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robthewriter · 1 year

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Doctor Who Showrunner says, “modern woke writers are rubbish and they eat tofu and pretend to like it!” shock! horror!

The following is from my blog on my website/Goodreads...

Doctor Who Showrunner says, “modern woke writers are rubbish and they eat tofu and pretend to like it!” shock! horror!

Well, that, or something like it, was apparently said by Russell T Davies recently, at least according to certain sections of the media anyway.

Incoming Doctor Who showrunner Russell T Davies, or RTD as he is generally known for short, is back to helm Doctor Who for the second time. He was the guy who resurrected the series back in 2005 after a long spell in the televisual wilderness.

It seems, however, that he is of the opinion that all new, young writers are boring, woke incompetents, who can’t write for tofu (no, that’s not a spelling mistake).

Or is he? Is that what he actually, said? Even if it was, was that what he really meant?

So, what did he say? The following is the quote in question, which comes from an interview with RTD and fellow writer Mark Gatiss in the Sunday Times…

“I do a lot of mentoring, and there are voices wanting to be heard — of any gender or ethnicity — who consider themselves invisible. They hate the media that ignores them, and they’re trapped into wanting a job in that medium purely to increase representation. I read their scripts and they’re rubbish. They don’t actually love television, so they don’t know how to write for it.”

Gatiss added…

“I’m so glad you said that. Sometimes I think I’m like Pollyanna because I’ve met so many people over the years who hate making television. It seems to make them so miserable. Go and work on the bins or something. It’s hard work — it gives you ulcers — so you have to love it.”

OK, so you could interpret that as, “RTD says all young writers are woke, angry and incompetent.” You could…

Or, he could be saying, these people got into writing for television for all the wrong reasons. To be clear, that’s not me saying that the causes that they are fighting for are wrong, I’m sure they are not, I’m sure they are all angry with good reason. No, I mean that getting into writing for television because you have an axe to grind and you think it will make a good whetstone, is a bad idea.

I am going to broaden this out in fact, I am going to say, that getting into any kind of writing, for television or otherwise, should be done for only one reason. Because you love it, because you want and need to do it.

Don’t go into it for fame, or money, or even because you have a noble cause to shout about. Do it for its own sake.

Here’s the thing. There are literally millions of talented people in the world who can write. Many, many, of them will be better than you, thousands and thousands will be just as good as you and yes some won’t be as good. Any, or all of these people may also have another edge. They may have had exciting, eventful lives, or have top qualifications in some allied field that gives them a reputation to build on. They may just be better connected and all of them, potentially, might just be luckier than you.

Your chances of success are really, low. Sorry, just telling you like it is. That’s not a reason not to try and just like the lottery, you have to be in it to win it. I am not trying to put anyone off, it’s an adventure, go for it. However, let me just refer you back to the gist of that quote from Mark Gatiss. You have, to love it. If you don’t love it, don’t do it.

There is another point here and it can be inferred from the same quote. I don’t know about writing for TV I have never tried it… looking at my sales figures, you might well argue that I don’t know much about writing at all. (yes, that was a short, bitter laugh you just heard). That aside, let me make another statement…

If no one is listening, all words have equal value.

The most profound statement ever written and a ‘dad joke,’ are identical if no one hears them. There has, to be an audience. Extending that, if you are trying to make a point or right a wrong, it must be the right audience. Not your friends and peer groups who already know what you are saying. No, you need the people who are unaware of you and your story. Otherwise, you are still talking to yourself.

Those writers that RTD mentioned need to love writing and the medium in which they are working. They need to understand it, its power and its limitations. If they want to reach the audience they need to reach and not just shout angrily into the echo chamber, they have to learn their craft. They have to love it.

I think RTD has stated elsewhere, in reference to TV budgets, that any television, even something quite modest, costs millions to bring to the screen in the modern world, where Netflix, Disney and Amazon have raised the bar so high. If someone is going to trust you with millions, you had better know what you are doing.

You are not writing for your friends; you are writing for strangers. You have to write characters they will care about and root for, or they won’t come on the journey with you. You have to entertain as well as preach. Never underestimate the power of humour too. Because a story is grim, doesn’t mean you have to tell it in a relentlessly grim way. If you do, there is a good chance you will lose half your audience. Some people love grimdark misery porn but most need a little balance.

