while I’m here. My fiancée saw some photos of me at the L.A. premiere, and she’s like, “Ed, you’re looking underweight.” I said, “Baby, I’ve got loads of sushi and juices.” And she was like, “That’s not what I’m talking about! I’m talking a fucking gigantic bowl of spaghetti Bolognese and a burger.” [laughs]
LAWRENCE: I hate you, by the way, for getting skinnier on a press tour. I only get fat. Because all I can eat is fast, hotel food.

LAWRENCE: Yeah. We were just on the plane, and Josh [Hutcherson] was eating something that I don’t like—salmon or something. I was eating my own snack and he kept eating my snack. I was going to share with him because I’m not an asshole, but then finally I was like, “I can’t eat your snack. So it’s not fair that you’re eating my snack!” Our security guard just started laughing at us. And we were like, “It’s been a lot of years!” [laughs]
REDMAYNE: Speaking of salmon and planes, do you remember that time I saw you at the BAFTAs in London? It was about two years ago, when you guys were doing Silver Linings Playbook [2012], and we were doing Les Mis. I’d flown in from Berlin that day and eaten some dodgy salmon on a plane. I was presenting with Sally Field. I did the red carpet, and I got in and we were in this bar and I remember I saw you there. We went into the BAFTAs and I was sitting behind Anne Hathaway, and as the lights went down—
LAWRENCE: “I’ve got to go!” [laughs]
REDMAYNE: I legged it down some stairs in the Royal Opera House just out of the auditorium and preceded to projectile vomit the entire way down the corridor!
LAWRENCE: Oh my God!
REDMAYNE: I know! It was horrific. And five minutes earlier, I had been chatting with you in the bar—but pale and sweaty.
LAWRENCE: I wish you had told me. I would’ve taken pictures!
REDMAYNE: I thought I got away with it. I was home within 20 minutes. I woke up the next morning still feeling pretty rough and turned on my phone and there were hundreds of text messages and e-mails because apparently Sally Field went on and said, “I was meant to be presenting with Eddie, but he’s currently being sick backstage.”
LAWRENCE: Oh my God!

REDMAYNE: I know! I was outed by Sally Field, but everyone just thought I was shitfaced. Anyway, so no more salmon on planes is the point of that story.

LAWRENCE: Oh yeah. No salmon on a plane. I projectile vomited from salmon. I can’t eat it anymore.
REDMAYNE: How many years has it been?
LAWRENCE: Um, four? No, longer.
REDMAYNE: That’s for life then. I give it like a year and a half after getting food poisoning from something, and then I start gorging on it again.
LAWRENCE: That’s what I think about tequila.
REDMAYNE: I hate tequila!
LAWRENCE: I’m always like, “Nope, I can never drink tequila again,” but …
REDMAYNE: Tequila is my salmon. I had a brutal experience with it at university. [laughs]
LAWRENCE: [Lawrence is disconnected and comes back on] I’m sorry. I think my publicist pulled the plug when
I started talking about tequila. [both laugh]