Colin Farrell Interview

Colin Farrell’s bewilderingly bizarre new movie, The Lobster, sees him playing a heartbroken architect who’d like to be turned into a red marine crustacean (bear with me on this). If the affable Dubliner were to be transformed into an animal in real life, however, he insists that he would much rather have feathered wings than armoured claws.

“I’d have to be skyborne, man,” he laughs, earnestly. “I’d want to be a seagull or a bald eagle – something that’s an apex predator, just so I’d get a bit more longevity out of it. So, yeah, a creature of flight.”
Animal? Farrell famously used to be a party one, but, clean and sober for eight years, he’s just a cool cat nowadays. Sitting slinkily across from Hot Press on a couch in a luxury suite in Dublin’s Intercontinental Hotel, the thin and tanned 39-year-old looks a picture of gym-fit health. He doesn’t look quite so healthy in the movie, for which he had to put on a 40lb paunch, but that weight is all gone now.
Still remaining is the ever-present weight of expectations. Despite generally glowing reviews for his role as troubled cop Ray Velcoro in the second season of HBO’s True Detective, Farrell’s movie career hasn’t exactly been setting the world alight in recent times. Having originally shot to fame as the handsome young star of Phone Booth, S.W.A.T. and Minority Report, and won a Golden Globe in 2009 for his role in Martin McDonagh’s dark comedy In Bruges, some of his more recent offerings – A New York’s Winter Tale, Total Recall, Ondine – have been poorly received by the critics.
Thankfully, The Lobster might well mark the beginning of a serious comeback. The first English-language feature by talented young Greek director Yorgos Lanthimos (previously best known for Dogtooth and Alps), The Lobster – an absurdist SF satire about modern relationships, set in a dystopian near future – is undoubtedly the weirdest and most surreal film to have been released in recent years.
Although the location is irrelevant to the story, most of the movie was shot in Kerry. Heading up a cast that includes Rachel Weisz, Jessica Barden, Ben Whishaw, Olivia Colman, and John C. Reilly, Farrell plays David, a somewhat joyless and gone-to-seed architect whose wife has recently dumped him. According to the societal rules of ‘The City’, all single people are taken to ‘The Hotel’ where they are obliged to find a matching mate within 45 days. If they fail to pair-up with a suitable partner, they are transformed into an animal of their choice and sent off into ‘The Woods’.
David has already decided that should he fail to meet someone suitable, he’d like to be changed into a lobster on the following grounds: lobsters have blue blood, “like aristocrats”, they can live for 100 years, and what’s more, he “genuinely likes the sea.”
The manageress of ‘The Hotel’ (a strikingly severe Olivia Colman) is approving of David’s choice: most people want to be dogs – which is why there’s so many canines in the world. She reminds him that his choice will dictate how easily he will find a partner in his next incarnation: “After all, a wolf and a penguin can’t be together, or a camel and a hippo,” she says. “That would be absurd.”
While the entire concept sounds laughably ludicrous, the film is actually really brilliant – brutal, compelling and thought-provoking. So much so that it has already won the Jury Prize at this year’s Cannes Film Festival. Even before it was shot, its script was awarded the A.R.T.E. International Prize for Best CineMart 2013 Project at the 42nd
Rotterdam International Film Festival.
There’s a scene midway through where a disconsolate Farrell, lost in ‘The Woods’, sings the most excruciatingly awful version of Nick Cave’s ‘Where The Wild Roses Grow’ that’s ever been heard. It seems as good a place to start as any...

OLAF TYARANSEN: I’ll begin by congratulating you on what’s possibly the worst Nick Cave cover version of all time.
COLIN FARRELL: Thanks, man. Yeah, yeah. Hard to fuck it up more royally than that. Seriously (laughs).
At this point in your career, The Lobster seems a very strange film for you to do.
It’s a very strange film for anybody to do, but probably in the anthology of my work it’s not as obvious a creative place for me to find myself. But it’s such particular work. Those boys are sosingular. I mean, if you look at Dogtooth and Alps, the conventions that both of those stories live within, and how they’re fleshed out, are so unusual and so awkward that I don’t think there are many actors that it would make sense for to appear in a film like this. And yet I was dying to do it.
The original script must have been a very bizarre read...
Extraordinary (shakes head). Yeah, I can’t say it was the fluidity of the language, but there was an absurdity and a sense of some kind of deep societal – and human beings being collectively what create a society, also human – discord that was at play that was very unnerving. Yet by the end of it, through all its emotional detachments, through all its absurdity of conventions – which were all supported by a massive logic – this world made perfect sense somehow, as unrecognisable as it was.
