Michael Fassbender (16 page)

One of those ‘frightening experiences’ occurred early on in the shoot when after a particularly intense scene Michael commented, ‘Yeah, that’s pretty good for a first take. You know, not bad.’

Steve looked at him and said, ‘Let’s have a chat.’ They then went into a separate room where Steve told him, ‘Some actor geezer just came into the room here. That wasn’t Michael Fassbender. I know what you’re doing but you’ve got to find something different.’

‘I was like, “Oh, shit,”’ Michael recalled. ‘So I went back to the drawing board and tried to pare things down and just make them honest.’

During a break in filming he told
Total Film
magazine, ‘I’m spending a lot of time with the character and getting to know him. So throughout the day I’ll think, “What would Brandon do in this scenario?” It’s about trying to understand and relate to him, as opposed to judging. That would be a mistake.’

The restaurant scene is perhaps the only charming one in the movie, showing the awkwardness, the pauses and flirtation of a first date. Initially there were pages of dialogue for the actors but, when they were ready to shoot it, Steve suggested that they improvise much of the dialogue to make it seem more realistic. When Brandon and Marianne are walking back after their date, he asks
her which era she would most like to live in. When it’s his turn to answer, Michael expresses his own private fantasy that he has always wanted to be a musician in the 1960s.

The bedroom scene was actually shot before the one in the restaurant. Nicole had been dreading it and was very relieved by how supportive and understanding Michael was. ‘I just tried to pretend there wasn’t a camera in the room,’ she said. ‘Michael is so engaged and so much fun to work with. I know I couldn’t have gotten through that scene without him. He is a total gentleman.’

Michael had always hoped to find a director as in tune with his ideas as Steve and considered himself extremely fortunate to have done so. For his part, Steve, a big, imposing man, with a rather stern default expression, talked about Michael as he might a lover in some newspaper interviews. ‘With Michael I’ve actually met someone with whom I have some kind of link,’ he told
The Times
. ‘It’s odd. Strange. And I never saw it coming. It was never a thing for which I strived. But when you find someone, it’s like falling in love. You want to keep it. And I think myself and Michael are very pleased that we’ve found each other in that way.’

His praise for Michael’s acting ability knew no bounds and he put him firmly up there with the all-time greats – and Michael’s heroes. ‘There is no one like Michael out there right now. And there hasn’t been, for me, since Marlon Brando. There’s a fragility and femininity to him, but also a masculinity that can translate. You’re not in awe
of him. You’re part of him. He pulls you in. And that’s what you want from an actor. You want people to look at him and see themselves.’

During a break in filming to promote
Jane Eyre
, Michael modestly brushed aside a journalist from the
Irish Voice Reporter
who mentioned his impressive list of film credits. ‘Oh, Jesus, it’s all luck and timing,’ he said. ‘I think you have to be aware of when your opportunities are coming. When
Hunger
came my way I just knew I had to get that one right. I was being given a chance to get my foot in the door. I think being aware of that and seizing it when it’s there helped. That feeling of timing is really important in this business, definitely. Having business awareness is important too.’

When he wasn’t flying around the world making and promoting movies, Michael was now happily settled in the East End of London. Although he had enjoyed the weather and creativity of Los Angeles, he found the necessity of driving everywhere rather than walking odd. He preferred the buzz of New York – one of his favourite cities – where he could walk the streets and enjoy the sights and sounds. This was the type of thing he loved doing in London.

In an interview with the fan website,
fassinatingfassbender.com
, he told how he likes to keep upbeat and talk to and smile at people he sees throughout the day. ‘That interaction with people, and getting on the tube in the morning and buying your ticket… If you have a little conversation with the person who is giving you the
ticket, smile and ask how their day is going, that sort of perks them up a little. And that exchange makes me feel good then to start my day off, you know. I think it’s likewise for most people, you know that interaction, it keeps us going.’

When he was making it in the business, it had been New York that symbolised the dream of being an actor. He told the French magazine
Obsession
that his acting method had come from the books and writings of Stanislavski and Lee Strasberg, the whole school of the Actors Studio. But as he couldn’t afford to live in New York he had settled in London instead. But that, too, had proved very expensive and he’d had to keep finding cheaper accommodation. Now that he was in much better financial shape he was rediscovering the joys of living in London compared to car-bound LA or the frenetic pace of New York. ‘It’s a place where you can take your time. I need to walk the streets and see the seasons change and not have endless sunshine.’

