Latest news with #SamClaflin
Perth Now
04-08-2025
- Entertainment
- Perth Now
Sam Claflin battled body dysmorphia
Sam Claflin suffered a form of body dysmorphia because of the "pressure" he felt to achieve the perfect Hollywood physique. The Hunger Games star admits he never saw himself as a "leading man" when he embarked on an acting career and he felt like he had to go to extremes to get in shape to fit in among his peers. He told The Telegraph newspaper: "I was always really short until I was 18, so I never thought of myself in any way as a leading man ... "I assumed I'd become a character actor. When I was cast in Pirates [Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides], I thought: 'What on earth am I doing here?' ... "There is this Hollywood assumption that it's the men with the six packs who sell the movie. So there was a pressure that that was what I needed to look like. "As a result, I developed a form of body dysmorphia. It wasn't quite an eating disorder, and I'm not blaming anyone but myself, but it was definitely because of the industry I'm in." Sam went on to insist he's become much better at talking about his feelings as he's grown up and he eventually realised he wanted to prioritise having a family over his Hollywood career. The actor - who has two children with his ex-wife Laura Haddock - added: "We're men and we are not allowed to talk about our feelings. "But I've got much better. These days, I'm definitely not afraid of speaking about how I feel. And I also realised I didn't want a career in Hollywood. I wanted to come home and become a dad." Sam previously admitted he pushed himself too far in a "desperate" to be nominated for an Oscar. He told GQ Hype: 'I went through a stage of desperately vying for an Oscar but doing things that were really not me. Physically, emotionally transforming myself. "[2018 film The Nightingale] was too far the other way. I think that was the turning point in my life. I don't think I could do that again.' However, Sam realised his acting career and vying for awards masked deeper issues. He said: 'One of the reasons I became an actor is that I always want people to like me. I think it's only recently dawned on me that I try so hard to make other people happy that I don't know who I am. "I'm from Norfolk [in the UK] but I've just adopted an accent that no one can really put a flag on. It's an amalgamation of other people's accents. Over time I'd sort of lost, I don't know … What makes me happy?"
The Guardian
02-08-2025
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
The Count of Monte Cristo review – you'll have to pause every 45 seconds to shake your head at its daftness
Are you ready for some bad, fun TV made from a bad, fun book? Of course you are! It's high summer and the air is heavy with promise, so come inside, get comfy on the sofa and prepare to binge an eight-episode adaptation of Alexandre Dumas' ludicrous potboiler The Count of Monte Cristo. This series from Greg Latter and Sandro Petraglia stars Sam Claflin (last seen on the small screen being very good as the main man of the sextet in Daisy Jones and the Six) as one of the most wronged men in history, Edmond Dantès. Gosh, he goes through the mill. As do we. The two episodes available for review (there was a third, but the site kept crashing – possibly for my own protection) are extraordinary. The plot is simple enough. Wild, of course – that is what keeps you turning the 1,300 or so pages of the book – but straightforward once you realise that la credibilité is not an overarching concern. We are in France in 1815, just as Napoleon is escaping Elba and looking forward to his brief return to power. Meanwhile, our man Dantès annoys a fellow sailor, Danglars (Blake Ritson), by being promoted to captain over him. I suspect a lifetime of jokes about his name have rendered Danglars overly touchy, but it proves to be very bad luck for our hero. Because Dantès also narks a man called Fernand Mondego (Harry Taurasi) by sweeping his cousin Mercédès (Ana Girardot) off her feet when Fernand was quite looking forward to doing so himself. Danglars and Fernand duly get together to frame Dantès for treason. Thanks to the self-interest and corruption of Marseille's deputy prosecutor, Gérard de Villefort (Mikkel Boe Følsgaard), they succeed. Before you can say: 'What a trio of dirty dogs!' Dantès is chucked into a carriage and then into a cell on an island fortress, where he moulders away for 10 years with nothing but the maggots in his gruel for company. The crushing despair a man would feel, pushing him to the brink of madness and beyond is conveyed by putting Claflin in a terrible long wig. But then! He hears a tapping from the other side of his cell wall. It is the sound of Abbé Faria, played by Jeremy Irons, breaking through. The abbot shares his education and escape plan with his new best mate and they spend the next five years chipping away at the stones and mortar lying between them and freedom. Faria also works out just what dirty doggery has taken place and gives Dantès a raging thirst for vengeance, albeit one that he cannot slake until he is out of Chateau Maggotes. Alas, just as they are about to flee, the abbot has a stroke, leaving him with the strength only to give a 40-minute monologue about the origins and meaning of a scrap of parchment in his ragged pocket. It shows the location of treasure buried on the island of Monte Cristo; he bequeaths it to Dantès before carking it. Dantès