Tom Sturridge interview for The Boat That Rocked
Although no novice, Tom Sturridge found himself in uncharted waters filming The Boat That Rocked, Richard Curtis's pirate radio comedy, in an ensemble that included Bill Nighy and Philip Seymour Hoffman.
I'm homeless,' Tom Sturridge declares matter-of-factly as we order coffee in a cafe tucked away behind Brick Lane, east London. 'In between filming I've been staying with friends, here and there. Plans change so quickly, it's hard to know what I'm doing. Next week, I might be going to LA to see a friend, then New York. It's all up in the air.'
Even dressed scruffily in jeans, a check shirt and black hoodie, which give credence to his claims to being of no fixed abode, Sturridge is arrestingly handsome, with piercing blue eyes, ivory skin, a chiselled jaw and a mop of thick dark hair that appears not to have seen a hairbrush for months.
Sitting atop a newspaper on our table is Sturridge's little black book; not the digit directory of potential girlfriends but a private journal into which he writes stories and musings plucked from his imagination. 'I write constantly, about everything,' he enthuses. I don't doubt that it would make a damn good read, as life is currently very exciting for him.
Aged 23, Sturridge is about to appear in his fourth major film: set in the 1960s, The Boat That Rocked is a Working Title ensemble comedy written and directed by Richard Curtis. Landing the part was 'a beautiful moment', not only for Sturridge's career. 'I was in my old flat,' he says. 'My flatmate and I were about to be evicted so we had this big meeting on our kitchen floor – because we had a very small kitchen – saying, "We've got to sort our lives out. We have to get jobs. We have to get some money. Things have got to change." '
Sturridge says that he wasn't sure the film's casting director liked him – or the big beard he was wearing at the time – but Curtis tells a different story: 'We probably saw 70 people for this part over about two months so it was a big relief when we met Tom. He's handsome, but also quirky and charming. We were pretty sure when he walked out of the room that we'd found the right guy.'
Sturridge plays the part of Carl, a freshly expelled 18-year-old sent by his free-spirited mother, Charlotte (Emma Thompson), to visit his god*father Quentin (Bill Nighy) to 'learn about life'. Quentin is the boss aboard Radio Rock, a pirate radio station broadcasting rock'n'roll music 24/7 from a rusty trawler in the North Sea to millions of insatiable rock-deprived Brits, tired of the BBC's conservative offering of only two hours of rock'n'roll a week. Having been largely ignored by his mother and unaware of his father's identity, on board Carl finds himself among an eclectic ensemble of 12 loose-living, rogue DJs, revelling as gods of the airwaves amid the pirate radio revolution of 1966. Leader of the pack is Philip Seymour Hoffman, an enigmatic, brash American known as the Count, whose anarchic co-broadcasters include Rhys Ifans, Nick Frost, Chris O'Dowd, Ralph Brown and Rhys Darby. Infuriated by the corrupting influence of Radio Rock – a 'sewer of no morals' – the British Government, headed by Minister Dormandy (Kenneth Branagh), is hell-bent on silencing this 'rock'n'roll p*rn*gr*phy'.
The Boat That Rocked is Curtis's first non-romantic comedy, inspired by his own childhood memories of listening clandestinely on his transistor radio to the broadcasts of pirate stations such as Radio Caroline, anchored just outside British territorial waters before it was shut down by the Marine Broadcasting Offences Act of 1967.
Being an 'intense worrier' by nature and the youngest cast member, Sturridge describes his experience as both exciting and terrifying. 'It definitely took me a while to relax into it,' he says, putting up his hood and smiling awkwardly. But having such huge personalities around him made life a lot easier. His overriding memory of filming The Boat That Rocked was of laughing so much he could hardly breathe. 'There were three handheld cameras filming us all the time,' he says. 'Often there would be eight of us in the room just talking, and very quickly it would develop into improvisation and I'd forget that I was on set.
I became immersed in it.'
Sturridge needed regular reality checks. 'There I am, watching Philip Seymour Hoffman, one of my favourite actors in the world, walk into the room dressed up as Father Christmas, being hilarious, and I'm suddenly thinking, "Where am I?"'
According to Curtis, Sturridge more than held his own in the group: 'There's a scene where he had to jump into the freezing-cold North Sea off a very high part of the boat and we, along with the insurers, argued long and hard about whether it was too dangerous for him to jump from that height into such cold water. Tom was completely game and in he jumped. Sadly, we've cut that scene so all of Tom's courage was entirely wasted.'