He expanded on the subject to
Radio Times
magazine: ‘I love London. I love its diversity, the wonderful mix of people. I love the fact that I can afford to take the tube without worrying about it. I keep an eye on the money I make because it’s important for me to make sure that I don’t go back to counting every 50p. If you can survive in London, you can survive anywhere.’

Now, after an intense five weeks of filming on
Shame
, he was looking to relax. He had enjoyed the experience of
playing Brandon but it had left him drained. It had been the toughest job of his life, he admitted, and from someone who had starved himself to play a hunger protester, that was no lightweight remark. ‘I enjoyed being honest with myself making the film and exploring those things that society has deemed to be shameful,’ he said. ‘I don’t have the answers to a lot of the moral questions but it’s important to pose them.’

However, he was quick to disperse any notions of him being the kind of actor who believed in suffering for his art. ‘I don’t want to be one of those actors who’s sitting there saying, “This is such hard work,” when obviously there’s a lot of people out there doing proper hard graft,’ he told the
Sunday Independent
. ‘But the fact of the matter is that this was the fifth film of six films I did over a twenty-month period and they were all back-to-back so I was jumping from one personality to the next. By the time I got to
Shame
, I was kind of tired.’

Having made 5 films in just 12 months –
Haywire, Jane Eyre, A Dangerous Method, X-Men: First Class
and
Shame
– he had been looking forward to an extended rest. It had been a hectic period, diving from one project to the next and creatively exhilarating. But now it was time to sit back, take stock and enjoy some downtime. That was the plan. But then, to paraphrase one of his heroes, Marlon Brando in
The Godfather
, he was made an offer that he couldn’t refuse.

S
ir Ridley Scott, whose directorial credits include
Blade Runner, Thelma and Louise, Black Rain
and
Gladiator
, had contacted Michael during the filming of
Shame
to say that he would like him in his latest movie,
Prometheus
. Despite feeling jaded after a run of back-to-back movies, Michael knew he couldn’t turn down the chance to work with such an acclaimed director. He would do one more film and
then
take a break.

It was to be another blockbuster movie, and rumoured to be a prequel to Scott’s 1979 sci-fi classic,
Alien
. The story follows the crew of the spaceship
Prometheus
in the year 2085, as they explore an advanced alien civilisation to uncover the origins of humanity. Michael was to play a
lifelike human android named David, the latest creation of the Weyland-Yutani Corporation, headed by Peter Weyland (Guy Pearce). Swedish actress Noomi Rapace was to play archaeologist and scientist Elizabeth Shaw after Scott had been impressed by her performance as Lisbeth Salander in
The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo
.

Charlize Theron was cast as Meredith Vickers, Weyland’s company rep on the spaceship, captained by Janek (Idris Elba). The other crew were Logan
Marshall-Green
(best known for his TV roles in
24
and
The O.C
. and the movies
Devil
and
Brooklyn’s Finest
) as hot-headed scientist Charlie Holloway, Rafe Spall (
Hot Fuzz, Shaun of the Dead
) as botanist Milburn and Sean Harris (
Brighton Rock, Harry Brown
) as geologist Fifield.

Michael was fascinated by David, by his multiple functions as butler, housekeeper and maintenance man aboard the spaceship, and by the way the crew treated him. Because he is not human he routinely fails to get any respect and his superior intellect and advanced physicality gives rise to some contempt. This brought in the intriguing notion of how David would feel about the crew over time. Is he capable of emotions? What if he started to develop human personality traits? For two and a half years the crew are in cryostatis – a sleeping state – so David matures differently over that period of time. What does he do to amuse himself?

News of
Prometheus
caused a big stir among fans of
Alien
. Ridley was determined to keep details of the script
from being leaked, so secrecy was paramount. The cast had to sign clauses forbidding disclosure of story details and their first reading of the script was under supervision in Ridley’s production office.

Michael was impressed, thinking the script intelligent, well constructed and respectful of the lineage of the story. ‘It was a real thriller with real anticipation.
Alien
had that. The atmosphere was thick. You knew that something was going to happen. It’s very rare that you can read that in a script.’ By way of preparation, he chose not to revisit
Alien
or its sequels,
Aliens, Alien 3
and
Alien Resurrection
, but instead watched one of his favourite Ridley Scott movies,
Blade Runner
.