I’m finding it very hard to explain to people what the film is actually about.
Yeah, it’s tricky (laughs). But by the end of reading it, it was moving. And that was the biggest coup for me. Yes it was interesting, and yes it was eccentric, and yes it was by turns darkly funny and absurd and violent but, by the end of it, it was a very sweet and moving tale. And in playing it; by the time me and Rachel [Weisz] got together to do the last third, there was a sweetness to the characters. Not that I’m going to say they were in love, or what love is in a world like this, or what love is in the world that you and I inhabit – it’s something that’s baffled us all since time immemorial – but I loved it. It was like nothing I’d ever read.
Did you rehearse it beforehand?
Not at all. Not a lick.
The acting is somewhat Aspergian, almost deliberately wooden. It took me about twenty minutes to tune into what was going on.
Sure. It really is something that – and I’m not trying to sell extra tickets – lends itself to a second viewing. It really does, because I think the world is so unusual and is so apart from what we’re used to. There’s an absolute lack of naturalness. There’s a lack of contemporary fluidity, movement – even the physicality of the players. Everything is so stunted, kind of stopped mid-growth. Everybody is a child in the body of an adult, but without the fun and the wonderment of what it was to be a child. The seriousness of an adult, but the loss of innocence and uncertainty of being a child, and being told by this patriarchal system how you have to live your life. But there was no rehearsal. The director didn’t want to talk about character back story, or any of that shit.
It’s almost as though none of the characters had any back story.
Yeah, exactly. That was the way to go with it – not to inform the story with any of your own individual creative proclivities or nuances. The story itself was so extreme, and the story itself was so gracefully unusual, you nearly go, “God, do we really need actors for this? Because we’ll fucking ruin it for you by bringing our own shit and our own opinions and try to make it about us.” And, more than ever before, this really had to be a bunch of actors that were okay getting, not on top of but really beneath the dialogue, and doing as little as possible with it so that the awkwardness and the peculiarity and the beauty of it could breath itself.
The hotel where it’s all set was straight out of David Lynch...
It really was. David Lynch, Kubrickian. That’s a major character in the film, was the hotel – extraordinary place. And we lived there as well so it was quite claustrophobic.
This is down in Sneem?
In Sneem, yeah – in Parknasilla Hotel. You’d say goodnight to everyone at the end of the day, and then you’d bump into them 30 seconds later on the stairs. Did you ever get that thing in a car where you wave goodbye to someone that pulls up and you say, “Yeah, I’ll see you, I’ll give you a call in a bit,” then you pull up at a red light and it’s like, “How’s it going?”
I think that's a Father Ted scene, actually!
It is. Same kind of thing, very claustrophobic. You’d come down in the morning and there were cables everywhere in the lobby. But the hotel became this kind of labyrinthine almost organism that grew around us, and catered to us living there, but also held the story in its breast.
What was the first scene that you shot?
That’s a good question (purses lips and pauses). The first scene shot was the first scene in the film. There is a more extended version of that scene on a cutting room floor somewhere. The scene where the missus is breaking up with me. Then into the van and then out to the hotel. It was pretty much shot in continuity. It wasn’t the biggest film budget-wise, but even for a film of its size, about €4 or €5million, it was shot unusually in a certain amount of continuity, which was lovely.
On the first day, because you were all acting – or not acting – in that way, was there a nervous feeling of, “Is this going to work?”
Yeah, I was very aware, and I had said to Yorgos on Skype, that more than ever before, it’s so vague to even say, but I wanted to be present in this film. Like just fucking sit down in it, and not try and inform a scene, or not try and inform everyone else, and all the old Stanislavkian things about: "what’s your objective and what’s your...?" [My character] David doesn’t have a fucking objective. Where’s the next sandwich coming from, you know what I mean? To find a partner, yeah, because that’s what the rules say you have to do, and he doesn’t want to be turned into a lobster – as much as he’s given it its due diligence as far as considering what animal might be the best animal to be turned into. The first day, because we didn’t do any rehearsal and I wasn’t thinking, “Oh, I’m just going to be flat,” there was a lot of thought about it and stuff, but it was just a case of trying to observe without any judgement. I mean, he’s completely guileless, so trying to observe without any guile or any subtext. Everyone in the world that we know, including myself, has subtext or you’re always making judgements or little calculations about what you come up against in life. David, not so much. Playing a character like that was both oxymoronically containing and liberating in the same sense.