puts the corpse in his own bed, sews himself into Faria's body bag and gets himself thrown off the battlements and into the sea. Liberté! There are two problems. Un, we are but a quarter of the way through this and we still have so much to cover – finding the treasure, becoming the count, fooling Parisian high society, some murders, some currency manipulations, at least one duel, some poisoning, blackmail, embezzlement and assorted other shenanigans. I fear that either the story must have been slashed to ribbons or that we will have to hurtle through at such a speed that it becomes incomprehensible. Incoherence already threatens, because of problème deux: the script. The Count of Monte Cristo requires you to pause it every 45 seconds or so to shake your head at needless utterances such as: 'If we can't get through this storm, we'll perish.' Some of it is truly unbelievable. Did Dantès really just say: 'I'd like to add two hours a day to my digging,' to his abbot friend? Did the abbot honestly ask, in wonderment at the sight of a watch Mercédès had given Dantès: 'And you've kept it all this time?' Yes, of course! What was he going to do? Lose it somewhere in his teeny tiny cell? Give it to a mouse? Chuck it out the window in a sudden passion for minimalism? (A high proportion of the performances are terrible, too, but let's be kind and blame most of that on the instructions the actors have been given.) There are enough of these howling absurdities to hobble the pacing, which needs to be fast and furious to cover Dumas' own, and to prevent the viewer from making any investment in the characters. But their stupidity brings a joy of its own. When the tech gremlins decide I am ready, I look forward to many more episodes. The Count of Monte Cristo aired on U&Drama
Telegraph
02-08-2025
- Entertainment
- Telegraph
Peaky Blinders star Sam Claflin: ‘Jeremy Irons spoke to a dummy for four minutes thinking it was me'
The other day, a director started talking to Sam Claflin about the unexpected shape of his career. 'He said to me, 'What happened to you? You were going up and up in this direction, and then, suddenly,' Claflin stretches his arm out horizontally, ''you went over there.'' Claflin shrugs. 'I don't know if that swerve in direction damaged my career or not. But I needed to shake the tree.' For a long time it seemed (not least to Claflin himself) that he was barely in a film that didn't require him to take off his shirt. He was frequently bare-chested as the sword-wielding hunk Finnick Odair in The Hunger Games franchise. He whipped off his shirt as William in 2012's Snow White and the Huntsman. The first time it happened, during the fourth instalment of Pirates of the Caribbean, in 2011, in which he played the missionary Philip Swift, showing his abs wasn't even part of the script. 'They decided a week before filming that I was going to take my top off,' he says. 'I was like, what? I hadn't done any of that Hollywood thing, such as eating properly or going to the gym. Instead, I'd been drinking beer and eating like a student. So to be told you had to go shirtless, in your first Hollywood movie, with only a week to prepare, was slightly terrifying.' Moreover, still barely out of drama school – he graduated from Lamda in 2009 – he lacked the courage to resist. 'It happened at a time in my career when I was so young, I felt I couldn't say no. Call it imposter syndrome, but I was really afraid of being caught out, of people thinking I couldn't act. Of course I was saying, 'Yes sir, yes sir, whatever you need me to do.'' So, several years ago, Claflin, 39, decided to change tack. Realising that he was on a trajectory that on one level might easily result in blockbuster-level stardom, but which also might mean playing what he calls 'the same character over again but in different costumes', he set about going against type. He was up for the role of Miles Richards in The Riot Club, but politely persuaded the casting director to let him read for the more obnoxious character of Alistair Ryle, too – which he got. He successfully auditioned for the part of the murderous rapist Hawkins in the 2018 Australian thriller The Nightingale, despite the director telling him he wasn't quite right. 'Which only made me more determined to prove them wrong,' he says. He's portrayed Oswald Mosley in Peaky Blinders and Sherlock Holmes's malicious brother Mycroft in Enola Holmes. 'Before The Riot Club, I'd only ever played the good guy, the one who got the girl,' he says. 'I was very conscious of being pigeonholed. I knew I needed to take riskier roles. Who knows if it paid off?' According to the Golden Globes, it has – last year, he was nominated for his portrayal of the narcissistic rock-band frontman Billy in Amazon's adaptation of the hit novel Daisy Jones & the Six. And now he's back on screen in Bille August's TV adaptation of The Count of Monte Cristo, in which he plays Alexandre Dumas's dreadfully damaged, magnificently unforgiving, 19th-century French avenger, who, after spending 14 years in a stone-walled island prison, having been framed by his fiancée's jealous cousin, is implacably focused on retribution. 'The hardest part was, once I'd escaped from prison, having to act like someone who was utterly dead inside,' says Claflin, who admits the most vindictive he gets in real life is becoming a little bit cross when someone cuts him up at the traffic lights. 