Some may find it unpalatable but here is the truth…

You can tell a bad story well and launch a franchise. You can tell a good story badly and sink the ship.

Happy sailing folks…

#dr who #doctor who #russell t davies #mark gatiss #interview #controversy #woke writers #writing #creative writing #blog #author #sci-fi #fantasy

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hbcsource · 1 year

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Nolly stars Helena Bonham Carter, Mark Gatiss and writer Russell T Davies | BFI Q&A The cast and crew of Nolly, Russell T Davies's celebration of the life of Crossroads soap star Noele Gordon, visit the BFI Southbank to talk about their show. Nolly is an outrageously fun and wildly entertaining ride through Noele Gordon’s most tumultuous years; a sharp, affectionate and heart-breaking portrait of a forgotten icon. As widow Meg Richardson in the long-running soap opera Crossroads, Gordon was one of the most best-known figures in Britain. Then in 1981, at the height of the show’s success, she was axed without warning. Nolly is a bold exploration of how the establishment turns on women who refuse to play by the rules, and a love letter to a legend of television and the madcap soap she starred in.

#helena bonham carter #mark gatiss #russell t davies #nolly #noele gordon #interviews #2023 #interviews: 2023 #nolly bfi q&a 2023

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britsgovernmentmh · 2 years

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I stumbled upon a very old video of Sherlock Interview and there was few things that strike me about how Moffat/Gatiss approach to the whole Sherlock show and fans interaction:

1. Moffat said that Sherlock was basically their fanfiction on how they see Sherlock Holmes. Even if the show wasn’t a big success, and if BBC still allowed them to make it, they will make it for each other.

2. Gatiss stated (response to fans reacting to ASiB) fans reactions to what they wrote are very normal - as there is a sense of ownership. If that leads to fans writing fanfiction then that’s it.

3. In regards to theory, Gatiss stated that if you have to blow up a scene 65x to find a continuity error then you are in the wrong path

in other news... Mark is very sweet to Andrew during the whole interview. He is very attentive and make sure that Andrew able to say something when he nudged Mark. No wonder they were paired together during that Sherlock Con few years ago.

#mark gatiss #andrew scott #sherlock #interview #sherlock holmes #fanfiction #fan fiction #sherlock bbc #bbc #bbc sherlock #actor #fans theory #theory

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catboyrightsdefender · 11 months

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i was today years old when i discovered the word raffish

#and in an interview of mark gatiss on top of that #.txt #am i raffish. i want to be raffish

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aconissa · 7 months

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WRITERS + DIRECTORS ON THE POWER OF HORROR

Catriona Ward, interview for The Guardian Mark Gatiss, in A History of Horror (2010) Pascal Laugier, for Electric Sheep Candyman (1992), dir. Bernard Rose Colin Dickey, Ghostland Carmen Maria Machado, for Paris Review Kier-La Janisse, House of Psychotic Women Possession (1981), dir. Andrzej Żuławski Mariana Enríquez, ‘Notes on Craft’, Granta Guillermo del Toro, Haunted Castles, Dark Mirrors

#guillermo del toro #carmen maria machado #kier la janisse #possession #candyman #catriona ward #mariana enriquez #colin dickey #pascal laugier #mark gatiss #ana speaks #mine #my comparatives #quotes #horror #popular

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eliebluebell · 1 month

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TLoG, Psychoville and Inside No.9's fandom archives

Google Drive 1: for DVD Extras of all three series, TV interviews related to the shows, audio commentaries by league members on other films, etc. Google Drive 2: Doctor Who Confidential with Mark Gatiss, Documentaries with, again, Mark, DVD extras of others projets than TLoG, Psychoville and Inside No.9, films and plays that haven't been commercialized/are not finable elsewhere, TV shows where Mark, Steve or Reece appeared, and funny little videos.

I hope you'll enjoy!

