They Were Having a Father-Off: The Paul Mescal & Andrew Scott Interview
They Were Having a Father-Off: The Paul Mescal & Andrew Scott Interview
To quote Lisa Barlow: I’m shaking. I’m physically shaking.
*taps microphone* This is a SHUT UP EVAN exclusive!
“What are you doing Friday at noon?” my friend Barry texted me last week. I was in the thick of Chaos Dinner prep, tunnel visioned within an inch of my life. “Flying home,” I responded, unaware that moments later I’d be sent into cardiac arrest with an offer to conduct the very first joint interview with Paul Mescal and Andrew Scott in promotion of their new film, All of Us Strangers (see: my interview with director Andrew Haigh from earlier this month). I changed my flight and began doing a series of breathing exercises my therapist had recommended for me to cope in moments of unrest.
I wrote a series of questions in my notes app and rehearsed with a mnemonic device in my hotel room in an effort to be fully off-book, but I knew that this interview would only take off by staying in the moment. While I always aim for professionalism in these settings, I know the alchemy of journalist-meets-fan is my sweet spot so it’s always a calibration game, one whose outcome is dictated by intense preparedness mixed with a willingness to throw it all out.
“Thank you for popping our cherries,” Andrew told me moments after we wrapped the interview. Paul laughed and voiced his agreement. I felt my knees begin to buckle as I stood up to take a photo with this especially photogenic pair.
But that’s jumping to the end. Let’s begin, instead, with a perfect place to start.
So is this the very first press junket the two of you have done together for this film?
Andrew: Yes! Our first interview together.
Wow! I feel even more honored than I already did. We had a strike for some period of time and it looked like maybe we weren’t going to be able to promote this film but fortunately, we are! What is it like being able to talk about it now? Is there pressure built up from all that time?
Paul: It’s a massive relief. It’s really exciting.
Andrew: We both didn’t think we would be able to talk about it and we both loved the film so much that it seemed like a great shame to not be able to get out in front of it. So yeah, it’s brilliant! Thank you for being our first.
So there’s what this film is about on paper, but then there’s what this film is really about. For both of you, based on when you first read the script and had conversations with writer and director Andrew Haigh, what would you say this film is trying to speak about on a higher level?
Paul: You can go first. [Laughs] We’ll get better at this!
Andrew: I think it’s about love. It’s a love story. There’s two different forms of love in the movie: familial love and romantic love, and in a way, I suppose it’s also about grief. The thing that’s been really surprising for us was — well, not that we thought it was only going to appeal to queer audiences, but what seems to be emerging is how it affects everybody because everybody has a parent or a child or some relationship with parenthood, and everybody has some degree of interest in romantic love. And I think that people are genuinely moved by the film [on a cellular level].
Paul: I think it’s also a study in loneliness and how loneliness and love get in the way of each other. But ultimately, I think it’s a study of how brave you need to be to invest in the idea of love and how on the surface, it looks like something that’s easy but with Adam and Harry, you really see them work toward finding each other. I think it’s an incredibly brave act to love somebody.
This film also sits with you. It’s come back to me in multiple ways. I told Andrew Haigh I’ve been listening to “Always on My Mind” by Pet Shop Boys, which is featured in the film, and it makes me feel like the film is moving through me again and I almost quiver. Andrew mentioned that the two of you were fans of each other’s work before, so I’m wondering what it was like to then be in a scene with someone who you’ve long admired for their acting?
Andrew: Disappointing. [Laughs]
Paul: Immensely! [Laughs]
Andrew: We had done a little skit for [an Irish fundraising television event called] Comic Relief. It was sort of a Normal People/Fleabag mashup where [I as] The Priest from Fleabag took Connell and Marianne [from Normal People]’s confessions, so we’d done a little bit together and hung out a little before [we started shooting this film].
Paul: I think to say that I was immensely excited at the prospect of working with Andrew is an understatement, and I was nervous because I’ve watched him for so long and been such a great admirer that when the cameras turned on and we were in a bubble together, it was an immensely exciting experience and one that I hold very dearly.
Andrew: What we’re required to do is so intimate.
There was a lot of intimacy. I thoroughly enjoyed it! Let’s talk about that. I’m fascinated by the idea of chemistry; if it can be created, if it can be harnessed. How do you go into a process like this of working on a film that relies on chemistry? That’s kind of a tall order.
Andrew: I’m exactly like you: I find chemistry so fascinating. It definitely helps if you get on with someone initially because you skip all the precursory stuff. And you do feel really vulnerable because you’re sitting there with no clothes on, it’s 6:30 in the morning, there are lots of people —
Paul: Bangin’ around! [Laughs]
Andrew: Exactly! [Laughs] Bangin’ around in a different way. But also, I have heard of people who can’t bear each other but their chemistry on-screen is really fine, so in a way, the challenge is to produce a different type of chemistry than the type of chemistry that me and Paul have because we can have our own specific chemistry as two people, but then Adam and Harry’s chemistry is really very different and that’s where it just [laughs] — well, it requires some skill.