You put on a lot of weight for the role.
Yeah, it just felt right. David felt like he was a bit more round than I usually am, and that he was a bit of a comfort eater, and a little bit soft, and a little bit awkward in his own body.
How did you do that?
Just got it into me! Burgers for breakfast, pizza for lunch, and desserts, and never pass a milkshake shop without stopping in. Just eating as much as possible.
And how long to take it off again?
Two months in, two months out. Eight weeks each end – a complete reversal.
How does that feel?
Not great (frowns). It’s a bit shocking! But, as I said, it was a short-lived thing.
You were looking fairly svelte and lean on the cover of Men’s Health a month or two after.
I had a thing to do, a very particular photoshoot that I had to be really in shape for about eight or nine weeks after we wrapped, otherwise I would have taken more time. But it was fine. I’d be disciplined in that way, but there’s a thin line between discipline and madness when it comes to that kind of stuff.
I’m thinking of someone like De Niro doing it for Raging Bull, but it was quite some commitment for a low-budget Indie movie.
I don’t know. I think it behoves you to treat the films that are small Indie films with as much seriousness and dedication. At times they ask more of both those things than the bigger, lighter fare that has to reach a broader ocean of people. I mean this is about as specific a film as I’ve ever been part of. And so with that in mind everything in it had to be, I mean even down to Yorgos’s framing and how specific he is... (reaches down to table and starts moving objects around). If there was a coffee table like this and a tray with things, and Yorgos was shooting you across this way, he wouldn’t take it as it was put down. He could spend quite a bit of time, you know... (continues moving things). You know, “Move this fucking thing!”
Doing a Polanski on it?
Yeah, a little bit. And part of you wants to go, “Jaysus, is that really necessary?” But part of you goes, “No, it is,” because he’s very concerned with every single line, every single bit of texture in a frame, and with the composition of that frame. It was fascinating to watch him at work: he was very, very specific. So I think, alongside that, everything regarding the costumes and the performances, and some characters with the way they walk, had to be tightly calibrated, I felt, like I said we didn’t talk, the actors, or rehearse and I didn’t see them throughout their process. I just saw the end result. Nor did they through mine. But specificity seemed to be paramount in this one.
Obviously it’s a satire of modern relationships. In terms of your own personal life, you’ve had many relationships.
A few, yeah (smiles).
Are you still single?
Yeah.
Was that a deciding factor in why you took on the role?
Not really, it’s just good work (shrugs). You will, at times, find yourself drawn to things, and even unconsciously, that something begins to reveal itself to you that is a concern, even if it’s not something that you’ve been vocal about or even something that you recognise. There’s a certain kind of alchemical thing that can go on as well. But no, for this – I’d seen Dogtooth in a cinema in Philadelphia a couple of years before I’d read this. I’d come out of Dogtooth with my sister just going, “What the fuck was that we just saw?” and, “What mad bastards wrote and directed that film?” And it was brilliant and so believable. Such absurdity and yet rendered so truthfully. Then, when I got a call from my agent saying, “Have you ever seen a film called Dogtooth?” I went “Oh I did! What a great film.” She said, “Well, the director’s making his first English language film” – and I thought, probably for the same reasons that you said, it’s a pretty strange choice. I thought that I’m probably not what he would see in his – I mean there are certain actors that are known for more character work or whatever. But we Skyped, and we got on well enough, and I’d read the script before we Skyped, and I loved it, just loved it. At the same time if it didn’t go my way, that’d be all right – none of it means that fucking much. But I was delighted that after talking to Yorgos that he made the call and put me in it.
Are you more comfortable in comedy?
I wouldn’t say so, because this didn’t feel like comedy. If I was doing a comedy with Will Ferrell, that would feel like comedy. When I did Horrible Bosses a few years ago, that felt like comedy. That was broad. This didn’t feel like comedy and even though there is humour in it, in the same way that In Bruges didn’t feel like comedy. Because there’s very high stakes, there’s a lot of dramatic dynamics going on, there are characters that are in pain. Then through that absurdity, through that black hole of experience and the flickering of redemptions on the periphery, comedy comes out. Obviously True Detective was the furthest thing from fucking comedy a person could ever do. I don’t know if there’s a genre I’m more or less comfortable in than any others, but it’s nice to mix it up.