#The League of Gentlemen #TLoG #Psychoville #Inside No.9 #Jeremy Dyson #Mark Gatiss #Steve Pemberton #Reece Shearsmith #in9 #League archive #dvd extras #inside no 9 #inside number 9 #league of gentlemen #Ian Hallard #Doctor Who Confidential #DVD commentaries

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fuckyeahmarkgatiss · 5 months

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Interview/article with Mark from the Times.

From Ruther2's Twitter

#mark gatiss #christmas #interview #the times #ghost stories #gatiss wednesday

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aworldofgoldfish · 2 years

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#Mark Gatiss #Interview

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areyougonnabe · 6 months

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I'm nearly 150 pages into Worst Journey and Priestly keeps showing up and he is telling me so many interesting things but I'm still not sure what his Job is on this expedition all Cherry's told me is that he A) wrote a book and B) served with Shackleton and I have discerned that he Takes Photographs which is Important!!! But I am wondering if he is also perhaps. A geologist or something? PLEASE HELP.

LET ME TELL YOU ABOUT SWEET BABY RAY

this stylish dude began his polar career when he was chosen to go on shackleton's nimrod expedition in 1907. he was a geology student at bristol university at the time, only two years into his degree at age 20 and without any qualifications to speak of. shackleton asked him two questions in the interview (“Would you know gold if you saw it?” “Can you play a musical instrument?”) and then he was hired!

he mainly was like... the Young Man of the expedition (alongside brocklehurst who was his age but brocklehurst's role was the Rich Kid) ... the most notable incident was when he slept outside a tent during a blizzard on mount erebus (bc there wasn't room for him inside 😭), got pushed down the hill by the wind in his sleeping bag and nearly died. but he was ok!!! didn't even lose any toes!!! unlike that loser PHIL

(bb priestley on nimrod. early in his baldness journey)

there were two other qualified geologists brought along on the expedition, Edgeworth David and Douglas Mawson, who he learned a lot from, and after the expedition he spent time in Sydney cataloguing and studying the Antarctic samples underneath Professor David. this led to him getting picked right back up by Scott again when one of the Terra Nova's geologists dropped out due to tuberculosis and he asked David who he should take instead.

he wasn't part of the main cape evans party on scott's expedition but was instead the geologist for the Eastern Party, which became the Northern Party and ended up having a ludicrously bad time, trapped in a tiny ice cave for six months. (for more about that check out The Longest Winter!!)

but they rescued their own asses and ended up all getting out OK. while waiting to get picked up by the ship, priestley and debenham hung out at shackleton's cape royds hut (where priestley had lived back in the day) and sketched out the plans for what would eventually become the SPRI!!!

after the expedition, all the scientists went home to england and hung out at priestley's family home in tewkesbury while working on their scientific results. this had the hilarious consequence of two of his sisters getting married to his expedition friends (Doris to Griffith Taylor and Edith to Charles Wright). and deb missed out somehow... tough luck bro.......

(baldness journey well advanced. he is transforming into mark gatiss)

aaaand after that a lot of stuff happened.. like the war.... he got a degree in agriculture (?) then helped deb and wordie found the SPRI, and eventually became a career university administrator. he was very active in lecturing about the antarctic throughout his whole life! and even went back as a tour guide for prince philip in the 50s lmao

in conclusion: priestley you have to stop. you smoke too tough. your swag too different. your bitch is too bad. they'll kill you

#also deb complains in his diary about priestley being conceited bc of his antarctic experience which is really funny #polar exploration

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local-blog-for-local-people · 11 months

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Mark Gatiss Interview on That Gay Show

#These are for you Raf <333 #The League of Gentlemen #Mark Gatiss #Phil Proctor #TLOG #My Gifs

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becausegoodheroesdeservekidneys · 1 year

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Doctor Who, but Chronologically: 40

Okay, here we go boys: jumping ahead six years from Partition to 1953, the coronation of Queen Elizabeth Two, and wow, this episode hits extremely very differently when the last thing you watched was the Tale of the British Empire (Derogatory).

It's the Idiot's Lantern. At one point a character declares that even though they're losing the Empire, at least the coronation can still give us pride. Yikes.

