I’m very heartened to hear that. Now we can dig into Heretic, your new horror film from the two of them. I interviewed you on the Dungeons & Dragons carpet, and you gave me some elaborate backstories for Phoenix Buchanan of Paddington 2, and Forge, of course. Could you tell me a bit of backstory for Mr. Reed?
I can tell you two things. One is that he had a great loss somewhere in his life. Someone died who was very special to him, and he, in his grief, looked for some comfort in religion and didn’t find it. That partly explains his encyclopedic knowledge of religion and his disdain for it. But, more broadly, he was just that kid who seemed nice, and actually quite charming in a way, and to whom people would be drawn for a bit. But suddenly, they think, ‘No, yuck, there’s something wrong here.’
He was not invited to parties and sleepovers. He’s sad about that, and has overcompensated throughout his life by trying to be ever more fascinating, and groovy, and different, and playing pranks on them. He’s superintelligent, to an almost sort of painful degree, hence his fascination with trying to organize everything. His plan for the two girls in this film has been written down. It’s an incredible labyrinthine program—‘If they do this, then we do that. If they do that, then we do this’—and it’s all part of the world he built, the house he’s actually physically built, the weird analog locks on the doors, all that.
You’ve said multiple times that you are in your “freak show era.” Have you always had this in you, and is it cathartic to finally let it fly?
When I started acting, I thought the only thing I was good at was character work. I never wanted to be too close to whatever I am, but for some reason, that’s what I had to do, when I had a sort of successful romantic comedy career. And it’s been nice to get back to Hallowe’en acting.