His inspiration when it came to David’s posture and movement was not an obvious one. He modelled him on the American Olympic diver, Greg Louganis. As for his behaviour and personality, Michel felt there should be an androgynous quality to David. With his hair dyed blond for the role – which, he remarked, made him look like ‘a ten-quid rent boy’ – he thought of TE Lawrence and David Bowie, who ‘both have a feminine quality about them’.

He also joked to
Empire
magazine, ‘I haven’t suggested this to Ridley but I want David to be doing a robot dance, in a secret disco room on the ship. I want him sitting there with a disco ball and a floor that lights up!’

Filming began in March 2011 at Pinewood Studios in Buckinghamshire. ‘It’s the story of creation, the gods and the man who stood against them. It’s not a small film,’
commented Ridley to journalists. ‘I’m using the giant James Bond 007 stage at Pinewood and six other sound stages to film it.’ Other filming took place in Spain, Toronto and Iceland, where the first 15 minutes of the film unfold in a ‘beginning of time’ sequence.

Michael was dazzled by the big-budget effects. Walking on set, he said, was like walking on a spaceship with all the panels, screens and lights. Much of it was physically there rather than added later via CGI. Attention to detail was important, Ridley said, right down to the smallest of things – even shoelaces. ‘There was even a big argument about the globular helmets,’ he said. ‘I was certain I wanted the fully spherical glass helmet. I’m in 2083 and I’m going to space – why would I design a helmet that has blind spots when what I want is a globular helmet, a three-sixty?’

Michael was also impressed by how unpretentious, accessible and available Ridley was to everyone on set, always willing to listen to ideas. Like other quality directors Michael had worked with, Ridley encouraged his actors to use their intuitive and interpretative skills as much as possible, rather than bluntly be told what to do. ‘Ridley comes to you with an interesting prop and says, “I see your character maybe messing around with this,”’ Michael explained to
GQ
magazine. ‘It’s just the oddest little things – like he might rub his finger on a desk to test for dust and then you’re thinking “OK, right, that’ll take me on a mental tangent.”

‘That’s the thing with all these directors – none of them want to give you a direct, “Just do this in the scene.” They want you to find it by yourself. A great director is a great manipulator. They might manipulate you two nights before at a dinner by saying a phrase or by mentioning a piece of information that you realise when you come on set, “Ah, that’s what they’re talking about.” You don’t even realise they’re doing it.’

The glasses that Ridley wanted Rafe Spall to wear as Millburn, however, caused much amusement among the cast after Rafe said that they made him look like Dame Edna Everage!

Screenwriter Damon Lindelof (whose credits include the TV series
Lost
and the offbeat Daniel Craig-Harrison Ford movie
Cowboys & Aliens
) remarked on how impressed he was by eager fans of
Alien
.

Damon also felt that the film tapped in to how humans would view exploring space in the years to come. ‘Space exploration in the future is going to evolve into this idea that it’s not just about going out there and finding planets to build colonies,’ he said. ‘It also has this inherent idea that the further we go out, the more we learn about ourselves. The characters in this movie are preoccupied by the idea: what are our origins?’

After filming wrapped at the end of July, Michael finally took his overdue break. He had been looking forward to a holiday at one of his favourite holiday destinations – Trancoso in Brazil with its beautiful white beaches. ‘I love the Brazilian temperament,’ he has said. ‘Everything is very sexy. They do everything better and sexier than we do. There’s a spirit of joy and living life that’s very infectious and nice to be around.’

A keen world traveller, Michael enjoys meeting people and experiencing different cultures. Often he will pop into a church on his travels and light a candle but he drifted away from Catholicism years ago – ‘too many contradictions’. However, he still respects priests and sees them as figures of authority so he was chastened when he wandered into a church in Germany and was told off by the priest for wearing a hat. ‘My grandfather would have
been very cross,’ he later remarked. ‘He believed that if you entered any building at all, you took your hat off.’

When
X-Men: First Class
opened in June 2011 it was a critical and box-office smash. Michael, in particular, was picked out for attention. He had entered the big-studio movie world without shedding his credibility and it sent his star appeal soaring. In playing Magneto he had managed to avoid a one-dimensional, comic-book caricature in which a super-power and a cool outfit zapped gravitas and emotional inner struggles. Michael’s portrayal was of a real man with real anxieties, which allowed even non-fans of the genre to enjoy his performance and the movie.

The
Sun
raved, ‘In every sense this is genuinely First Class.’ The
Telegraph
smelled an instant hit. ‘In a summer movie season that promises to be dominated by superheroes and special effects, a group of mutants and telepaths are set to rule the box office,’ it said, adding, ‘It’s not your average superhero movie.’