Anyway, happily, we get Tennant and Rose, who have a lot of chemistry, but unfortunately this is a Mark Gatiss episode. Fortunately, it's edited by RTD, so it is much more interesting than it might have been. Unfortunately, it's still Gatiss trying to write a Spunky Woman, so inevitably, Rose has a shining moment of brilliance where she immediately spots that Evil TVs are stealing people's faces and wanders off to interview the guy responsible, only to be immediately imperilled and then absent for the rest of the episode, trapped inside a telly. Ah well. Could be worse, this could be Amy or River with Smith. Rose can at least pass the sexy lamp test. And doesn't get subjected to sentences like "Of course you're a psychopath, you're a woman."

So yeah, there's an alien that was executed, but rather than dying it made it into an electrical form and thence to 1950s televisions (this is not really explained.) It feeds on the electrical signals of human brains, which is pretty stupid, since it's inside TV sets which have a far higher voltage, but okay. It's planning to feed on the 20 million people who will watch the coronation, and thus have a body again. The Doctor thwarts it by... idk it's really unclear, just electrocuting it somehow in an extended scene that was way too thin on explanations to justify the number of "plot twists" it attempted. "Plot twist! Your wiring hasn't worked!" Okay but we are not electricians and this is fantasy electrical wiring, so this means nothing to us, Gatiss. Honestly though, as sci-fi plots go, it's... fine. Not amazing, but there are much worse.

The side plot revolves around one family - mum, dad, son and grandmother, except the grandmother is fed on and so doesn't have a face. In a series of very poorly acted and directed scenes, it is made painfully clear that the father is a violent domestic abuser, at one point promising to beat the gay out of his son. Nonetheless, in an absolutely baffling and utterly gross scene at the end, as his wife throws him out and he leaves in shame, Rose and the Doctor both tell the son that he nonetheless must forgive his abuser and make amends because "He's your dad." Rose even straight up says that not forgiving his abuser would make the son stupid. It is utterly, utterly unnecessary, and I am entirely baffled by what moral I was supposed to take away from it. I can only assume Gatiss was watching too much American telly when he wrote it? It's the sort of thing you see super commonly in American telly over here - "He's your dad! You have to forgive him, because he's your dad! Let's reconcile the strained father-son bond!" It's almost as common as a boxing episode, which American telly always has. Even Babylon 5 had a boxing episode. Even Leverage. They all do.

Anyway it's wank, and it takes what was otherwise a blandly inoffensive showing to Fuck Me What An Awful Episode.

Still no proper sign of why Rose is particularly special! I mean they have GREAT chemistry, but it's all in the acting, really, though it's increasingly clear that she's maybe the most people-focused of all of them (except Donna). Sigh. Maybe we'll get a non-Moffat/Gatiss Rose episode soon, and then we can finally know.

Meanwhile, shout out to the best actor of the whole episode: Cardiff, doing amazingly in it's starring role as Totally London, Honest. Funny story! I remember this episode being filmed, because my mate Emyr accidentally wandered into the street they used to film the street party, and had the surreal experience of going "Hang on... why are there flags? Why... is it the 50s? Am I in the 1950s? How has this happened? What's that box - oh it's the TARDIS I see what's happened."

(This has happened to me TWICE in St Ffagans and once in the Brangwyn Hall. Common South Walian experience.)

Ummm... no plot threads! I don't think. None resolved, none added. Well, that's about right for Gatiss.

“She” (an unknown person) is returning (perhaps River returned as Missy. Maybe Me? Maybe Clara???!)

There is something on Donna’s back

An entire planet, Pyrovilia, just… disappeared, somehow. (Maybe because the TARDIS is exploding??? Saturnine was also lost, and that WAS because of the TARDIS exploding. The lion man’s planet was also lost but he was a bit of a knob about it if I’m honest. The Thijarian planet was destroyed by some sort of impact)

Amy is maybe dead (she’s not)

The Doctor has been cubed (he’s out, but how?)

River is possibly blown up (unless she’s Missy. Nope: she is definitely not blown up)

The TARDIS has blown up (It’s fine now. Except it’s sort of melting now because it’s corrupted, but it’s fine again)

The universe appears to have ended (the universe is back again)

The Doctor has employed(?) Nardole

(And Nardole was “reassembled???” Nardole had glass nipples and invisible hair?? WHAT THE FUCK IS HE)

There’s a vault in the TARDIS and it contains Missy but we don’t know why (sometimes she knocks for the bants)

There’s an immortal Viking girl now. Her name is Me and she’s now looking after the people the Doctor abandons

Why was Rory entirely unconcerned by the entire world suddenly going silent when that is Not Normal and should have been, at the very least, extremely disconcerting?