Paul: Some acting! [Laughs]
Andrew: So that’s where the real work is: finding the way that [our characters] would be with each other and touch each other and communicate with each other. We watched the film for the first time with an audience the other night, because we first saw the movie together in a screening room in London, just the two of us, and afterwards we were like, “Did you enjoy it?” [Laughs]
Paul: Like, “Yeah, I think it’s good!” [Laughs]
Andrew: We had no clue!
Paul: We were too close to it.
Andrew: Then we separately went to see it with people we love.
Paul: I saw it for the second time before you had and I remember coming right out of the screening room and calling you and being like, “Andrew! It’s really good.” [Laughs] “You’re really good in it!” But I think it’s one of those films where, when we were shooting it, I was acutely aware of how special it felt to make it, so then viewing it for the first time, it’s a horrible pressure. You’re like, “God, I hope the special feeling I had making it translates.” You end up just white-knuckling it through the film the first time. And I think watching it last week with an audience, with the intimacy thing we were talking about: On the surface, you might think sex scenes are obvious markers, but there were little moments in it — stuff that I have no recollection of doing — like how we looked at each other in those moments that are true markers of the work that we put into Harry and Adam’s chemistry. It’s quite frightening watching the film from [our] perspective because I have no recollection of looking at [Andrew] like I wanted to rip the clothes off him. [Laughs]
Andrew: It also feels so exposing. When watching it with 350 other people as we did the other evening, I just felt so exposed. I think that’s a good sign that you’re in it as an actor: when you don’t really remember looking at someone with such love or desolation. It feels like a really tender and tactile film. There’s so much physical touch in it, and I think that’s a real part of the film. The smell and taste and feeling of it is very alive.
I was really struck by the audience’s reactions to certain moments in the film. One that comes to mind is Harry’s expression when he’s first in the doorframe lingering and looking longingly at Adam. I read that moment as being incredibly hot, but the audience started giggling. I was trying to unpack that after the fact and I’m wondering what you make of that, because I don’t think the intention of that moment was to be funny.
Paul: I think when an audience giggles like that, it’s a mark of recognizing something, and I think they’re laughing in that moment at the fact that they feel uncomfortable and they don’t know why. I think that moment is loaded with the obvious thing of sex, but there’s also an uneasy desparation in Harry to try to get into [Adam’s] flat and into his pants! [Laughs] The audience isn’t really sure what the footing of the film is yet, and that’s really satisfying to be involved in.
Andrew: And it feels like a very theatrical film in a sense because there’s no glow around [Adam’s parents] to signify that [they’re dead]. That requires a lot of work from the audience, and I think audiences like to work a little harder, so it’s an incredible thing that people also have varying ideas about who Harry is and [which characters] are alive.
It didn’t occur to me until two weeks later that the elevator moment was the final time we see Harry alive. I thought I had this “a-ha” moment but I told my friend and he was like, “Yeah, of course!” I thought I was a cinema historian, but that was not the case. Zooming out a bit: You two are people that fans are superfans of. People don’t just love the both of you; they love the both of you. (I’ve done boots-on-the-ground reporting of this. I can confirm!) Who do you two superfan over?
Both: Ooh… Ooooh…
Paul: Let’s say that louder! [Laughs] Oooooooh!!
Andrew: It’s maybe more singers or even athletes because actors are your tribe so you admire them, but you’re not like, “Oh, my GOD!” I remember Billy Jean King, the tennis player, came to see a play I did on Broadway —
Paul: That wasn’t in the bingo cards, for sure. [Laughs]
Andrew: I swear! She’s a legend. A queer legend, as well! But I remember I just couldn’t believe it. I think she might’ve been with Holly Hunter? It was a long time ago. [Laughs] They came to the dressing room and I just couldn’t believe Billy Jean King was there. She had that type of skill that’s just like, “I don’t know how you do that!” So I’m gonna go with Billy Jean King.
And Paul, I know you love Clairo.
Paul: I love Clairo. Musicians like Clairo, Mitski — that’s my territory for sure. It’s like what Andrew was saying: It’s a different discipline that just moves me emotionally but I have no idea how they do it. And then you’ve got the old-style movie stars: I remember bumping into Harrison Ford and I was like, “What the hell is going on?” [Laughs]
Switching gears a little bit: I grew up as a queer person with a bleak queer cinema landscape. I’m very appreciative of what we did have then retrospectively, but I’ve been thinking about all of the incredible queer cinema that’s come out this year alone: this film, Bottoms, Red, White & Royal Blue. Queer films are no longer a genre; they can now populate any genre. What is that like to witness?
Andrew: To me, it’s an absolute miracle. When I was growing up, the idea of being in or even being able to watch a film like this was miraculous. I’ve been in a couple of gay films over the years and there’s always the question of how to market the film, and what I love about this film is that in the trailer and featurettes, our relationship is front and center. [Usually] you can have a gay storyline in a movie, but [the marketing team] has to trick the audience into believing that it’s not gay, which I’ve always thought was completely preposterous. So the idea that it’s there and people are actually interested in seeing that side of the film is not only wonderful but it actually makes sense, because of course there is an audience — and not just a queer one.
Paul: The themes of this film are totally universal, regardless of sexuality. Bottoms is a great example of that: It did so well at the box office and it’s an out and loud comedy and it’s incredibly refreshing and exciting to see.