Hunger TV

 Published 12.5.2012

– I –

Thou shalt live truly, deeply and madly

– II –

Thou shalt shun the worth of possessions

– III –

Thou shalt be suspicious of all authority

– IV –

Thou shalt strive to be selfless

– V –

Thou shalt always be gracious

– VI –

Thou shalt smile in the face of oppression

– VII –

Thou shalt love like a deity

– VIII –

Thou shalt not suffer fools

– IX –

Thou shalt mock thyself before mocking others

– X –

Thou shalt champion the underdog

HUNGER ARTICLE:
ABOUT RHYS IFANS.

"My name is Rhys Owain Ifans. My family name is Evans,
but Evans is pronounced Ifans in Welsh. I chose to spell it
phonetically – I was a bit of a twat when I was younger.”

Anyone who has met Rhys Ifans soon gleans two things
from him. The first is that he’s an actor but he isn’t ‘an
actor’. The second is that he’s perfectly ordinary but he
strikes you as extraordinary. 

He is a living dichotomy. He
would be as at home at a wild party as he would be gently
smoking a pipe by the fire. He seems complicated, but at
the same time very simple; thinks big but treasures the
little things; loves the high life but hates fame.

Throughout his life, he’s avoided the path well trodden.

Both his parents were teachers but Rhys didn’t inherit the
scholarly gene, and found acting at the youth theatre in
Mold, North Wales a welcome escape from the monotony
of school life. This led to a scholarship at the Guildhall
School of Music & Drama, but Rhys didn’t feel that he
fitted in, so left to pursue his music career (he was in the
original lineup of Super Furry Animals and sings with
offshoot band, Y Peth). 

He came back to acting in 1997
when he was cast with his brother in Twin Town, the
distinctly rock’n’roll story of two glue-sniffing underdogs
who take on a local Swansea gangster to avenge their
injured father.

Since then, Rhys’s comic and chameleonic disposition has
provided him with a continuum of far-ranging roles. His
expressive features and stature are as suited to
distinguished cavaliers as they are to rock stars, gangly
goofballs, drug-addled townies and fantastical villains. He
has just appeared as the Earl of Oxford, Edward de Vere,
in Roland Emmerich’s Shakespearean thriller, Anonymous.

In mid-2012, Rhys stars as the Lizard in The Amazing
Spider-Man, torn between his innate human goodness,
and his vision of a world dominated by super-reptiles like
himself.

With his power to transform both on and off screen, his
application of personal social philosophies, and an
unintentional ability to subvert expectations, Rhys is
master of his own esoteric universe.

HUNGER ARTICLE: INTERVIEW WITH RHYS IFANS.

THE HUNGER: WHAT MAKES A TYPICAL WELSHMAN?

Rhys Ifans: My first language is Welsh. I fuck and dream in
Welsh. We’ve got longer words, so they both last longer.
What makes a true Welshman, whether they speak Welsh
or English or both, is that they understand language, and
therefore the world, differently. My English informs my
Welsh and my Welsh informs my English. To marry the two
cultures together, you have to resort to metaphor.
Everything becomes poetic because you are constantly
translating and trying to find solutions that explain how you
are feeling.

WHERE DID THE DESIRE TO ACT COME FROM?

I found secondary school claustrophobic and so I joined
the youth theatre. It gave me a real sense of responsibility.
If you didn’t know your lines or show up on time, you let a
lot of people down, whereas in school, if you weren’t in
class, it didn’t really matter. I’d never wanted to be an
actor, but when I left school, I got a job in Clywd Theatre
as a trainee flyman. A flyman brings the scenery in and
out. I used to sit up there with another flyman, an old hippy
called Hughie. Actors and actresses would come and go,
periodically, and there was a certain perfume-like smell
that came only from the women. I discovered when I
moved to London that it was gin.

MUSIC CAME VERY EASY TO YOU. DID YOU FEEL
SCARED ACTING?

Absolutely, everything that I feel is fear. You wouldn’t
believe it, but I’m a very shy guy and acting presented me
with an opportunity to address my shyness in public. I
cower when I get a round of applause.
I watched Little Dorrit on the BBC a while ago, which was
really good, but the more you remove yourself from the job
you do, the sillier it seems. I was watching this and
thought, “Is that what I do? Is that my fucking life, dressing
up and pretending to be people?” Not to disparage anyone
I’ve ever worked with or anything I’ve ever done, because
it’s necessary, but so silly. Everyone needs to be tickled,
but sometimes you get tired of being the tickler. When I
watch something that I’ve done – with forensic scrutiny –
I’m fucking suicidal. The forced vanity that film presents
you with is excruciating. I never see the character; I see
huge reservoirs of myself. It’s crippling, but you get used to
it.

DO YOU EVER HAVE DOUBTS ABOUT IT AS A
CAREER?

When you are an actor, a lovely blacked-out car comes and
collects you every morning and takes you to work. It
doesn’t pick you up because you’re special; it picks you up
because you’re livestock and they have to keep you safe
and take you home. It’s not because you’re the fucking
Queen or the Prince of Wales, it’s because you are
insurance. You’re prodded and cajoled and sometimes lied
to, which is fine, but it’s ironic for an art form that is so
dependent on truth. That glimpse in a lens, that’s the
moment of truth. Increasingly, the circles that surround that
moment are less and less to do with it. So, I’d quite like to
write and direct.

YOU HAVE PLAYED A LOT OF INHERENTLY GOOD
PEOPLE WHO MAKE ERRORS IN JUDGEMENT, MY
FAVOURITE BEING JED IN ENDURING LOVE.

There’s a pathos and a mentality in these characters that
we all recognise. We aren’t all heroes, gods or prophets;
we’re just flawed, frightened children, particularly in Jed’s
case.