Sturridge had not done comedy before, which added to the feeling that he was slightly out of his depth – but that was exactly what was required for his character. 'From my point of view it was about a boy sent to live among his heroes, and that was pretty much what I was doing there. I didn't feel I really had to act, I was just reacting to their genius. It was all genuine because I really was in awe of them. I learnt so much just from observation.'
In particular, Sturridge found Curtis 'an impressive and extraordinary person. Working with someone who genuinely believes that the most important things in the world are friendship and love and music, was inspiring.' Curtis's kindness spread through the set, Sturridge says – as did his vast knowledge of 1960s music. 'We would be playing a song during filming and he'd know the album, the garden it was recorded in and what they were drinking on that Tuesday.'
The similarities between Sturridge and Carl extended beyond the set: Sturridge didn't finish school either. 'I left school early in my last year before I took my A-levels,' he explains. 'I wasn't expelled. It was just a mutual understanding. I wasn't interested in going to school and they said, "You're not turning up", so we severed ties. Both sides appreciated it.' And aboard the testosterone-saturated boat, Carl confesses that the nearest he has come to a proper kiss is a lick on the face by a horse. 'That's relatively close to reality, actually,' Sturridge says, feigning shyness. This is hard to believe, despite his claims to be single at present.
Unlike many of his peers, Sturridge doesn't hang out with a thespian crowd, which is surprising given his film industry genes. His father is Charles Sturridge, who directed the original Brideshead Revisited television series as well as films such as A Handful of Dust. His mother is the actress Phoebe Nicholls. 'As children, my siblings and I were actively discouraged from acting,' he says. 'I have no memories of going on set with my parents – aside from Gulliver's Travels.'
During the school summer holidays, when Tom Sturridge was seven, his father was casting for his television series Gulliver's Travels. He wanted a child actor he could talk to and who would respond well to him, so he asked his son to step into the role, despite his total lack of experience. 'All I remember is occasionally having conversations with my father and then someone filming me,' Sturridge says.
He describes his upbringing as very normal and always filled with affection. 'I felt that my decisions, whether good or bad, would always be supported by my parents, because I was loved and respected.' But he confesses to having been an annoying teenager who felt the need to rebel against his parents' mould. 'I didn't want to be a part of that world, in the same way that most kids rebel against what their parents do.' He says he didn't have any ambition to become an actor, not even in school plays.
He stuck to his guns until 2004 when, aged 18, he met the Hungarian film director István Szabó. The father of a friend of his was the casting director for Szabó's film Being Julia, later nominated for an Oscar. They couldn't find anyone to play the part of Roger Gosselyn and Sturridge, who was the right age, was asked to audition. 'It was against my philosophy at the time,' he says, 'but I was obsessed with Szabó when I was younger, mainly because of his film Mephisto. I really wanted to meet him and was really excited by that so I went for it.' Sturridge lived and filmed in Hungary for the summer after his GCSEs, an experience he describes as a 'massive formative moment'. It was the first time in his life someone had chosen him on his own merits, he felt. 'I was incredibly seduced and that's what made me want to be an actor.'
Since then, he has played Jonathan Rhys Meyers's son, Georgy, in Vanity Fair, with Reese Witherspoon as Becky Sharp. In 2006 he starred in Like Minds, a complex psychological thriller alongside Eddie Redmayne and Toni Collette; 2009 brings The Boat That Rocked and Waiting for Forever, James Keach's independent comedy also starring Rachel Bilson and Richard Jenkins.
As for the future, Sturridge is guarded. 'So many things I thought I was doing have fallen apart. Until I've finished filming I don't believe I have the job.' In 2006 he landed the lead in the sci-fi thriller Jumper only to be replaced two weeks before shooting started by the older and more prominent Hayden Christensen. The life of a rolling stone suits Sturridge down to the ground. 'This is the one time in my life where I don't have too much responsibility – a spouse, children or a mortgage – so I can be free, creatively,' he says.
What he hopes for above fame and glory is to be able to feel proud of his work. He can certainly feel proud of his part in The Boat That Rocked, safe in the knowledge that there is plenty more to come. 'It's very early days,' he agrees, pulling his hood off again. 'But it's exciting, definitely.'
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