Ahead of today's long-awaited Eternals release, we were able to sit down with star Barry Keoghan (The Killing of a Sacred Deer; The Green Knight) to talk about his pivotal role as the scene-stealing Druig in Marvel Studios' most unique blockbuster yet!
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While our time was short, we did get his thoughts on working with Chloe Zhao and how easy she made his job as an actor, his thoughts on everyone thinking his character would become evil, doing big-budget stunts for the first time in his career, developing excellent chemistry with the cast and a little bit more about what could come down the line.
Check out our full video interview with Keoghan below and keep scrolling for the full transcript!
ROHAN: I loved Killing of a Sacred Deer and Green Knight - you’re a master at playing characters whose intentions generally aren’t very clear until it's too late, was there ever a conversation about Druig having darker intentions, or were you always intended to sort of playing the bad boy with a heart of gold?
BARRY: I think that’s the way it’s kind of written as well, I think it seems that way anyways, but as the movie plays out and when I was reading the script, again, he takes a stand for the right reasons man, and he’s got a point. He wants to interfere, yeah, he has valid points, I think so. I think the mind control confuses everyone because everyone kind of relates mind control to a villain, which we have seen before, so as soon as you see mind control, you’re like, “Oh, he’s going to you know. He’s going to control my mind!
ROHAN: He is arguably the most relatable, cause he really does want to help.
BARRY: I think he has the coolest power, just the eyes and you know.
ROHAN: You’ve worked with Yorgos Lanthimos and David Lowery - and now you’ve worked with Chloe Zhao, another very unique director, what was your biggest takeaway working with her?
BARRY: Chloe’s really, really good and she’s such a good person as well and we had dinner last night, and I was just telling her how proud I am and she should be extremely proud as well. I’d love to work with her again, she’s very good at working with actors. Coming from The Rider and Nomadland, working with non-actors, that takes a really, really special skill to get someone’s trust and allow them to be vulnerable and there were scenes in the Eternals where I just couldn’t really get there and Chloe had a formula to allow me to get to that place and feel comfy and be vulnerable, and allow me to trust her, so that is a massive, massive credit to her.
ROHAN: By the nature of your power, you are sort of forced to take a backseat in most of the action until the very end. Can you tell me about filming the finale and the stunt work?
BARRY: I really loved the stunts, I really did. I had fun doing them, doing all my own stunts. There were more, but they cut it and Chloe had written a boxing scene as well. He kind of had a dip in and a cool swag, and he was avoiding punches and the tail, and stuff like that. It was really nice, it was really, really nice and I wanted to see that. So, it was kind of cool doing my own stunts, man, I love doing my own stunts.
ROHAN: The cast chemistry was one of the strongest points of the movie, was there anything special you guys did to bond or was it just something that came naturally from being together for so long?
BARRY: I mean I guess hanging out, everyone’s so cool and I really mean that. Everyone bonded really, really quick and I came into it three weeks out, four weeks out I think, and I was welcomed pretty quick, really, really quick, I was welcomed in. Being a fan and admiring all of their work and stuff, you kind of have a starstruck thing that goes within days because everyone started doing the same job.
ROHAN: Druig and Makkari have this really fun relationship, what would you say your characters see in one another that makes them the perfect match?
BARRY: Lauren is brilliant, really fun to work with. It just felt natural, it really did and again, with everyone it did, and Chloe just wanted to explore that. That’s the amazing thing about Chloe, she sees something going on, and she’ll dive into it a bit more.
ROHAN: What are your hopes for a sequel or are you first planning a trip to Arrakis?
BARRY: *with a smile* I can’t really say-- not that I know anything, but I can’t really say anything, but you know, I’ll let people make up their own minds about what they think. Yeah, I’ll let people make up their own mind about what they think about what will happen.
“Eternals” follows a group of heroes from beyond the stars who had protected the Earth since the dawn of man. When monstrous creatures called the Deviants, long thought lost to history, mysteriously return, the Eternals are forced to reunite in order to defend humanity once again.