Romantic comedies made Hugh Grant one of the well-known males on the earth, however he has just a few doubts about their premise.
“The big question is whether the whole idea of a man and a woman belonging together — and this being something we are all desperate for — is true, or a big fat lie,” Grant informed reporters in Paris, the place he was selling his new movie, fantasy blockbuster “Dungeons and Dragons: Honour Amongst Thieves”.
“And I have a feeling it might be a big fat lie — despite having made a whole career and fortune out of it. I mean, how many really happy relationships do you know? There’s not many,” he continued. “All those romantic comedies I made — it would be very interesting to have the sequel now, which would presumably start with the divorce lawyers.”
As normal, there was a big dollop of mischief in Grant’s feedback.
But in a separate interview with AFP, the 62-year-old struck a extra severe tone when requested if he had been formidable throughout his earlier years.
“I wish I had been more ambitious. I wish I’d had sharper elbows,” he stated, all of a sudden dropping his normal tongue-in-cheek supply.
“Honestly, I think I’ve been too lackadaisical. I could have tried much harder when I was very bankable and popular in Hollywood,” he informed AFP. “I could have made any film I wanted… but really I just wanted to watch the football.”
The self-doubt is nothing new — Grant has been considerably ambivalent about his fame ever since “Four Weddings and a Funeral” and “Notting Hill” made him the world’s favourite bumbling Brit within the Nineteen Nineties.
It a minimum of partly explains his disastrously awkward interview on the Oscars this month, when he was unable to muster the pretend pleasure anticipated of stars on the crimson carpet.
But these days, he appears re-energized by extra villainous and extra satisfying roles, enjoying the dangerous man in “Paddington 2”, HBO’s “The Undoing”, and now as a power-hungry felony in “Dungeons and Dragons”.
“Slimy villains do suit me rather well,” he stated with a chuckle. “I’ve loved myself a bit for the primary time within the final six or seven years since I acquired too previous and ugly to be the hero.
“Actually it is how I started — doing characters and foolish voices. And all of a sudden I acquired side-tracked into being a number one man, and I by no means thought I used to be notably well-suited to that.
“It’s really difficult being the lead guy, the hero,” he added. “Well-paid, but hard.”
Not that he ever made a acutely aware resolution to modify to dangerous guys: “These things just plop on to my doorstep,” he stated.
Does he have any recommendation for stars who’re breaking out in the present day?
“Fame has changed so dramatically since it happened to me, due to social media,” he informed AFP, earlier than pausing to replicate. “I at all times fantasized about being within the mould of these mysterious movie stars of the 30s and 40s the place you by no means acquired to know who the actual individual was, and also you and the studio have been allowed to lie about you as a lot as they favored.
“I’d go for that — try to maintain some mystery, don’t have an Instagram account. But that’s my advice to almost everyone in the world.”
© 2023 AFP