Ben Barnes Factory Mag Podcast transcript
Thanks to gorgeouseyes

My name is Howard Webster and I'm the editor of Factory. I'd like to welcome you to the special interview with none other then Prince Caspian himself a.k.a. Ben Barnes. Ben is widely regarded as one of the hottest young acting talents to come out of Britain today. He won the role after getting rave reviews for his performance in the History Boys in the West End of London. When I caught up with him in London recently, I asked him what it was like to receive the news that he was gonna get the role that was gonna change his life forever:

Ben Barnes: " Well.. uhm.. I was fast asleep coz it was... we found out on american time, in their afternoon, that I got the part.. so I was called up by, you know, my agent and manager and everything, on the other end of the line...and I just ran around the house screeming, got this huge adrenalin rush... swearing... and, you know, I would have been smashing things if there were things to smash, but yeah it.. it was uhm...really overwealming... it was the second time that I heard that I've got a big part... the first time I was in LA driving... and I got... and I pulled over and I got a call saying that I've got two parts... I got a pilot that I've been aditioning for and I got a part in Stardust movie... and I was so excited I.... five minutes later I crashed!"

Howard Webster: "Oh really?"

BB: " I was so over excited,,, I got really like led...right for... just speading down Wilshire boulevard and went straight into a back of another car" (laughing)

HW (Laughing): "Oh my God! How did you explain it to them?"

BB:" I did explain it to them but they were not particularly simpathetic probably because almost everyone in LA is an actor and wants those jobs so...they weren't particularly happy... but it was only a little dence... it was alright."

HW:" That's not too bad... so you..you...you... the casting process...you know, coz I heard it was a long long time with all the key roles but you were just telling me it was qite short for you..."

BB:" For me it was really short, yeah, I mean I know they've been looking for that part for what, over a year, because they were not exactly sure what they were looking for ... wether they wanted mexican, spanish, or you know french or what kind of race they were gonna make this Telmarin race so they were kind of looking all over the world and eventually they...
Somebody saw me in the History boys, the windows theater in the West End and suggested I come in for a quick reading, which I did and then I did a screen test the next week with the director and producer and everything and then I got a part a couple of days later so it was really whirlwind for me... it was couple of weeks start to finish...but.. yeah... and then within 3 and a half weeks of that ... funnier that... I was in New Zealand on a horse..."

HW:" Galloping around?"

BB:" Well not galloping ... it took me another two weeks to get the galloping...but uhm"

HW:" coz with the... coz you were telling me you coudn't ride... or that you've ridden once..."

BB:" no... I mean I told them I could. They said how was your riding and I said, I think I used a word like average or intermediate, when of course I've been on a horse once when I was eight but I thought that counted... and I got there... and I landed and before I even went to the production office I met with the... the... other actors and you know Andrew Adamson the director... I was driven straight to the riding center... and we needed somewhere that was kind of quiet so I thought it was quite ironic that I actually learned to ride a horse in the riding center for the disabled."

HW: laughing

BB: " I thought that was some sort of *missing word* in the fact that I suggested that I might be able to ride better then I actually could but it was free in the afternoon, so..."

HW: (laughing) "So you are now awsome... you can charde through rivers..."

BB: " I can charge through rivers I can yeah run down ramps, do it holding flaming torches... jumping I haven't quite mastered yet but... rearing up and everything, it was yeah... I really began to enjoy it by the end.

HW: "What was your horse called?. Did you have one?"

BB: " I had a couple...uhm...I had a couple, they were kind of spanish names like Thebelon and stuff like that but uhm...there was actually... we actually had one... we didn't have quite enough doubles of the horses coz obviously if they get tired you have to swop them out so we got a new horse and they let me name it so I named it Destrier coz that's the name of Caspian's horse... in the actuall book so we named it Destrier... so there's now an official Destrier roaming around."

HW: " Do you have your Entourage? What is your Entourage?"

BB: " Yeah I've got some mates in LA who literarly fir the descriptions perfectly and when they e-mail me they say hey Bennie what's up coz my life at the moment when I go to LA does feel a bit like the very beginning of you know the start of Entourage... it's not quite as glamurous but uhm...but it's a .. you know I've learned a lot from that show.."

HW. " Really?"

BB: " I love it!"

HW: " So what would you... who... you can't name names.."

BB: " They're just not anyone, anyone would notice."

HW: " What's your favourite episode from that show?"

BB: " Oh my favourite episode... I like the one with the threesome."

HW: "The threesome?"
BB: "Yeah! Of course I do!"

HW: "Whish one's that?"

BB: "You've might not got there.. he's got a girlfriend who's just divine..
The thing is really interesting to me is just watching how they do the negotiations for the films and you know how they negotiating the amount of weeks and the cast and all that... it just hits home you know... it's great!"

HW: " So your experience of that life is actually quite that..."

BB: " It's quite similar... not..not as quite as many nice cars and women or any of that stuff but...the rest of it...pretty accurate."

HW: " so what... obviously now with Narnia..you're signed for the Dawn Treader

BB: "Yeah... doing that next summer."

HW: " And.. but what actualy.. you know in terms of.. appart from doing those sorts of movies what do you want to do?"

BB: "To me it's anything with an interesting twist on it, you know, I'm very happy to do you know kind of action stuff but it's got to be something that's clever that hasn't been done before, that has an interesting kind of edge to it, coz it's all about for me... it's always been about character... I kind of got into acting through music stuff... I started doing musicals but it was always the story and the characters that...that...kind of held my attention so...you know.. I've done.. I've been lucky enough so far to be cast as people from all different walks of life..
I've only ever worked once in my own accent you know I get cast as russians and americans, you know and people from Yorkshire.. the whole gammit, but uhm... I just want variety and I want really interesting characters and stories that have something to say."