What did the Doctor do to Queen Lizzie One?

Why is Amy seeing a one-eyed woman in a vanishing window? (She’s with the Silents, but we don’t know why Amy saw her)

Why is Amy’s pregnancy inconclusive? (Maybe because the baby had Time Lord DNA?)

Who is Sarah-Jane Smith?

How is the Doctor Bill’s teacher and why/where does he have an office?

What is going on with the Cyber War and the Cyberium???

What happened with the Other Cyber War?

What happened with the Third War that deleted the void?

Why does Rose seem particularly important?

What order do these Doctors go in? (Eccleston, Tennant, uncertain, Smith, Capaldi, Whittaker)

Which companion just… forgot the Doctor, and how?

Yaz and Vinder are about to die as Mori/Mwri/Muuri

There is a Lupari shield around Earth.

What’s a Time War?

What’s the Rift?

What’s Bad Wolf?

In which war did the Doctor become a war criminal, and how?

Who is the Master?

Why has Amy forgotten Rory? How did she forget a Dalek invasion?

Is Rory plastic or not?

Why is the Doctor sulking on a cloud?

How exactly does the Doctor have a cloud?

What exactly happened with Strax to, uh, tame him?

Which friend killed Strax?

Which friend brought Strax back?

Where did this lesbian lizard and human couple come from?

What happened with Clara as Souffle Girl and the Daleks?

How does Clara actually join?

Why so many Claras?

Why is Missy apparently in robo-heaven?

Why is probably!Missy pushing Clara and the Doctor together?

What is Trensilor and what happened there?

Who is Handles?

The Doctor is about to be dissolved by a beautiful geode man

The universe is being crushed by the Flux

Will the Doctor open the fobwatch?

Sontarans are invading Earth again

Who is Kate?

Who is Osgood? Another name of Clara’s again?

The fuck is the deal with the Grand Serpent

Does Martha get to go to an ice cream planet with 12-fingered massage aliens?

How did the Doctor forget Clara?

Who is Bill’s puddle girlfriend Heather?

How did Nardole die?

When does Bill get Cyberman-ed and die?

When does the Doctor shrink and enter a Dalek called Rusty?

Whittaker is falling to her death rn

Was that ring relevant?

Does anyone know the Doctor’s name?

When did Yaz talk to Dan about fancying the Doctor?

When did Dan talk to the Doctor about fancying Yaz?

What’s happening with the bees?

What happened with Donna’s ex and a giant spider?

What war wiped out the Daleks, and is it one of the ones already mentioned?

What did the Doctor mean when he said “The (Daleks) always live, while I lose everything?”

If Dalek Caan is the last Dalek left why are there more now?

How did the rest of the Time Lords die?

How and why did Amy melt?

What’s the question that will make silence fall?

Why do the Silents… want silence to fall?

How and why are Silents at war with the Doctor when he… hasn’t even heard of them?

How does Hitler get out of the cupboard?

What’s the significance of fish fingers and custard?

Why does the Doctor feel guilt about Rose, Martha and Donna?

What happened with the space whale?

When does Rory defend Amy for 2000 years?

How does the Doctor survive River

How does he erase himself from history

Did Captain Jack lose his memories to the same people as the Doctor? What did he lose?

When did the Doctor send the Daleks into a void to save the universe?

What’s with the weird crack in the wall and is it affecting memories?

Why do Amy and Rory think the Doctor is dead?

Is Matt Smith’s Doctor a tree racist?

#doctor whom #and yet we are continuing

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inevitably-johnlocked · 7 months

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Hi. Sorry if this was asked before or if I missed anything here. If you don't wanna answer it, it's alright.

In regards to Mark Gatiss' "playing with homoeroticism in Sherlock" interview question, is it possible he was talking about Sheriarty/Moriarty, not Johnlock here?

