Because you can raise hell *and* save the world, right?
Everyone knows that Tom Hardy is an actor, philanthropist and real-life superhero.
Anyway, the sex-God has spoken – and he’s not a fan of how “clean-living” the characters in modern-day superhero films are becoming, comparing the likes of Harrison Ford’s Indiana Jones in the ’80s to Chris Hemsworth’s Thor.
“One was allowed to express personal characteristics,” the 39-year-old actor told The Sunday Times newspaper.
“Now you’ve got to look like you’ve just come off a vegan diet, gone to the gym, part Navy Seal, really clean-valued, clean-living, moralistic – and then you go out and save the world from an impending danger that isn’t really dangerous at all.
“And it becomes not committed to any sense of the gubbins of reality: I don’t recognise this man.”
Of course, Tom played the villain Bane in The Dark Knight Rises, and was reportedly in line to play Rick Flag in Suicide Squad until a scheduling clash with The Revenant filming led to his exit from the superhero movie.
He recently opened up about his role in new show Taboo, telling the BBC that “it’s not a period drama until someone gets naked”.
“You’re lucky there was a loincloth because I didn’t want one,” he said.
“It’s not a period drama until someone gets naked and covers themselves in blood. At least you’re showing willing.”
The new show follows the story of James Delaney (Hardy), a traveller who everyone thought was dead until he returns to London in 1814 after spending 10 years in Africa to reclaim his father’s shipping empire.
The eight-episode series boasts a stellar cast including Jonathan Pryce, Oona Chaplin, David Hayman, Jessie Buckley and Jefferson Hall.
The Oscar nominee and star/EP of FX’s 19th-century period drama admits he’s earned his fierce reputation: “I’ve been a dick. But then, who hasn’t?”
If you believe everything you read, Tom Hardy is the best actor of his generation and also the most dangerous. Descriptors like “volatile” and “mercurial” trail his name, as do tales of on-set squabbles. But as the Oscar-nominated actor, best known for his roles in Mad Max: Fury Road, The Revenant and The Dark Knight Rises, arrives at The Ritz-Carlton on a snowy Manhattan morning to promote his 19th century drama Taboo for FX and the BBC, it’s hard to reconcile that image with the man seated before me. Between puffs of his e-cigarette, a thoughtful and exceedingly self-aware Hardy, 39, who both stars in and executive produces the limited series, spoke candidly about playing “scary blokes,” learning to love the awards circuit and just about anything but those Star Wars rumours.
Profiles of you typically include references to your “dangerous” reputation …
There’s this myth, which is quite asinine, that circulates about me — usually by those who haven’t worked with me. There’s only one thing worse than being talked about and that’s not being talked about in this game so I’d rather it be that, I guess. But there are other people who I work with consistently who know that’s not the case — who just wouldn’t risk having somebody like that in their midst because there’s too much at stake. Obviously you’re going to rub people the wrong way … and I’ve been a dick. But then, who hasn’t?
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Many actors will have experienced a long wait for their dream part, working their way through the stage and screen ranks before their ideal script drops on their doormat.
Tom Hardy, however, is not one of them.
The British actor, who has become a Hollywood favourite after appearing in a string of blockbusters, is to play his ultimate fictional character on television this month, after getting his father to write the script for him.
Hardy, whose father Edward “Chips” Hardy worked as a comedy script writer, has previously told how he hoped to play an amalgam of “every classical character in one”, encompassing the key traits of of Bill Sykes, Sherlock Holmes, Hannibal Lecter and Heathcliff.
His father’s handiwork, Taboo, is now set to broadcast on the BBC this year.
“I wanted to play Bill Sykes, Sherlock Holmes and Hannibal Lecter, in one.”
Taboo has been a long time coming – BBC One’s wild and ambitious new period thriller will arrive on our screens some seven years after originating, as a spark of an idea, in the the mind of its star Tom Hardy.
Along with his father, Edward ‘Chips’ Hardy, Oscar nominee Tom conceived of a character – originally known as ‘Osborne’ – who has been to the ends of the earth and comes back irrevocably changed.
“It came about from doing [BBC One’s 2007 miniseries] Oliver Twist and playing Bill Sykes,” Tom tells us. “To be bluntly honest, I wanted to play Bill Sykes, Sherlock Holmes, Hannibal Lecter, Heathcliff, Marlow [from Heart of Darkness]… just every classical character in one.”
Tom Hardy, the actor famous for playing Bane, Charles Bronson, the Krays and a whole host of other downright terrifying roles, is going to be reading the children of the UK a bedtime story on New Year’s Eve.
The 39-year-old Londoner might not seem like an obvious choice, but Hardy does have some experience of reading bedtime stories and not scaring the bejesus out of his audience: he’s got two kids.
Hardy, who was joined by his dog Woodstock for filming, is going to read ‘You Must Bring a Hat’ by Simon Philip and Kate Hindley. It’s a story about a boy who is invited to a party where, you guessed it, he must bring a hat.
If you and/or your little ones like what they see, there’s good news. Hardy will be back on the show in the new year reading more bedtime stories.
Hardy will be on CBeebies Bedtime Stories on New Year’s Eve at 6.50pm.