'I'd have the scenes with my former fiancée, Mércèdes, who'd be crying [she marries the count's nemesis in his absence, unaware of what he has done], and, because of the sort of person I am, I'd instinctively want to hug her. But the point about Cristo is that his rage and hatred over what has happened to him is overpowering. So that was a challenge.' On one level, The Count of Monte Cristo plays to Claflin's natural appeal as an epic adventure hero, not least because August's production is exquisitely filmed and much of it has the photographic beauty of a magazine shoot. Yet the story's swaggering melodrama – it's a relentless tale of betrayal, fury and forgiveness, which sees the count adopt many masks in his pursuit of justice – also showcases his talent for combining a delicate emotional sensitivity with a more savage, muscular darkness. The show also stars Jeremy Irons as his benevolent cellmate, Abbé Faria: how did he find working with him? 'He's very vivacious, but also quite eccentric. At one point, the producers had a dummy of my body made for the scene in which I'm thrown off a cliff. During filming, Jeremy came across it and started talking to it, assuming it was me. For four whole minutes. Obviously, 'I' didn't say a word in response during that time, but he carried on regardless.' I've met Claflin in a central London hotel during a day of back-to-back interviews. He has a reputation for being terribly nice, and in person he emanates a lovely, shy sweetness, as though he still can't quite believe anyone would want to talk to him. He is nearly 40, but even now has an undeniable, chiselled boyishness. Yet for years he felt deeply insecure about his looks, his self-perception at odds with the way the film industry saw him. 'I was always really short until I was 18, so I never thought of myself in any way as a leading man,' he says. 'As a kid, I played Dodger in Oliver!, Zoltan Karpathy in My Fair Lady. I assumed I'd become a character actor. When I was cast in Pirates, I thought, 'What on earth am I doing here?'' It wasn't an entirely healthy feeling and soon Claflin was going to extremes to fit in. 'There is this Hollywood assumption that it's the men with the six packs who sell the movie. So there was a pressure that that was what I needed to look like. As a result, I developed a form of body dysmorphia. It wasn't quite an eating disorder, and I'm not blaming anyone but myself, but it was definitely because of the industry I'm in.' Does he think young male actors find it harder to protest against this sort of pressure than actresses, who have become much more vocal in recent years at the reductive roles many of them are expected to play? 'We're men and we are not allowed to talk about our feelings,' he says. 'But I've got much better. These days, I'm definitely not afraid of speaking about how I feel. And I also realised I didn't want a career in Hollywood. I wanted to come home and become a dad.' Claflin, who has two children under 10 with his ex-wife, the actress Laura Haddock, whom he married in 2013, grew up in Norwich. A keen footballer, he had no intention of becoming an actor until an injury forced him to find something else to do with his time – 'anything that didn't involve reading or writing, basically'. He fell in with a local drama club and loved it, but when he told his parents he wanted to become an actor, they were shocked. 'They thought that meant I was going to do musicals for the rest of my life. With my upbringing, acting as a career was unheard of. I went to a very rough school. Most people from where I come from become a mechanic or go into the army.' He won a place at Lamda, but his student grant didn't cover the costs of living in London. So he took part-time jobs within the college to make ends meet – working as a waiter at functions and hired by teachers at weekends to help with their gardens. 'My parents have always been wonderfully loving and supportive, but I've got three brothers and there was never any money. There's no way they could have afforded to send me. And there is no way I could have survived if the college hadn't helped.' Much has been written about the way in which drama schools are becoming increasingly prohibitive for working-class actors. 'The odds are against us, definitely,' says Claflin. 'That's not to say the whole industry is geared more towards middle- and upper-class people, but there are definitely more of those actors in the pool because they have more opportunities to be there in the first place. That's a systemic issue. I was bullied at my drama club because I spoke in a working-class accent. I adopted this posher accent to survive.' It must have been a bit exhausting, being inside the younger Claflin's head. Besieged by self-doubt, constantly worrying about his identity and how he came across. Today, he is self-assured and calm, thanks in no small part to undergoing therapy after the break-up of his marriage. He has a raft of projects coming out this year, including Harlan Coben's Lazarus, for Amazon Prime, in which he stars alongside Bill Nighy; and after years of feeling terribly homesick and unhappy in Los Angeles, is now settled in west London, close to Haddock, being a normal dad who happens to have a second life as a film star. 'When I was younger, I was so desperate to do a good job, I was overthinking it. I probably failed to have as much fun as I should have. But I'm nearly 40 now. I can now think, 'I've been doing this for 15 years. I only need to please myself.' And so the pressure is off.'
