NBCUniversal
Eddie Redmayne and Lashana Lynch take on the new series “The Day of the Jackal,” in which an elusive assassin meets a tenacious British agent.
Extra’s Mona Kosar Abdi spoke to Eddie and Lashana about how exciting it was to film on location across Europe.
Lashana says: “We shot for eight months out of Budapest. A lot of the sets were there, and there was a little bit of filming in and around Budapest and in London, which also served as Afghanistan, and Croatia.”
Eddie added, “It’s part of the DNA of this show, this globe-trotting Europe is kind of the playground, and like Lashana said, you got to go to Vienna, Budapest, Croatia, the Dalmatian Coast. No,” he added. It’s so beautiful there, even London…I woke up in a helicopter at 4am to photograph London as the sun rose over the Thames. I see cities rising out of the fog, and even London. I would say it’s reconfigured in a way that we haven’t necessarily seen before. ”
Eddie jokes that it satisfied his “‘White Lotus’ envy,” adding, “When I used to sit down and watch ‘White Lotus,’ I was like, ‘Why did I do that?’ I thought, ‘Maybe he didn’t get the job.” Why can’t I ever go to these exotic climates? ‘So I feel like I expressed ‘The Day of the Jackal’ through aspiration, and it was beautiful. ”
The series follows the novel and 1973 film of the same name, and Eddie reflected on the modern twist on the story.
Eddie reflected on living up to fans’ expectations, saying, “You know, when I played Stephen Hawking, I said, ‘This is going to be the hardest thing to do, because this person is going to watch you perform.’ And then I thought, “With “Fantastic Beasts,” I said, “This is going to be the hardest, because the “Harry Potter” movies are the most successful films of all time, so it’s basically acting. I realized it was normal for the course.” Each one feels difficult in some way. ”
Redmayne said, “I love the original movie and the original story, and I grew up watching it. My family was into it and we had a beat-up old VHS. I love thrillers, so I wanted to see the characters represented. I love the cat-and-mouse element, and the theatricality of it appeals to me.So for me, what I loved about The Jackal as a kid was the disguise. He was like an actor.”
He added: “What I like about this series is that it carries that DNA and that it’s being made by people who really respect Forsyth’s books and Fox’s movies, but hopefully It’s a work that feels current. All of these elements come together.” It was very convincing to me. ”
Eddie and Lashana also opened up about the biggest challenges they faced during filming.
Eddie recalls the time he had to wear a disguise: “I don’t speak any German and I had to play this German character, so I learned how to say these German words purely from the music. I learned it from someone.” spoke. But he’s also supposed to be a chain smoker for 70 years. ”
Eddie joked that wearing that look made him sound like “some kind of bubbly 10-year-old kid.” “So I had to find this kind of chain-smoker version of German in one day,” he recalled.
Lashana’s biggest struggle was deciding how much action she wanted to take.
She said: “After ‘The Woman King,’ I told myself I wouldn’t do any stunts for a while…There’s a lot that happens to your body, it’s very taxing, and mentally, you don’t want to do any stunts. If that happens, you have to go somewhere else. You’re going to push yourself into that kind of physical role.”
She said her character Bianca was too “juicy” to pass up, but when it came to the stunts, she said, “I almost don’t know how to approach it, should I just say, ‘Okay, whatever, I’m fine.’ “I was fighting against myself,” he said. “Let’s do it all” because my body knows how to do everything. ”
Lashana added, “We have a whole industry called the stunt industry and it’s incredible and I respect them so much that I want to celebrate them here and actually give them a job. What we want to give Bianca and see her as a real human being and that it’s going to let her down or fail by not giving her all the stunts. I think she was able to do it, but she also fought to protect herself.”
“The Day of the Jackal” premieres Nov. 7 on Peacock.