Moving away from things that make you laugh to things that don’t make you laugh. What makes your blood boil?
People without a handicap pass parking in the handicap spots (laughs). Fucking fucks me right off. Yeah, it really does.
Any road rage incidents? Or car park incidents?
No, no road rage incidents. You have to be careful because sometimes someone has just forgot their pass and you go, “Who owns that car out there?” and somebody comes wheeling up to you, so you have to be... That kind of stuff pisses me off. Judgement pisses me off, and yet I’m capable of it myself. Judgement and cruelty, whether it’s physical or verbal – some of the things people say about each other, all of that stuff fucks me right off.
You’re filming the Harry Potter spin-off movie at the moment [Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them]. As the father of two young boys, are you doing that for them?
No, I’m doing it just for the work. I mean they may not like it, but it’s really great that they’ll be able to see it – because there’s not many of the films that I’ve done – Lobster’s not really suitable for 12 and 6-year-olds, nor is True Detective. But it’s great that they’ll be able to see something that I’ve done and hopefully they’ll enjoy it. But I’m doing it just because it came up and it’s good work and David Yates is kind of extraordinary and it’s JK Rowling, you know? So it’s nice to be aligned with her imagination for a bit.
Have you met her?
No, but she’s obviously all over the page, you know?
Back to The Lobster. Was the fact it was being shot in Ireland a deciding factor?
It wasn’t a deciding factor because I’d already told Yorgos, “I know you have your process but I’d love to do it. I’m in.” I let him know that. I said, “Where are you shooting it, by the way?” and he said, “This place Kan-mar.” I went, “Kenmare?” and he said, “Ah yes that’s it.” Huge draw. I was there already wherever it would shoot – Greece or Bulgaria, wherever. But the idea of going back to the southwest of Ireland, which I’ve always loved, which from Falling For a Dancer to Ondine, and then this now, I’ve just had so many of life’s great joys in the southwest of Ireland. So it was a lovely thing.
You’re based in L.A. all the time?
Yeah, based in L.A. but I travel for work. Based in L.A. and that’s where my boys are (Farrell has 12-year-old, James, who has special needs, with model Kim Bordenave, and six-year-old Henry with Ondine co-star Alicja Bachleda-Curus – OT).
Do you live with your boys?
Yeah, yeah. I mean they move around, but very close.
Do you ever bring them on location with you?
They have visited; they both have been here many times and visited me on sets from London to Bulgaria. We make it work, you know?
It must be difficult to make a relationship work because, as an actor, you’re always travelling.
I suppose. A lot of actors are in them but for me, yeah. Dad of two kids and always working so it’s a lot. I just haven’t met anyone.
Do you come back to Ireland a lot outside of work?
No, not as much as I’d like to. I used to come back every Christmas for two weeks, but then my mother had to go and marry an American man, so now she doesn’t come home. She’s in Los Angeles as well, which is great.
Do you still have a family home here?
I don’t, no. I had a place that I rented, an apartment in Ballsbridge in the same building as my mother that I rented for years. Then she gave up her apartment and there was no point in me keeping mine, either. So I have a lot of family over there now: I have two sisters and a niece and two boys of my own, and I have my mother and her husband, so it’s incredible. I would like to come home more but look, when I’m not working or on the road travelling with work I want to be home with the lads. It’ll always be here.
Do you watch your movies often?
Not often, no. I’d see them around the time of the premiere or something like that.
And that would be it?
That’d be it. I mean, every now and then something will be on from 10 years ago and I’ll catch five minutes of it, but it’s like looking through a photo album for me. I remember what was going on outside the experience at the time. I know a lot of actors just don’t watch the work. I garner no enjoyment from it. I’ll have a look once at a screening or a premiere, and curl up inside myself, and then that will be that.
What’s your big ambition now?
No ambition. You just want to do things that you find intriguing, that you find provoking – and hopefully some level of intrigue or provocation can be experienced by the viewer as well. You do different jobs for different reasons. I always have to feel that I can do something with it. Even Total Recall, which was a lovely financial payday and allowed me to put a few kroner in the bank, even with that I thought I could do something with it. You do things for different reasons. You do something like The Lobster because you’re just blown away by it; you just want to be a part of it. As I said, the budget on this was about the same as what they’re spending on catering on the Harry Potter film. Ambition? I don’t know. The ambition has shifted from film ambitions to more life stuff.
What kind of life stuff?
Being a dad and a friend, being a decent brother and a partner, whenever that happens. All of that kind of jazz.