Recently nominated for a 2025 Golden Globe Award for Best Actor in a Leading Role for the TV series &ldquo;The Day of the Jackal&rdquo; and an Academy Award winner for &ldquo;The Theory of Everything,&rdquo; Eddie Redmayne has been embodying roles ranging from a transgender artist in &ldquo;The Girl from Denmark&rdquo; to activist Tom Hayden in &ldquo;The Trial of the Chicago Seven&rdquo; and the &ldquo;Fantastic Beasts&rdquo; saga for twenty years.

Text by FABIA DI DRUSCO Photography CHARLIE GRAY Styling DAVID BRADSHAW

A Cambridge graduate in art history, Eddie Redmayne, who won an Academy Award for his role as astrophysicist Stephen Hawking in The Theory of Everything, has played many diverse roles in a career spanning nearly twenty years. From Marilyn Monroe's bodyguard in &ldquo;My Week with Marilyn&rdquo; and Marius in &ldquo;Les Miserables&rdquo; to transgender artist Lili Elbe alongside the stunning Alicia Vikander in &ldquo;The Girl from Denmark&rdquo; and Newt Salamander in the &ldquo;Fantastic Beasts&rdquo; saga, as well as a killer nurse in &ldquo;The Good Nurse&rdquo; with Jessica Chastain. We recently saw him in the TV series &ldquo;The Day of the Jackal,&rdquo; for which he received a nomination for the upcoming Golden Globes.

L'OFFICIEL HOMMES ITALIA: What attracted you to &ldquo;The Day of the Jackal&rdquo;?
EDDIE REDMAINE: I love the idea of being able to play a character for 10 hours, to explore all aspects of his personality, especially when he's as mysterious and multifaceted as this. One of the things I like most about my work is the strange things you have to learn in preparation for a role. In this case, I spent a lot of time with a military espionage expert. He taught me various techniques for using car rear view mirrors and store windows to determine whether or not you were being followed. We did training sessions in central London where he would send me pictures of people via WhatsApp that I was supposed to be following or avoiding. He taught me a lot in terms of self-defense using phones, how to disappear while remaining visible. And he taught me the art of sniping, the complexities of the craft at the Bisley shooting range outside London. Then there was the language issue. I don't speak German or French, so I had to learn both languages.
LOHI: You began your acting career almost twenty years ago. What roles have defined your career?
ER: A lot of years when you first start an acting career, you just try to get work. And if you're lucky enough to get a job, you take it and go do it. That all changed for me when I did The Theory of Everything. The fact that the director, James Marsh, told me right away that the movie, in a sense, would live or die by my acting gave me the confidence I needed to ask for what I needed. So I worked with one coach to figure out how I should move, another to figure out how I should speak. I asked for four months to prepare. From that point on and the success of the movie determined the method with which I approach my roles.

LOHI: After the Oscar for &ldquo;The Theory of Everything,&rdquo; you were nominated for an Oscar for your next film, &ldquo;The Girl from Denmark,&rdquo; where you played artist Lili Elbe, the first person to undergo gender reassignment surgery. I read in an interview that you wouldn't accept the role today.
ER: I wouldn't accept the role today because while in an ideal world actors should be able to play anything, in reality there are whole communities and people who have never had the opportunity to sit down at a gaming table and play their part. So until there's a fairer playing field, I think it's important to be careful about the roles you take on.

&ldquo;Having no acting training, I've always been like a sponge absorbing how other actors work&rdquo;

LOHI: Which directors you've worked with do you have a special relationship with?
ER: Tom Hooper directed me three times: in the Elizabeth I TV series starring Helen Mirren, which was one of my first jobs, then in Les Miserables and The Girl from Denmark. Working with the same person, with mutual trust, makes everything go faster. But one of the directors who has inspired me the most is the Danish Tobias Lindholm, who directed me in The Good Nurse. He's a writer and director with such a specific vision of the world, which I really enjoyed.
LOHI: What directors have you never worked with but would like to?
ER: Many. Charlie Kaufman (&ldquo;Eternal Sunshine of the Pure Mind&rdquo;), Paul Thomas Anderson, Luca Guadagnino, Derek Cianfrance (&ldquo;Blue Valentine,&rdquo; &ldquo;The Place Under the Pines&rdquo;). The list goes on...
LOHI: Let's go back in time. When did you start dreaming of becoming an actor?
ER: I have loved music since I was a very young child. I didn't come from a family of artists, but I loved music and songs. My parents often took me to the theater, and I remember one day after seeing a production of A Midsummer Night's Dream, I went on a sort of backstage tour of the National Theatre in London and was completely captivated. Then, when I was about 10 years old, I was cast in a production of the musical Oliver and found myself skipping math class at school to take the subway to the London Palladium, one of our most famous theaters, where I was paid to do something I was passionate about. It never occurred to me at that age that this could be a real career opportunity, and even today I continue to be amazed that it actually happened.

LOHI: You continue to alternate between film and theater. What do you particularly enjoy about the experience of working on stage?
ER: One of the things I love about theater is that in acting you can never do everything perfectly, it's... it's always... you're throwing something into the ether and trying to... it's like trying to catch a butterfly, it's almost impossible, but the beautiful thing about theater is that you can go back and try again every night. I just did Cabaret in New York for almost six months, and people asked me, &ldquo;How can you do the same thing over and over again?&rdquo; The answer is that you have a different audience every night.

