Brian Fisher talked about how he and Ruth Wilson worked on simian movements for Mrs. Coulter. Ruth's very glad there's no video of rehearsals, but they thought that some of her dæmon comes out in her physically. There's her fight with Benjamin de Ruyter where she hammers him in the back, but Brian also taught Ruth other ways that a simian moves. There's a looseness in the wrist when Coulter picks things up, and she also reaches in from above rather than from the side; he demonstrated with a water bottle, picking it up by the neck rather than the main body. There's also a tendency to spread the legs wide, and a foot turned in on its side.
The real-life Jonathan Pine shared his thoughts about the original novel at the BFI & Radio Times Television Festival
Tom Hiddleston is an expert on The Night Manager. And we don't just mean the TV series – the actor's memory of the novel it is based on is remarkable...
Speaking at the BFI & Radio Times Television Festival, Hiddleston praised John le Carré’s 1993 thriller (from which the BBC series takes its name), in particular how his hotelier-turned-spy Jonathan Pine was written.
“The character was so appealing: a lost soul looking for a cause,” Hiddleston began. “In the opening paragraph of the third chapter Jonathan Pine is described as a ‘graduate of an archipelago of orphanages, foster homes, half mothers and cadet units. A sometime army wolf-child in a special unit. A chef, catering, itinerant, hotelier, perpetual escapee of emotional entanglement. A collector of other people’s languages, a self-exiled creature of the night. A sailor without a destination.’ That was my diving board from which I jumped.”
Yes, it is an actor’s business to cement myriad lines into their memory banks. But to still remember a description not in the script almost two years after filming finished? There’s no doubt about it: Hiddleston a) has a terrific memory, and b) put a lot of thought into his character.
So far, so impressive. But later in the session, Hiddleston also offered the audience a concise analysis of Jonathan Pine.
“The whole character, for me, centres on the malleability of identity,” the Thor star began. “The idea that somehow there is something blank and broken about Pine is something that is unique to him. That something is repressed in him from his military service, his tragic love affair.
“All this grief has been tied up with him for so long. He’s been hiding: that’s why he’s the night manager. He hides behind the uniform, he hides behind the cover of darkness – literally. He doesn’t have a character apart from the moral compunction that Olivia Colman’s character [Angela Burr] latches onto and says ‘come and do the right thing’.”
Despite Hiddleston’s fluency with the novel, meeting the author himself led to a brilliant misunderstanding. During the restaurant scene where Corky (Tom Hollander) punches the waiter, John le Carré was on set and made a cameo as an agitated diner – a little too agitated. Although the script required Hiddleston to calm his character, le Carré improvised his lines to the extreme.
“I don’t know if John had read the part in the screenplay giving him direction for the scene. But he refused to settle,” explained Hiddleston. “Like any great actor, he made me try harder to achieve my objective, which I almost didn’t achieve.”
After le Carré persistently insisted that Pine should apologise to the beaten waiter, director Susanne Bier (who appeared alongside Hiddleston at the festival) had to speak to the author to move the scene along.
But, ever the gentleman, that didn’t deter Hiddleston’s admiration of the writer: “It was amazing to be in a scene with John,” he said. “It was a remarkable honour for all of us.”
Tom Hiddleston was speaking at the BFI & Radio Times Television Festival in a panel alongside Night Manager co-star Alistair Petrie, director Susanne Bier and executive producer Simon Cornwell.
Mark Gatiss contemplates writing a ghost story for the stage
Mark Gatiss has contemplated writing a ghost story for the stage – which could be read by candlelight inside a church.
The Sherlock creator, who has penned a slew of macabre mini-series for the BBC including Crooked House, said he was intrigued by the idea of a theatrical reading.
Speaking at the BFI & Radio Times Television Festival, Gatiss, 52, described writing a ghost story for the stage as “a very good idea”.
He said: “I often think of what Dickens did. Doing readings. It’s very economical, it’s very cheap.
“I suppose it’s about putting together a package and what you can actually do in an evening. It might become quite difficult.
“For the performance it would be really extraordinary to do three half-hour stories. The appetite is definitely there.
“And definitely towards Christmas – what would you rather do? Sneak off to a church by candlelight, listen to some ghost stories? It’s perfect, isn’t it? Let’s do it.”
Gatiss and Steven Moffat have written a forthcoming adaptation of Bram Stoker’s Dracula, with Danish actor Claes Bang taking the title role in the mini-series.
Gatiss said he sees well-known tales, like that of Sherlock Holmes, as ripe for reinvention.
He told the Press Association: “These things are absolutely what I grew up loving most and to have a go at Baker Street, to have a go at Castle Dracula, is a dream come true.
“It’s an interesting thing to do, to not mess around with it but reassess it. If you photograph every page of the book, what’s the point? Read the book – the book is not going to go anywhere.
“You can do something new and interesting with it – like we did for Sherlock.
“You can get a new audience or a new response to it. It’s a really interesting way of looking at the material again, through a different prism. You’re not just slavishly reproducing it.”