I associate homoerotic subtext mainly with those hero / villain "I need you, I want to destroy you, I want to kill you, but I don't want you to die because I need you, and they may be a deeper reason behind it) dynamics.

Johnlock on the other side, is mostly romantically coded, not sexually. And it's written more like a traditional romance, with the structure and the tropes.

Hey Nonny!

I think you're referencing this interview here? I just reread it, and the part I have seems to just be talking about Sherlock as a whole, and doesn't reference any ship specifically, so I think it's safe to say that I believe it's for everything done for the show. Regardless, in another interview, I believe, post S4, he still admitted to putting it in there to essentially bring in an audience. To me it doesn't matter which pairing it's referencing, it's still kinda awful.

And yeah, I agree re: the romance. But that's the thing... why put it in there at ALL if they weren't going to follow through? It's kinda shady. They could have stopped it in S3. Maybe they didn't realize what they were doing, but I doubt it. Mofftiss, for all their numerous faults are neither dumb nor unaware of what they're putting in their own material. Moffat has put subtext in his shows for years. His run of Dr. Who was full of it. But inevitably, what they did is kept dragging it out and got pissy at the end.

But yeah, that's my very loose take on it. I've written about it before and I still think it's pertinent today.

#steph replies #homoerotism #subtext in sherlock #shitposting #shitposting steph #my thoughts #chatting with nonnies

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rebeccalouisaferguson · 6 months

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This interview was conducted in July 2023.

After a five-year hiatus, prolonged due to the pandemic, Tom Cruise’s Ethan Hunt and team are back for the seventh instalment Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One. Shrouded in secrecy, the plot and character details are very much being kept under wraps with little being known about it beyond the crazy action sequences shown off in the trailer. From Tom Cruise riding a motorcycle off a cliff in Norway to drifting a bright yellow Fiat 500 around the streets of Rome whilst Cruise and franchise newcomer Hayley Atwell are handcuffed to each other, Dead Reckoning Part One has somehow managed to step up from the heights of Fallout to provide yet another impossible mission. This time, Ethan Hunt and his IMF team must track down a terrifying new weapon that threatens the whole world if it falls into the wrong hands.

Thankfully, Ethan’s not alone. Alongside him for the ride is the return of Simon Pegg’s Benji, Ving Rhames’ Luther, Rebecca Ferguson’s Ilsa, Vanessa Kirby’s mysterious White Widow and Henry Czerny’s former head of the IMF Eugene Kittridge who hasn’t been seen since the first Mission film. Joining the cast are Esai Morales as the film’s main villain, Cary Elwes, Mark Gatiss, Rob Delaney, Pom Klementieff and Hayley Atwell. The cast for the new film is certainly a force to be reckoned with.

Hayley Atwell’s character Grace is set to feature prominently alongside Cruise and is a character that Atwell described as “consistently inconsistent and unpredictable.” Christopher McQuarrie, director of Missions 5,6,7 and next year’s 8, has known for some time that he’s wanted to work with Atwell. After seeing her on stage in London 10 years ago he told her “That thing that you can do on stage, I want it. I don’t know where to put it, I don’t know what the character is yet, but I want to work with you.” But the process of writing Hayley Atwell into a Mission film hasn’t been that straightforward.

When it comes to writing a Mission film, the bare bones are there, and the key action sequences are confirmed but there isn’t a full script for the cast and crew to work with. McQuarrie allows the actors to shape their characters. “Apart from essential plot points of her, it was up for grabs really about things I could offer them, things I could suggest, and ideas I could throw out,” described Atwell. It was a liberating process for Atwell because of the safe space created by McQuarrie and Cruise. “There was no such thing as wrong, or bad, or judgement, or mistakes. There was just making choices and trying new things,” Atwell added. “What they’re doing is exceptional, and their ambition for the piece means they’re only ever going to use things that really elevate the story.”