YOU’RE STARRING AS HOOK IN NEVERLAND AND
THE LIZARD IN THE AMAZING SPIDER-MAN. DO YOU
FEEL AN AFFINITY WITH CHILDREN’S STORIES?

Yeah I do. I was a big Spider-Man fan as a youth. Spider Man is a school kid who responds initially to bullying, and I think it speaks to generations who have been through that

– he’s very human. Also, there’s something very
pubescent about Spider-Man. The changes that he finds
himself going through when discovering his superpowers
are essentially what every teenager goes through during
puberty.

ARE YOU A BIG KID?

Yeah I am. That’s a big yes. Buy me some Lego. If you
can’t afford a house, you can build one out of Lego.

ACTORS WHO MAKE IT LOOK EASY GENERALLY
WORK VERY HARD AT IT. DO YOU?

You do make a creative decision to be precise, true and
honest, but the driving force is that you don’t want to look
like a fucking idiot. I’m very easygoing about the show
business machine surrounding it, but I take my work very
seriously, which allows me to enjoy it. If I didn’t, I wouldn’t
be prepared and if I wasn’t prepared, I’d be frightened, and
if I were frightened, I wouldn’t enjoy it.
I hate talking about acting. I’d rather fuck than watch porn.
It’s a gig that I take very seriously and I love – but the
whole analysis? Just do the gig, man; learn your lines,
don’t be late, be good, be kind, be true. Job done. That’s
your reward.

WHAT MADE YOU CHOOSE ACTING OVER BEING IN
THE SUPER FURRY ANIMALS?

I was an actor before I was in the Super Furries. Being a
lead singer is easy on the vanity; you stand up straight,
sing in tune and receive applause. I was a better lead
singer than I was an actor, so I decided to improve my
acting. You can act when you’re old and bald, but you can’t
be a lead singer. Plus, I didn’t want to die, which I might
have done if I’d have stayed with the band.

DOES IT FEEL LIKE IT’S AN IMPORTANT THING FOR
YOU TO STILL BE CONNECTED WITH THE MUSIC
INDUSTRY?

Not the music industry, not at all. I like singing and
songwriting, that was my first love. If acting was my one
passion, my bedfellow, then I wouldn’t sleep much. Music
has played a big part in my life, whether through
participating in it or just listening. It has supplied a
soundtrack to my whole life, and certain songs and bands
have a potency that speaks to me on a deep emotional
level. I love the classics: the Stones, the Doors, the Velvet
Underground. Growing up, I was a little punk rocker,
listening to the Clash, the Pistols and the Dammed. I
became obsessed with one punk band in particular,
Butthole Surfers.

ARE YOU QUITE POLITICAL?

Yeah I am. I was a very political teenager and I’ve
remained that way, to an extent. I don’t want to end up like
some armchair anarchist, and it’s really hard, in this day
and age, to find a movement or voice that you can align
yourself to. It’s all very disparate now, which is healthy.
When I was younger, all you had to do was hate Mrs
Thatcher. Now, the world is a lot more complicated.

IS THERE ANYTHING THAT MAKES YOU ANGRY?

Injustices, on a large scale, and the ineptitude of
governments. I find it increasingly frustrating. As a
teenager, you hope that by the time you are my age,
things will have improved. In some ways, they have, but
largely we’re still in a crippled democracy that gives no
one a voice.

WHAT MAKES YOU HAPPIEST?

I feel most content when I wake up in the morning and my
girl is lying next to me, and I roll over and hold her, and
she holds me. Simple things, like walking in the rain in the
early morning and old people holding hands – that really
gets me, when one reaches out for the other and they hold
hands. I turn into a blancmange when I see that. I love old
people: their stories, their wisdom, their kindness and their
manners. I’m going to start collecting them.

DO YOU HAVE A MAD SIDE?

Oh yeah. There’s a real propensity for utter madness and
chaos within me, but that’s very much in the past. I’m
finding a balance now, and hedonistically I’ve calmed
down. I just got bored of partying. I think I’ve met everyone
I need to meet. It’s not a big life choice and it’s not difficult,
it’s just a new skin.

HAVE YOU BECOME MORE AMBITIOUS?

Not in terms of accolades or recognition, in any way,
shape or form. I’d say I’m ambitious in that I want to do my
best – not the best but my best.

WHEN WILL YOU FEEL SATISFIED?

When I’m holding a baby in each arm, having just finished
a great gig.

ARE YOU A REALIST OR DO YOU LIKE TO ESCAPE
FROM REALITY?

I like to escape to reality. I am becoming increasingly
aware that we live in different realms of consciousness. I
had this conversation with my girlfriend the other day. I’m
44, but sometimes I still feel like I’m pretending to be a
grown up. We went for a meal with some older people the
other night and I really wanted a food fight, but I had to talk
about Bhutan. The adult in me keeps catching me being
childish, and the child in me keeps catching me being
grown up –both are equally amused.

THIS FEATURE IS ABOUT YOUR DIVINE TESTIMONY.
ARE YOU A RELIGIOUS MAN?

I was an avid atheist and now I’m a lazy agnostic. I try to
live by the original Ten Commandments but I think the
world is a lot more complex than a mere ten – not that I’m
a Christian in any way, shape or form. I try to live as good,
as gracious and as kind a life as I possibly can, at every
given turn. I think it’s quite simple.

SO, IF YOU COULD PLAY GOD, WHAT WOULD YOU
CHANGE?

Well, first of all, I’d redress the balance of the world, to
give everyone an equal stab at education, food and water.
Following that, I’d like more civic areas to be made out of
Lego. I would give dogs bigger cocks and men smaller
cocks, just to see what happens, and I would make polar
bears black. They’ve been through enough, haven’t they –
why not put them through more?