Almost as famous as Snow White herself, Snow White and the Huntsman‘s Prince Charming (called Prince William in this iteration) played by Sam Claflin turned out to be one of the key players in the twist on the fairy tale classic.
In this exclusive interview with Hypable, Sam Claflin talks about how he reacted when he found out that he would be playing the type of character he’s always dreamed of playing, the motives behind his Prince, and his badass entrance into the film.
Hypable.com’s James Bean: So how did you feel about Snow White and the Huntsman? You’ve seen it, obviously.
Sam Claflin: Yeah.
JB: And you loved the filming of it-
SC: Well yeah, it’s really every boy’s dream come true, wielding a sword, shooting a bow and arrow; it took me back to my primary school days running around the playground pretending I was Robin Hood. As an end result, it’s something I’m really proud of.
JB: Talk about an entrance to a film, a shocking flaming arrow.
SC: Really, there should be an award for best entrance into a film.
JB: People have been so obsessed with archery lately-
SC: I know! I don’t know what that is. There’s been four or five films with an archer in it now.
JB: How did you even go about landing this? Did someone notice you in Pirates?
SC: When this project came up, my agent sent me the script, I was in Los Angeles in January of last year, and very soon after that I had a meeting with the director. We sat down, had a chit-chat, and he sorta talked me through his ideas and the visual world that he had created and I was sold. I wanted to be a part of it. Four months later after meeting the producers and having general meetings, I got a phone call from Rupert in London congratulating me. It was pretty insane.
JB: What was it like talking to him about his ideas? It’s such a dark and twisted world-
SC: He had a very specific idea of where he wanted to go with it. It was something I had never seen before personally. He showed me a lot of the concept art and the design he had come up with – the buildings, the castles, the costumes. Everything that he already had pre-planned was overwhelming, incredibly done and-
JB: Gorgeous.
SC: Right! And he was so exact. He literally knew everything from the details on the fairies to the dark forest to the sanctuary. Everything he had pre-planned, and to be able to share that with him, the experience was amazing.
JB: Now tell me a little bit about your role in this, because it gets pretty tricky. This is getting into spoiler territory, but you join the bad guys at one point. It’s all on your journey to get to Snow White, so how did you justify falling in with the bad people in order to meet your goal?
SC: He will do anything to get to her, and really he doesn’t really know who’s the baddies and who’s the goodies. He just needs to find someone who knows their way around the dark forest to get to her. That’s where he knows she is and he just joins up with guys who seem to be good trackers. Kinda lucked out I suppose! It was incredible going on that journey with the character and exploring this badass territory. It was a dream come true, getting to play the darker side of a character that people already know.
JB: How much of a say did you get in terms of his darker side? You don’t see too many protagonists dodge an arrow and then immediately kill someone.
SC: It was something that was very important to me and Rupert from very early on. In the first initial script, the character was very similar to the Prince Charming that we all know and love. The guy’s a little straight-laced, and doesn’t like to get involved – he’s just a good guy. Where we were going with the script was that The Huntsman was going to be younger and there was going to be more of a dynamic relationship between him and her. A kinda chemistry and I needed to be able to compete with him. The guy that needed to be the love of her life needed to be able to compete. It can’t just be a white-wash “I’d choose him over him,” I needed to be able to step up my game, and that led to the darker elements of the character.
JB: So how did it feel landing the role of Prince William, and then reading the script and finding out about the kiss?
SC: I thought it was a dream! For me the kiss was fantastic. Getting the phone call saying that I’d been offered the part, my lawyer and my agent, there were about four people on the phone and I just remember hearing the words “You’ve got offered -” and I just went [sound of immense excitement]! I didn’t know what I’d been offered but I just went, “No way!” I was so happy, sort of screeching loudly, swearing loudly, in the middle of London, which you can imagine got a fair few weird looks. I was not expecting that. I knew of a few other people that were auditioning, people I’m friends with even, and I just never thought it would happen.
JB: Wow, so it was a wide casting call then?
SC: Well I don’t know how many people exactly, but one of my very good friends was up for it, so I’m lucky. Very, very lucky. I don’t know if it was as wide a margin of a casting call as it was for Pirates, but they saw a fair few people. So I beat off everyone with a stick.
JB: You’re definitely the most charming. How about your next projects? I just happened to go through the synopsis of the next one about a professor that tries to create a poltergeist. Anything you can tell me about that?
Come back Wednesday for the rest of the interview! What did you think of Sam Claflin’s performance in Snow White and the Huntsman? Warning, the second half of this interview comes with spoilers, so be sure to see the film before you read it!
Check out our reviews of Snow White and the Huntsman by Jessie Cadle and James Bean! If you’ve seen it, don’t forget to sound off about it in our What Did You Think feature!