&ldquo;Acting is like trying to catch a butterfly. It's impossible. The beautiful thing about theater is that you get to try it every night.&rdquo;

Because it's a live performance, everything is in motion, and inconsistent, and you're always reacting to the specifics of that moment, and the connection that is created with the audience is always different. But that search for something, I would say, the search for perfection with the knowledge that you're not going to achieve it, is the reason for my addiction to theater. And also in theater you have control over your performance, whereas in film and television you play your own version, but essentially the result is the fruit of a dance with the editor and the director and many other people.

LOHI: Is there a role you'd like to play that you've been thinking about for a long time?
ER: You know, I don't have an answer to that question, I like to be challenged and I find it more interesting when others see something in me that they think I might be capable of. When I read a script, I choose instinctively, I have to feel that feeling in my stomach that makes me say, &ldquo;I have to do this.&rdquo;
LOHI: Have you ever turned down a role and regretted it afterward?
ER: No, not really, no. I've been very lucky in that sense. There have been things that I couldn't do because of time issues, but when they've had great success, I always think that I wouldn't necessarily have had the same success. Especially in film and television, an alchemy of words, performance, directing, editing and a certain moment in time has to form. And if you change any of those components, the result won't always be the same.
LOHI: Are there any actors you admire and who have been in some ways a model for you?
ER: Over the years, having no acting training, I always realized that I was doing something that I wasn't fully qualified for. So I've always been like a sponge absorbing how other actors work. One of the most fascinating experiences from that perspective was Aaron Sorkin's movie &ldquo;The Trial of the Chicago Seven,&rdquo; with a cast of all kinds, methods and styles: Mark Rylance, Jeremy Strong, Yahya Abdul-Mateen II, Sacha Baron Cohen, Frank Langella, Michael Keaton. And since most of the movie took place in a courtroom, it was almost like watching them in a theater. I love watching not only people's method of working, but how they act like people, how they try to manage the strange work-life balance typical of the acting profession. And I'm lucky that many English actors I started out working with and consider friends are still working. We find that we talk less about work and more about life, about living as normal and happy a life as possible, despite the weirdness and eccentricity of our profession.

LOHI: What do you like to do when you're not on set or on stage?
ER: I was away for a year and a half, I was in Budapest and Croatia filming &ldquo;Day of the Jackal&rdquo; and then I was in New York. Now that I'm back home in London to my family, it's the day-to-day stuff that I love. Taking the kids to school, playing tennis together. As a family we like to play sports, go to museums. I like to paint. I play the piano, not particularly well, but I like it a lot. I like to cook. All in all, I like being a husband and a father.
LOHI: What do you draw?
ER: Postcards. I use watercolor, usually, and I like to paint postcards because they're small, quick, and it doesn't matter if the end result is a mess.
LOHI: You seem to have always lived in London. What do you like about living in London?
ER: I love this city. When I go away for a long time, coming home gives me an incredible thrill. I love the theaters, we have amazing art galleries. I love the way the South Bank has changed. You can walk along the Thames, past the National Theater, the Globe Theater and St. Paul's Cathedral. I used to live in the Borough, where the food market is. Traditionally I think the British had a bad reputation for food, but London has changed a lot and there are some fantastic restaurants here.
LOHI: How has fatherhood changed you?
ER: I think I've become much more aware of the passage of time and, as far as I'm concerned, desperate to be present in the moment I'm living in. Especially with my job, which is kind of a nomadic existence, similar to a circus where you can be gone for long periods of time.

LOHI: What is your relationship with fashion? I saw you at Burberry shows during the Christopher Bailey era, in a campaign with Cara Delenvigne..... And now you're being followed by Harry Lambert, Harry Styles' stylist.
ER: I love clothes. One of the things that attracted me to The Day of the Jackal is that the character is very meticulous about his style, he's a bit of a peacock. In talking to Natalie Humphries, the costume designer, it became clear how important it is that he changes every time you see him. And I suppose some of his tastes are the same as mine. I think of Saville Row tailors like Drakes, I think of beautiful sunglasses from Jacques Marie Mage (aJapanese brand). In real life, I love experimenting on red carpets. The older I get, the more I realize it's a moment of pure theater. And it's a lot of fun to play with it and to be able to meet extraordinary designers. Whether it's Sarah Burton, who I've known for years and who is a good friend of mine, or Alessandro Michele from Valentino.

LOHI: Let's talk about music.
ER: I'm bad at piano and guitar. I sang at Cambridge, in the choir, I had a scholarship. My voice was never strong enough to sing professionally, but I loved and still love it, and it's a challenge for me in Cabaret in London and New York, even though I had to prepare so much physically and vocally. I've been going to the ENT doctor regularly, taking steroids and all that, but I've managed to complete the tour without canceling too many shows. LOHI: What is your favorite band or singer at the moment?
ER: A couple of days ago we were at a gig at Wembley for a band called Ezra Collective, who I adore. I also love Celeste, who has one of the most unique and beautiful voices I've ever heard. She wrote the song &ldquo;Hear My Voice&rdquo; for the movie &ldquo;The Chicago Seven Trial&rdquo; (where Redmayne played activist and future senator and Jane Fonda's second husband Tom Hayden) and &ldquo;This Is Who I Am&rdquo; for &ldquo;Day of the Jackal,&rdquo; which I find delightful. Her voice is bursting with life, strength and fragility, and she is truly fantastic.

GROOMING&nbsp;Petra Sellge @THE WALL GROUP PRODUCER&nbsp;Cezar Grief LOCATION&nbsp;Repton Boxing Club, London

Eddie Redmayne: “Acting is like trying to catch a butterfly”

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