It's midnight and Jim Sturgess has just finished shooting scenes for his upcoming drama Ashes, when he calls from London, England. The 30-year-old star of films like The Other Boleyn Girl, Fifty Dead Men Walking and 21 is in a car en route to his home in Camden, a London suburb, when he reveals he never thought he’d become an actor. In fact, he dreamed of being something else entirely.
"I was in a band and was convinced that I'd be in it for the rest of my life," he says. "Then the rest of the members went off to university and I thought, 'Damn, what am I going to do now?'" Unsure of his next step, Sturgess took a media course which inspired him to write and perform a one-man play. A comment from an audience member after the show would be the catalyst that set his acting career in motion. "Someone in the crowd said I should speak to an agent, which I did. I had no ambitions to become an actor. So, acting was a bit of a happy accident," he says.
Accident or not, Sturgess is proving he has what it takes to make it on the big screen. Lone Scherfig, the acclaimed director of the 2009 hit An Education certainly thought so when she cast him in her latest film One Day. Sturgess plays a superficial television producer who can't seem to get his quirky college one-night stand — played by Anne Hathaway — out of his mind. Every year on the anniversary of the day they met, we get a window into where the two now are in their lives. Sometimes they are together, sometimes not.
Here, Sturgess tells us about his music, what he's gotten from acting, and playing an insensitive and shallow man in this month’s decades-spanning One Day.
![]() Sturgess and Hathaway in One Day (Courtesy of Alliance) |
Q: Could you relate to Dexter, your character in One Day?
“He’s not exactly someone I’d like. He can be vulgar — which was kind of fun to play. I could see all the trouble Dexter gets himself into. That sort of thing I could definitely relate to.”
Q: What was it like working with Anne Hathaway?
"It was so great. I often make films abroad in America so it was really nice to make a film at home in London. It was lovely to have Anne come and I could sort of look after her. I showed her some local spots. It was a lot of fun."
Q: Dexter ages from 20 to 40 in the film; how did you handle that? "I looked at pictures of rock stars at age 20 and what they look like now. It’s quite strange to play because you’re a young man at 20 but you’re not old at 40."Q: Where does your passion for acting come from?
"I don't know. I guess I love it because it keeps me doing really crazy things. You’re always doing something new with a new group of people with a new character to play. It makes you live life to the full. There are so many moments where I think, 'Wow, I'm having a moment. This is incredible!' You're just constantly enriching your life."
Q: What are some of those enriching moments?
"Before One Day, I did a film called The Way Back with Colin Farrell. I play a survivor in a Soviet labour camp who walks from Siberia to India during the Second World War. I had such an incredible journey of learning how to survive in the wilderness along with Colin. Then for Fifty Dead Men Walking, I learned how to make bombs with real members of the IRA. I've also learned how to count cards from gamblers who took casinos for millions for 21, and sang 'All You Need is Love' on top of a giant building for the Beatles film Across the Universe. It's just very cool."
Q: Who inspired you to become an actor?
"The first actor that really, really blew my mind was David Thewlis in the 1993 film Naked. It was one of the best performances I'd ever seen. I also loved River Phoenix in Stand By Me."
Q: Are you ready for fame?
"Some actors I've worked with have to deal with major fame and it can affect your life in a really negative way. I've managed not to have that in my life at all. I'm very lucky. But you never know when it's going to come so I don't know how much control you have over it. But I find it very strange that people would seek out fame."
Q: Is it true that you still play in a band?
"I still play a lot of music. My girlfriend, Mickey O'Brien, and I have written and are just in the process of recording our first album together. It'll be called Tragic Toys. She's a keyboard player for the band La Roux. We both work hard but when we’re at home, we write a lot of music."
Q: So you're okay with being an emerging star?
"I'm always happy to be emerging and continue to emerge. That's just fine by me."
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Jennifer Evans is a freelance entertainment and lifestyle journalist from Toronto.
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