Daily Mail
02-08-2025
- Entertainment
- Daily Mail
Line of Duty star Vicky McClure stuns The One Show viewers with hidden talent as she reveals exciting new career first
Vicky McClure left The One Show viewers stunned on Friday evening as she took to the stage for a surprise live performance with rock band Reverend and The Makers. The Line of Duty star, 42, appeared on the BBC programme alongside frontman Jon McClure, 43, and actor Sam Claflin, 39, where they joined hosts Alex Jones, 48, and Clara Amfo, 41, on the sofa for a lively chat. However, it was the unexpected musical moment at the end of the show that really got fans talking. Vicky joined Jon and the band on stage for a performance of their latest track Haircut, which dropped on July 18 - and she didn't disappoint. For the performance, the actress cut a stylish figure in a black tailored jumpsuit featuring velour panels and wide-leg trousers. She completed the look with a pair of silver platform heels as she confidently belted out the energetic tune. Following her incredible performance, fans took to the social media platform X (formerly Twitter) in droves to praise the star. One gushed: 'Yessss @Reverend_Makers and @Vicky_McClure on @BBCTheOneShow tonight! Love this tune, proper dancing music (dancing and love heart emojis) need more Rev on't telly.'; 'Brilliant! That was absolutely brilliant. It's such a bloody good song. ❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️.'; 'Tuned in just for this! Love @Reverend_Makers and love @Vicky_McClure ❤️.' Last month, the TV star announced to her Instagram followers that she would be joining the band Reverend and The Makers on their new track. In a collaboration post, the band teased their new music video, which shows Vicky and the Reverend and The Makers lead singer Jon performing on stage. They captioned the post: 'HERE IT IS. TV legend @ singing on record for the first time ever.' 'Some words from Vicky "I'm no Whitney (laughing emoji) but i love music. Making this with Jon & Rev was such a chilled experience. All i hope is you enjoy it, sing and dance along".' 'HAIRCUT is out July 18th but you can presave now using the link in the Rev bio.' Vicky joined Jon and the band on stage for a performance of their latest track Haircut, which dropped on July 18 - and she didn't disappoint The rock band also revealed in another post that Vicky's husband, Jonathan Owen, plays the bass on their new hit single. However, it's not the first time the actress has dabbled in the music world. She previously fronted the BBC's Our Dementia Choir documentary, which aired in 2018. The two-part series followed the acclaimed actress as she embarked on a deeply personal journey to explore the true power of music in combatting dementia. In the documentary, filmed in 2018, she formed a choir in her hometown of Nottingham made up entirely of people living with dementia, aiming to discover whether music could make a measurable difference in their lives. Formed during the documentary, Our Dementia Choir is still going strong, coming together to sing and share powerful performances with audiences across the country.
