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Their characters might have differing views of their host city, but In Bruges co-stars Colin Farrell and Brendan Gleeson are in total agreement they had a ball making the film, as FOCUS discovers.
Two of Ireland's most successful film actors, Colin Farrell and Brendan Gleeson star together for the first time in playwright Martin McDonagh's raucously funny feature debut In Bruges. They play hitmen hiding out in the picturesque Belgian city after a job has gone spectacularly wrong, awaiting instruction from their boss, Harry (Ralph Fiennes).
But they are contrasting characters who react in their own ways to the situation, the older, more easy going Ken (Gleeson) taking in some sights while the more hot headed Ray (Farrell) further demonstrates his talent for attracting trouble. For both actors the appeal of the film lay in McDonagh's beautifully crafted script.
"There's a way the characters communicate with each other," Farrell notes, "with their observations on the world, their level of honesty and a very human aspect. There seemed to be a great juxtaposition with that and what they do for a living. I mean my character's not very good at it, first time out he makes a mess of the whole thing with tragic consequences, whereas Ken has been doing it longer.
"They're not nullified to the experience or the weight that taking another person's life would have on them. To have so much going on and not have one particular sensibility reign throughout the whole piece, for it to be a mix of so many different worlds, so many different thoughts and so many different emotions just an absolute pleasure. And the use of language, Martin's use of language is really second to none, so it was really an amazing opportunity."
Gleeson, instantly familiar to viewers of a certain age from his recurring role as Professor 'Mad Eye' Moody in the Harry Potter films, agrees that this script stood out as something special when he first read it.
"It was jumping at you practically grabbing you by the throat," he smiles, "we were just trying to realise it. With films it's so hard to get everything right from the beginning through to the editing and everything, it can always escape out through the window on you. But this one jumped out and grabbed us from the moment we picked up the script."
There is a rare pleasure of seeing these two international stars playing Irishmen for a change, so successful have they been in American movies. But one wonders how important it is for them both to come back and make British and Irish movies.
"It's not really a conscious thing," Farrell shrugs. "Ideally, if I was to do two films a year I'd love for one to be in Dublin every other year. But you follow the work, if you're fortunate enough and you go where the work takes you. That's all you’re asking for really, as an actor. What you’re asking for, hoping for, begging for is that you connect with a piece of material and wherever that shoots you go there."
"It has been a little bit conscious for me," Gleeson notes, "I've always tried to spin it over. I live in Dublin, one of the reasons I ventured over to America was less about fame and fortune and more about the fact that every time a film came in all this part of the world was already cast.
"So the move to America, for me, was about trying to get into a place where I could actually get to do good work. Obviously, I love doing it at home, I really do, but at the same time as Colin was saying, when the work beckons you’ve got to go if you’re lucky enough to be involved in all this."
In the end it comes back to the work, and it’s not altogether surprising that actors get a kick out of working on material they credit with some quality. The multi layered quality that McDonagh ekes out of this very straightforward premise is matched by the shift between the comedic and the dramatic in his script. And, unusually for a film, preparation included a period of rehearsal.
"It was great," Farrell nods, "by the end of three weeks we were very comfortable and felt that we had an inherent understanding of the characters and then there was loads of room for playing in front of the cameras. We got inured to the comedy, because it was hard to make it through a lot of the scenes without cracking up and laughing. It really was, talk about the church giggles... once I start I can’t really stop, I’m nearly as bad as this fellow."
"It was good to work with him on something so classy," Gleeson smiles. "We refer to the pain and everything, but at the same time playing about was an awful lot of fun too."
ANWAR BRETT
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