Outlander’s Tobias Menzies sat down with Hypable to talk about what makes the men of his dual role tick.
You’re really jumping back and forth between the two characters: Frank and Black Jack.
Really up until episode 8, which is the first half of the first season, you have dotted in amongst the scenes flashes back to Frank. Not huge amounts, but you keep Frank boiling away. In episode 8, you have one of the most noticeable differences from the books. We go back to Frank to sort of catch up to him a few months after the disappearance of Claire. We have an episode where he is talking to police, and what he’s been up to. We learn what his experience of that loss is, and how he’s trying to come to terms with his wife having completely disappeared off the face of the Earth. That’s probably the aspect of the season that goes furthest away from the books, but I think it’s to the benefit of the story.
It’s really strong stuff, and in that episode we also kind of see Frank sort of fraying to an extent. The writers were interested in getting the odd flash of sort of Black Jack within Frank. What happens, what’s underneath. We sort of get a little ancestral kind of echo which is kind of fun I think. We decided to have a couple of flashes where Frank is at his lowest point. Suddenly he loses his self control, I guess and a bit of Jack comes flashing in. It was quite an exciting thing to do.
Did you ever have to go between playing the two characters the same day on set?
Thankfully they haven’t done that yet, but I feel like there’s going to be a day (laughs) towards the end of the shoot they’ll say, “Oh, we’ve got to get it done. Tobias go on and out your wig on!” (more laughter)
But in seriousness, thus far they have been on different days. The main job here is to render two distinct individuals. To a certain extent I just hope it works. It’s certainly the boldest thing in casting terms to have the same actor playing these roles. I hope people buy into it.
This is your second entry into novels being translated onto the TV screen. Will we be seeing you on Game of Thrones any more?
Actually, I bumped into Dan Benioff (Game of Thrones showrunner) at Comic-Con, and we were sort of joking about it. The character (Edmure Tully, Catelyn’s brother) didn’t die. He escaped the Red Wedding, so he’s languishing somewhere in a prison cell probably. So, who knows? It would be nice if he came back. I really enjoyed working on the show so it would be fun to go back.
Who do you prefer playing more, Jack or Frank?
I love them for very different reasons. I mean obviously Jack is the flashier of the two. They say that “The devil has the best songs,” and Jack is very much there. I hope that people will be surprised and interested in the Frank that we’ve tried to create. I think he’s a much fuller, more rounded person than in the books. He’s just as interesting to me. There’s a sort of backstory to his time with MI-6 and his experience in the second World War. Coming back to this marriage where they’ve sort of been estranged. All those things are sort of rich things to play.
There’s a bit of action that you have with sword fighting, whipping, and that sort of thing. Did you enjoy it?
Yes, actually. (laughs) What is interesting, surprisingly, you think the Jack stuff is very swashbuckling. Actually, most of it is inside. A lot of it is interior. I was expecting to spend a lot more time on a horse wielding a sword and actually when you get down to it, a lot of Jack’s stuff is in a room sort of getting inside someone’s head. It’s quite an interior chamber kind of psychological threat throughout the story. I think it’s an antidote to the much heavier romantic aspect of the story. There’s a dark psychological, dare I say sadistic element. For my money a study in sadism is what Diana has written. He’s someone who is intrigued by other people’s pain, other people’s boundaries. I’m very keen for him to be not just another superficially sadistic kind of villain. It’s all about what makes someone behave that way. Going back to Ron Moore’s concept, he is a man marked by war. It was an incredibly unpleasant, incredibly bloody, and troubled time in Scottish history. A lot of terrible things were done by both sides. It’s able to give it all a bit of depth.
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