Yahoo
02-08-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
'Better than 10/10': Why 'perfectly cast' period drama The Count of Monte Cristo should be your weekend watch
Cancel your weekend plans and get ready for a sweeping, character-driven epic! Period drama The Count of Monte Cristo lands on our screens this Saturday, bringing the grandeur and grit of 19th century Europe to life. The U&Drama series, which was called "better than 10/10" when it first aired in Switzerland last year, is perfectly cast with Jeremy Irons and Sam Claflin playing the leads, and is the sort of series you can get lost in for hours. Many of the best period dramas are based on classic novels and The Count of Monte Cristo is no different. The eight-part series is an adaptation of Alexandre Dumas's 1846 book of the same name, an adventure tale of love, betrayal and revenge. If you've never cracked open Dumas's book, it centres around young sailor Edmond Dantès (Claflin) who's falsely imprisoned, but when fellow prisoner Abbé Faria (Irons) tells him where a vast treasure is hidden, Dantès escapes, finds it and embarks on a whole new life. With Oscar-winning filmmaker Bille August on directing duty, and the series shot across Paris, Turin, Rome, and Malta, it's got must-watch written all over it. Before you tune in, here's everything you need to know about The Count of Monte Cristo, from the plot to the cast and how to watch it. What is The Count of Monte Cristo about? As we mentioned, the series is based on Alexandre Dumas's 1846 book of the same name. It's a weighty book, but here's a brief synopsis. When young sailor Edmond Dantès (Sam Claflin) is falsely accused of being a political traitor by jealous rivals, he's imprisoned on grim island fortress Château d'If. While jailed he meets fellow inmate Abbé Faria (Jeremy Irons) who reveals where some hidden treasure is buried. After a daring escape, Dantès reinvents himself as the mysterious and wealthy Count of Monte Cristo. Armed with a newfound fortune and various disguises, he sets off on a quest to exact revenge on those who wrongly accused him. Who's in the cast of The Count of Monte Cristo? The brilliant cast of The Count of Monte Cristo includes: Sam Claflin as Edmond Dantès Jeremy Irons as Abbé Faria Ana Girardot as Mercédès Harry Taurasi as Fernand Mondego Mikkel Boe Følsgaard as Gérard de Villefort Blake Ritson as Danglars Karla-Simone Spence as Haydée Reece Putinas as The Inspector Michele Riondino as Jacopo Lino Guanciale as Vampa Nicolas Maupas as Albert De Morcerf Gabriella Pession as Hermine Robin Greer as Maximilien Morrel Amaryllis August as Valentine de Villefort Bastien Fontaine-Oberto as Franz Poppy Corby-Tuech as Héloïse Ramona Von Pusch as Isabelle Greg Hughes as Boville Nell Baker as Julie Lynette Creane as Marie Tom van der Loop as a blacksmith Jason Barnett as Caderousse Nicholas Farrell as Morrel Is The Count of Monte Cristo any good? Yes, director Bille August is an Oscar-winner after all, and with the series shot between France, Italy and Malta in authentic historical settings, it gives it a really vivid, 19th century feel. It's been highly praised by Swiss and Swedish audiences and when series was released in Italy earlier this year, it became the most-watched show in three years on the country's biggest TV network. It's said to bring a modern feel to the classic, with viewers saying it gives a more nuanced portrayal of the characters than older versions have had. Jeremy Irons told Variety that 'Alexandre Dumas is a wonderful writer and this [series] feels rather topical,' adding, 'I think it has something to say about modern society: we haven't changed as people.' How can I watch The Count of Monte Cristo? Luckily, there's not long to wait before you can enjoy a bit of historical escapism. The eight-part premieres on U&Drama on Saturday 2nd August. The first episode will air at 9pm on, with every episode landing on the U and U&Drama streaming apps straight after. What other period dramas can I watch? Hungry for more historical storytelling? There's a ton of lavish period drama material to dig into, alongside well-loved classics such as The Crown and Bridgerton. We love Yorkshire rags-to-riches family saga The Hardacres, which has just been renewed for a second instalment. You can catch up on series 1 on 5. If you're looking for more juicy, soap drama with a Julian Fellowes feel, try Belgravia: The Next Chapter, a Downton-meets-Bridgerton drama that's perfect to binge. We're also marking our calendars for even more period dramas coming our way: later this year, The Forsytes, from the creators of Poldark, promises another gripping hit. And next year, keep an eye out for Dolly Alderton's fresh new take on Pride and Prejudice starring Olivia Colman and Jack Lowden. You Might Also Like The anti-ageing wonder ingredient you're missing in your skincare routine 15 dresses perfect for a summer wedding 6 items our fashion team always take on a beach holiday
