LONDON (AP) 鈥� was running away from spies.
After playing she was actively avoiding any role that involved working for the secret service. What part could beat a Bond girl who took from him?
鈥淚 was like, 鈥楴o, I鈥檓 not doing it again. That鈥檚 a legacy role. That鈥檚 something that absolutely should be untouched forever,鈥欌�� recalls Lynch.
But then she read the character of Bianca Pullman for a TV series based on Frederick Forsyth鈥檚 classic thriller Bianca was also an employee of Britain's foreign intelligence agency, but the differences between the two MI6 workers appealed: While Nomi was slick, Bianca was a mess Lynch could dive into.
鈥淚鈥檇 pushed against this world for a long time and it felt like it came right at me full throttle,鈥� she says.
No one is happier that she jumped on board than who plays the Jackal, the myth-like murderer for hire. Her 鈥渧ersatility is insane,鈥� he says, adding that Lynch even suggested the perfect song for the theme, Celeste's 鈥淭his Is Who I Am.鈥�
鈥淭he Day of the Jackal鈥� updates 1973 movie, starring Edward Fox as the cravat-wearing killer hired to kill the French president.
Redmayne鈥檚 version inherits the gentlemanly style of Fox, living a life of funded by getting away with murder through ingenious devices, clever disguises and flawless planning. Bianca is the intelligence officer and arms expert who will stop at nothing to find him, much to the discomfort of her co-workers and family.
Lynch and Redmayne are also producers on the show, which is airing on Sky in the U.K. and debuts Thursday on Peacock. They didn鈥檛 spend much time together on set, but saw each other in makeup, at the gym and are reunited for this interview with The Associated Press.
This conversation has been edited for clarity and brevity.
AP: So you both worked together very hard on this, but filming was completely separate?
REDMAYNE: It was so strange to do a job in which you鈥檙e so intimately connected to another character, and yet you don鈥檛 get to spend any time with the actor. But those moments we did have on set were pretty precious.
LYNCH: We won鈥檛 tell you what they were.
AP: What was the weirdest moment for you, where you鈥檙e looking at yourself in the mirror through the face of somebody else?
REDMAYNE: What鈥檚 weird about prosthetics is it鈥檚 such a long process 鈥� it鈥檚 not like you sort of blink an eyelid and you鈥檝e changed. So you see it layered on and there are interesting moments along that process. But it was always at the end of the day when I would take my clothes off and I would sort of have this old German caretaker face and then my sort of scrawny sort of 40-year-old body underneath. That was very disjointed and odd.
AP: Both characters have a very dubious morality. Was that so viewers are pulled in two different directions?
LYNCH: That鈥檚 one thing that this show does really well and what Ronan (Bennett), our writer, did really well in that, that running in parallel happened so seamlessly that you don鈥檛 really see it coming. And every single episode you feel like you want to root for someone like Bianca but the Jackal just makes sense. Even though he鈥檚 just done something completely heinous. You almost want to be him, which is, I think, the point.
AP: Did you get gun training together?
LYNCH: No, although we crossed over with the spy training. Spy training, which was us just walking around looking through shop windows, using our phones and car mirrors to find people, to track people and record them without them seeing. This is not just regular people on the street. This is someone that we鈥檝e specifically said!
AP: I鈥檝e heard of this type of spy training before, the did it.
REDMAYNE: Did they? Oh no! They鈥檝e stolen our thunder.
AP: Who was best?
REDMAYNE: We didn鈥檛 do it on the same day. I would have to ask Paul, our spy expert, about that, but I imagine Lashana was better.
LYNCH: No, no.
REDMAYNE: You鈥檙e sort of more deft around a corner, certainly with the guns you are. Because I spent most of my gun training working on sniper rifles. So when it came to bits when I had to do that thing and move like that (mimes holding a gun) around the corner, I was a bit crap.
Hilary Fox, The Associated Press
