Luke Evans is among the rare cadre of British actors who regularly balance Hollywood blockbusters with more modest British dramas. Not to mention the actor, who has starred in movies as diverse as “The Hobbit” trilogy and the live-action “Beauty and the Beast” opposite Emma Watson, also recently came off a five-month stint Broadway stint as Frank-N-Furter earlier this year, for which he was nominated for a Tony. His latest project is “The Party,” an adaptation of a psychological thriller by Elizabeth Day, which he also co-produced, for ITV. (The five-part series, which is repped for global sales by ITV Studios, is currently available to watch on ITVX).
The show deals with class, hidden sexuality and the nature of both romantic and platonic love all wrapped up in a tense drama. Evans, who first came across Day’s novel as a lockdown read during the Covid pandemic, was instrumental in bringing the series to screen and in getting Sarah Solemani to adapt it (Solemani also plays his wife, Lucy, in the show). Evans sat down with Variety to talk about the differences between the novel and the series, his recent experiences on Broadway and whether Tolkien fans can expect him to reprise his role as Bard the Bowman in Andy Serkis’s upcoming feature “The Hunt for Gollum.” When you bring somebody on who has the capability of someone like Sarah, you have to let them run with it, and it was exciting and also daunting to know what she was going to change, but also we knew things would change.
The fact that Lucy is pregnant adds another major layer of weight to what is going on in Martin’s head, and also that you know they had a physical relationship, and I think that informs something more about how messed up the life Martin has chosen to live is. There is a love there, and I think that’s another reason why we expanded on their relationship. You see much more of Lucy and Martin together because you want to see that they are a functioning, if slightly unconventional, relationship.
I know couples like Martin and Lucy. Putting him into detention to pay the price for someone else, it’s a scar that — he’s tarnished for life. He has a criminal record and lives his life knowing he didn’t do it, I mean it’s huge.
Sarah and I had very, very long Zoom calls where she just asked me lots of questions about my upbringing, and of course I started saying I can relate to Martin. I’ve come from a very working-class background, and I was presented with opportunities that I took that put me in very alien situations where I didn’t feel comfortable or an insider, but I kept watching, learning, adapting, and trying to fit in. I basically spent my whole life doing that, and that’s who Martin is.
I talked about the fact I’m an only child, a very religious background, and Sarah took a lot of those ideas from my life or real things that happened to me and turned them into Martin’s story. So of course, there are slight parallels, which is interesting and it works. There is closure for sure within this arc, of course there needs to be, but there are lots of unanswered questions.
Extract — continue reading at the source.