HW: " coz you were a pop singer, weren't you ...you did sort of... I've heard a few songs..."

BB: " I've dabled a little of bit... I did some jazz singing and yeah...uhm... I've had my moments but uhm..It was a useful period for me because I love music but it really is something that is more for me now, you know, something that I really enjoy, it's...it's my hobby.."

HW: "So when Buz Lehrmann calls you to do his next..."

BB: "...musical extravaganza, I'll be there in a second! Across the Universe, obviously the Julie Taymor Beatles movie has just come out, and I you know, I loved it..I thought it was fantastic...I think it's a real opportunity to again put a twist on things and make thing a little bit different and you know just really go for it and if people like it then that's their prerogative, that's what it's for..."

HW: " I think you'll get offers...I think you'll be surprised... I think you'll get action offers..."

BB: " Already I've got, you know a kind of wide garret of things that I am reading but it's inevitably this kind of small, obviously, the small human stories that really kind of get to you and they're the ones you really want to kind of go after..."

HW: " If you want to go back on a stage at some point what would be an ideal role? Where would you be? Coz I know you told me..."

BB: " You kind of have to take it script by script and see what kind of comes in... (long pause) ... you know any British actor who doesn't eventually want to have a crack at Hamlet is uhm.. in it for the wrong reasons..."

HW: "Yeah I know.. and if you have to play another role in Narnia..could you be a big part of Mrs Beaver for example..."

BB: laughing I was at the British Independent Films Awards yesterday and I went up to Ray Winstone and I said. I've taken over from you, I've taken over the Narnia *missing word* and he said: what you're do new eager beaver on the block and I said. Absolutely! Absolutely! That's exactly who I am but then about 10 minutes later... coz he actually thought I were... laughing... he said: mate you're never gonna get more beaver jokes then me... me and Dawn French walked down the red carpet together.. imagine how many we got in... he's Mr Beaver in the first one..."

HW: " Is he still in the second one?"

BB: "No, it's like 1300 years later.. there's no characters that are the same..."

HW: "He would be a very old beaver"

BB: "Apart from ... very old... both laughing and speaking indistinctivly

HW: " The accent though..I mean.. you were telling me the other day...where does that come from?"

BB: "In the Narnia film?"

HW: "Yeah"

BB: " Well originaly the plan was to have a Spanish accent but it would be a very fluent English because obviously C.S. Lewis is a very English author and they wanted it to be very smooth, very you know transferable, very you know very easy for everyone to understand and uhm.. but there was basicaly a sort of tinge of a Spanish accent a hint of a kind of swordy you know race decended from pirates and pacific islander women and stuff and so we started of doing a sort of Spanish accent but then they were a lot of Italian actors cast so we kind of had to round it out a little bit and I ended up trying a kind of pull-over different accents together...

HW: " *didn't understand the question*

BB: "Yeah well I've only done some of it so I've still got a little bit to go little bit of *missing word-think it's an abbrevation I don't understand* left to do ... so we'll se how it works out but..."

HW: "So what's the final accent sound like?"

BB: talking in Spanish accent (SO HOT!) " Well it sort of sounds a little bit Spanish but it's a little bit rounder as well, you know (stops speaking in Spanish accent)"

HW: "Ah like that?"

BB: " Like that...but it's not like... I did this uhm...British Indy film last year called Bigga than Ben where I played (speaking with Russian accent) a Russian and in the Russian I would be ..... (stops) like I would be struggleing to find words and I would be getting my grammer wrong and this it's kind of very smooth, it's very fluent but..."

(Ben's cell phone rings)

HW: "That's Mr Beaver calling..."

BB: "Hollywood calling... *too bad they didn't let us listen to the call :*

BB: "But my hair is never right for whatever part I go for... it's always exactly wrong.. when I went in for a ... the History boys i had long hair and they had to cut it all off and then I went in for Caspian and they needed long hair and I just cut it all off so I had to have extentions for like 7 months.. and..uhm.. you know...what ever I go in for the always say would you mind cutting your hair or would you mind getting extentions or would you mind growing your hair..like it's never right.. I can't do any right..."

HW: " Where did you have to start with the short hair.. was that the Russian.."

BB: " That was Bigga then Ben... the russian film..."

HW: "He does it really great... neither of them heard your Prince Caspian Spanish accent ...
*some other people joined the interview*

BB: " Well noone has heard that you see, it's... *all laughing*

A WOMAN: "Prince Caspian is Spanish? From Narnia books?

BB: "A Telmarine.. it's a Telmarine race... he's very English in any adaptations they've done so far but it's suppose to be.... it's a race decended from pirates and pacific islander women... so I had like thick... dark make up.. like a little bit of eye liner...." *LOL*

HW: " Well you look very healthy... charging around...."

BB: " yeah..yeah..yeah."

WOMAN: "What's your ideal role?"

BB: " As I was saying before I don't really have like one specific... ideal one...I just take it ..like... script by script and just anything that I find like particulary intriguing or anything that I read I think I can really do that well.. I can fit in a part of me into that..."

WOMAN: " How did History Boys come about:"

BB: " I played Dakin who's the kind of the young arrogant, very kind of sexualy provocative student, who tries it on with his teacher and he's.. and he's having his way with the school secretary and stuff..."

WOMAN: " So totaly against type.."

BB: "Exactly!! Completely against type.. I have to come out of my shell for that..." laughing