Working without a script might be challenging for some actors, but it’s certainly not an impossible mission for those involved in the franchise. Getting to have that collaborative effort to create characters — particularly characters that are new to the franchise — is a really exciting opportunity for the cast. Hot off the heels of playing Mantis in Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3, Pom Klementieff is already joining another franchise and Klementieff describes working on Mission as like a dance due to the way in which everyone on set, from the actors to the costume department, to hair and makeup, are all bringing ideas and working together to help shape the characters and to help shape the story of the film. Klementieff would come to set each day with no idea what they were shooting, and she’d ask McQuarrie “Who do I kill today?” and the two of them would work together to come up with how her character would go about achieving her mission and working with the props department to ensure that everything worked for the character and for the story.

It’s a testament to the creative minds of McQuarrie and Cruise and everyone involved to be able to create something so immense, without having it all entirely locked down in the first place. For Rebecca Ferguson, that’s what’s so exciting about the Mission Impossible franchise. “We just don’t work with scripts,” said Ferguson. Tom Cruise and Christopher McQuarrie have this incredible story in their head and things develop from that. Ferguson spoke of the differences between doing Mission Impossible and Dune as with the latter there’s a strict shooting schedule and mapping out the film, but the opposite is true for Mission and “It leaves you on your tippy toes ready to constantly jump”. For Mission, they’ll shoot multiple versions of things and see what works best. Ferguson admitted that even she doesn’t know what’s made the final cut of the film. “All that I’m prepared for is the action. I know my character. And the rest is revealed when I see the film.”

It’s essential that of the few things that are locked down, the action scenes are among them. Dead Reckoning Part One takes the action scenes to a completely new level. From scaling the tallest building in the world to hanging onto the side of a plane as it takes off, Tom Cruise has risked his life for the Mission Impossible franchise — multiple times. In Dead Reckoning Part One fans can expect to see Cruise and co-running and jumping around atop a runaway train in what promises to be one of the film’s best action set pieces. And there’s minimal CGI involved either as Cruise is insistent on doing all his stunts practically.

The stunts all being real is what makes the Mission Impossible franchise stand out from the crowd of action films. Hayley Atwell described it as “Unlike anything else that exists,” but adds that it’s part of the fun of doing a Mission film. “That was one of the reasons why I wanted to do it. You don’t come into theMission Impossible franchise with the possibility of building a very serious role next to Tom without wanting the opportunity and the challenge to physically do things that are truly extraordinary and exceptional.”

It’s not just Atwell who was drawn to the adrenaline and the thrills of the franchise with Pom Klementieff saying getting to work with Cruise and his stunt team was an incredible experience. “It opened up a new world of possibilities which changed me completely in an amazing way.” Having been a fan of the franchise since the beginning there was not a world where Klementieff would not accept this mission of being part of the franchise. “I have so many memories on this movie of things that were pinch-me moments. Sometimes I was just shooting and you kind of forget that you’re part of Mission Impossible, but sometimes I would just start singing doo doo, doo doo doo doo…” Klementieff told us that years ago when she was training and learning martial arts, she would schedule her fight training in her phone and call it “Mission Impossible” in her calendar because she was trying to manifest this role that has now come her way.

As for details on the new characters, Klementieff was able to share that her villain doesn’t speak much so she took inspiration from animals, in particular the shoebill stork. Klementieff would watch videos of the bird and channel that into her character. “I kept looking at videos of this bird and when it’s staring at you it’s just so f*cking scary…It’s like a dinosaur bird.” Getting to play a quiet character, particularly in an action movie where there’s often lots of exposition was a nice change of pace for Klementieff. She was able to focus on the strength and stillness that comes through the mystery of not talking. Klementieff teased that we can expect something a bit more mystical in Dead Reckoning Part One and something that hasn’t been seen before in a Mission Impossible film. “It’s such a rich movie and it’s so incredible…the characters are so fucking cool and the story is very special.”

As for Hayley Atwell, she loved Tom Cruise’s enthusiasm for film and the symbiotic relationship between him and Christopher McQuarrie. Getting to work closely with the two to mould and build her character as they went along meant that Grace couldn’t be boxed into one particular archetype. Atwell spent five months training for the role learning mixed martial arts, training with knives and guns, and learning how to drift in a race car, but one of the biggest challenges was preparing to run alongside Cruise and having to reach the bar of his iconic sprint where he runs with every cell in his body. “Pickpocketing and sleight of hand tricks seem to come quite naturally to me, as did drifting,” said Atwell, “because of all that training, by the time we got on set I was ready to inject physical and emotional behaviour into it and offer them a range of performances.”