As well as describing it as a ‘rip-roaringly enjoyable action prequel’, the
Daily Mirror
echoed Michael’s thoughts. ‘It doesn’t feel like a superhero movie, being more interested in the characters struggling with their outsider status than KAPOW! moments,’ it said. ‘You don’t get people this rounded in your standard Oscar flick. And, if it doesn’t feel like a typical superhero movie, it doesn’t look like one either, more closely resembling an early James Bond film.’

The
Independent on Sunday
also picked up on the Bond theme. ‘The young Magneto (Ian McKellen in the first films) is a dashing Nazi-hunter played by Michael Fassbender with more than a dash of James Bond and Harry Palmer.’ The
Daily Express
agreed: ‘Sleek, charismatic Fassbender shows us what a perfect Bond he could be.’

Several critics thought the film revitalised the X-Men series. The
Daily Express
said, ‘
First Class
takes the X-Men story back to its roots and is just the kick in the pants the series needed. It is smart, spectacular, never cheesy, often thrilling and always incredibly entertaining.’ The
Telegraph
concurred that it was ‘a stylish, snappy reboot to the Marvel comics series’, although it did criticise Michael’s accent for ‘being all over the place’. In America,
USA Today
said the movie ‘revives the flagging franchise with this globe-trotting iteration, infusing it with new life and dazzling visual effects’.

In all, it was generally agreed that Michael’s performance stood out among a good cast. The
New York Post
raved, ‘A large and talented cast manages to make more than a dozen characters pop, but still this is the Michael Fassbender show. He was a wonder as Bobby Sands in
Hunger
and showed huge charisma in
Basterds
. Now he’s where Christian Bale was about six years ago, a fresh, silky menace ready to fill any helmet or fire any weapon you’ve got.’

The
Washington Post
agreed: ‘In all honesty,
First
Class
belongs to one actor, and that’s Fassbender, whose Erik/Magneto emerges as one of the most nuanced, conflicted, genuinely antiheroic protagonists in recent comic-book-movie memory. As a transparent and eminently watchable vessel for contradictory impulses – vulnerability and superhuman strength, victimization and destruction, discipline and reckless rage – Fassbender’s Magneto is not unlike Bobby Sands, the IRA activist he portrayed in the 2008 film
Hunger
. His penultimate set piece, when Magneto singlehandedly raises a submarine out of deep waters through sheer force of his will, is one of those rare instances when an authentic screen performance isn’t drowned out by sheer spectacle.’

Entertainment Weekly
, meanwhile, was very taken with Michael and James McAvoy’s partnership. ‘McAvoy and Fassbender are a casting triumph. These two have, yes, real star magnetism, both individually and together. They’re both cool and intense, suave and unaffected, playful and dead serious about their grand comic-book work.’

Back home, Josef was amazed and proud of his son’s career success and impressed by the top-drawer people he had got to work with. ‘For him to be working with big actors, all the top guns… we never thought we would see this day. It’s great. You can see he enjoys what he does,’ he told the
Irish Independent
.

But what about his future? With most of the
First Class
story set at the height of the Cold War and an evil megalomaniac out to conquer the world, Michael’s cold
and ruthless portrayal of Magneto (not to mention the bespoke 1960s clothes) had had quite a few critics thinking of him as the next James Bond.

When the
IndieLondon
website asked him if he’d be interested in playing 007, Michael replied, ‘Well, it’s very flattering of course and Matthew [Vaughn] had sort of mentioned in some of the earlier meetings that it [the film] did evoke a lot of memories for him of those earlier Bond films. But for me in terms of approaching the character of Erik, I didn’t really go along that route. I mean, they dressed me up in clothes and bespoke suits that sort of harked back to those early Bond films but I really just approached it through the material that was available from the comic books. In terms of what I might expect or be hoping for in the future… I never try and plan anything. I never expect anything. I think Daniel [Craig] is doing a fantastic job, so let’s just deal with this film at the moment and see how that turns out.’

He told other reporters, ‘Honestly, I’ve heard a lot of stories but nothing has been brought officially to me. It’s a huge honour to even be associated with the [Bond] movies and I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t flattered. If anything did ever happen – in my wildest dreams, of course – it would make me the first ginger Bond! Some people did kick up about Daniel Craig being the first blond 007 but I wonder how they would feel about a red-headed one instead.’