The physical training all the cast underwent was a difficult experience but that’s not to say that the excitement of it all never got to them. Atwell spoke of one moment on set in Rome where all of a sudden, she turned to Cruise and said, “Oh my God, I’m in a Tom Cruise movie!” to which he responded, “No no no, I’m in a Hayley Atwell movie, you’re Hayley Atwell!” Atwell said, “It was so endearing of him and so generous of him.” Klementieff had a similar story of Cruise’s generosity as she had wanted to skydive with him but didn’t have her licence and so when the film wrapped, Cruise put her in touch with his trainer and taught her how to skydive. “I’m blown away by his generosity and how hardworking he is, and how inspiring he is,” remarked Klementieff.

Among all the excitement of the death-defying stunts performed by Cruise and co, everything in Mission Impossible is driven by character and the story. Even when things are subtle and not always immediately clear to the audience. After Fallout subtly dropped that Vanessa Kirby’s White Widow was the daughter of Vanessa Redgrave’s Max from the first film, Kirby has since been building on these family ties in her character. “I just went back and I watched [Vanessa Redgrave] a thousand times and I thought ‘Oh my goodness, this is one of the great theatre actresses of our time’ and she’s always been a huge hero of mine.” Kirby added “To play her daughter and to try and embody that within an action movie is awesome. I think there’s been a long lineage of really cool women in this series.” Vanessa Kirby was excited by the fact that Dead Reckoning allowed her to explore more, push more, ask more questions and try different things with the character. And whilst Kirby was keeping details on the White Widow’s progression in Dead Reckoning close to her chest, she did tell us that she’s grown up even more except now the pressures are getting to her, and more is on the line and there are way more challenges for the White Widow.

Rebecca Ferguson echoed this sentiment too adding that “people know what they’re going to see when they see a Mission Impossible film, but I think this is going to be ten times better than they think.” Ferguson added, “This is going to be darker and more gruesome and it’s going to engulf you more than you would ever have expected…there are bad-ass scenes, fantastic stuns and wonderful locations.” Making a Mission film is more than just a job for Ferguson who’s been a part of the franchise for almost ten years now. With the immense training and travel required, making a Mission Impossible film is a journey, especially given the fact they were shooting the film during the pandemic and production had to be shut down across COVID lockdowns. “You don’t film Mission, you live Mission…it becomes your life,” said Ferguson. But as a result, Rebecca Ferguson and her character Ilsa Faust have blended together. “She became me, and I her. Somehow, we moulded into each other.” Because of the similarities between Ferguson and Ilsa Faust, she could make decisions about the character in a split second without having to analyse things or check with McQuarrie.

At the end of the day for director Christopher McQuarrie, for Tom Cruise, and for the entire cast, it’s the characters that matter the most and make Mission Impossible what it is. Whether new or old, it’s the characters that drive the Mission Impossible films. The whole franchise, but in particular Dead Reckoning Part One is full of great female characters too. Vanessa Kirby told us, “There’s a lot of great women in this…the women in this series are amazing.” The women in this film are all equals to Ethan Hunt and make this entry into the franchise stand out so much. “So much of the Mission franchise is about the team,” said Atwell. “It’s about Luther and it’s about Benji, and it’s about Ethan and what they have sacrificed to become part of the IMF.”

With Dead Reckoning being a two-parter there are rumours that this is the start of a big send-off for Hunt and his IMF team but nothing is set in stone. Ferguson was quick to say that she doesn’t believe the franchise will end until she hears Tom Cruise himself utter the words “I am done,” three words that she’s yet to hear from his mouth. “I think Tom is going to keep on going with anything until he can’t bloody walk.” Agreeing with Ferguson, Vanessa Kirby remarked that with Cruise anything is possible. “That’s why it’s called Mission Impossible because he always does it,” added Kirby stating that she’s not heard anything about Cruise being ready to deliver his final mission just yet.

#rebecca ferguson #hayley atwell #pom klementieff #vanessa kirby #mission impossible dead reckoning part one #mi7 #mission impossible 7 #interview #mi7 interview

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