Hugo Weaving on Priscilla, The Matrix and hanging out in Dublin for his new play
Hugo Weaving stars in The President at the Gate in Dublin. Picture: Lisa Maree Williams/Getty
Hugo Weaving is making the most of his time in Ireland by absorbing as much of our culture as he can. Not only is he working on an Irish-Australian co-production in his new play at Dublin’s Gate Theatre. In his spare time, he’s been enjoying the best our musicians, actors and writers have to offer.
“I think you're blessed with a culture that's celebrated by the people who live here - it’s a thrill to be here for that reason, actually,” he says. “I’m very aware of Irish filmmaking talent in front of the camera and behind it, and Irish culture is so powerful in many ways. Music, fantastic writing. There's a great book I recall, The Lesser Bohemians by Eimear McBride and I was just blown away by that. Anna Burns’ Milkman, wonderful writing. I'm reading Prophet Song at the moment which won the Booker Prize. Small Things Like These, Claire Keegan's book, was fantastic. Not to mention Joyce and Beckett - Beckett to me is my God."
Weaving has also been enjoying the atmosphere in the Dublin theatre for the early previews of The President. “Your audiences in The Gate are wonderful. They're very appreciative and it's a complicated play that we're doing but they're really embracing it in a way that shows that they're thirsty for new ideas.”
That play is The President by Austrian writer Thomas Bernhard, directed by Tom Creed and featuring a cast including Weaving and Olwen Fouéré. The first co-production between The Gate and Sydney Theatre Company, the play is set in an unnamed country following an assassination attempt. Weaving has become a big fan of Bernhard since exploring his writing further.
“The President has just survived an assassination attempt. The First Lady’s dog died in the assassination attempt of a heart attack and the President's right-hand man died and was shot instead of the President. They're both in shock, and they're living in fear and it feels like the regime's in its last days, perhaps.
“There was something really, really thrilling about the writing that led me to immediately start reading Bernhard. I knew of him, I had seen one of his plays, but didn't know his work.
“It's been a great adventure, delving into the man and the complexity of the man and his history and his past. Some of his work is now in my top 10 books ever read. I think he's just a genius. It doesn't mean it hasn't been incredibly challenging. It’s a very dark play but it’s very funny."
Weaving recalls the other projects he's worked on that have involved Irish and Australian cast and crew, including Famine-set revenge thriller Black '47. “This is the third production I've done now, where there's been a mix of Australians and Irish and it feels like an easy fit. There's a lot in Australian culture which has come from Ireland, and there's a sense of humour and a sense of musicality in the language I think.”
As well as his stage career, Weaving’s time in Ireland will see him revisit one of his most beloved screen roles. Next month, the Irish Film Institute will host a screening of The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert, followed by a Q&A session with the actor.
The iconic comedy drama sees him play a drag queen named Anthony who decides to take his act on a road trip, inviting fellow cross-dresser Adam (Guy Pearce) and transsexual Bernadette (Terence Stamp) along for the fun.
Already a well-known star in Australia (he was born in Nigeria to English parents, though he has lived in Australia throughout his career), the film helped propel Weaving's international success.
“It was just incredible fun, wild,” he says fondly of the 1994 low-budget hit. The whole idea of it, drag queens in the desert, was so fabulous. It was prosecuting something in an intensely simple visual way that was begging so many questions. What is a drag queen doing climbing Kings Canyon, Ayers Rock? And what does that mean?
“I think Priscilla popped bubbles in a really great way and it was a celebration of who we are, but also a celebration of diversity and celebration of complication and a celebration of reversed expectations. At the time it felt like it was the crest of the wave of something, it was heralding in a whole new understanding of who we are as a society. And I think that struck a chord all over the world. I’m glad people still love it.”
It does feel like Weaving has a knack for picking his projects. He has starred in such huge successes as The Matrix and the Lord of the Rings series. “My instincts are good,” he says. “If I read a script, and think: ‘I really want to see that. I can't wait to see that film’, it forces you to jump in and take part in it. It was really like doing this play actually. It was thrilling. You jump in even though you don't know where you're going."
He remembers meeting Matrix creators, the Wachowski siblings, and getting along very well with them, as well as being impressed with their script. “It was quite mind boggling to comprehend the worlds within the worlds that had been created. And then seeing all the storyboards and talking to them and effectively doing four months of kung fu training.
“They were serious, you know, they wanted us, the actors, to do it. So over those training months, I got a very strong sense of how powerful this film might be. And visually it was going to have a fantastic aesthetic.
“Every second ad ever after was using that bullet time. Suddenly, cameras were racing around and slowing down and suddenly a whole new technology was invented which the commercial world took up in a big way. So it was kind of groundbreaking as well.”
Weaving also remembers feeling a sense of excitement about another film early in his career - the 1991 drama, Proof, co-starring a young actor by the name of Russell Crowe. “It was big in Australia and did very well around the world too. A film that felt new and different from an Australian perspective. We'd been used to seeing so many period costume dramas, wonderful films actually. But this felt to me like it was a contemporary, urban, story.”
During his last working visit to Ireland while filming Black ’47, he enjoyed a Christmas-holiday road trip around Ireland with his daughter and her partner. The rehearsal period for The President has been busy, but he’s looking forward to seeing more in the coming weeks. “Once we open I'm looking forward to getting out to some galleries and having some walks. We did take a little trip to Glendalough a couple of weekends ago. It’s really lovely to be back here.”
- Hugo Weaving stars in the Irish premiere of The President by Thomas Bernhard, the first co-production between the Gate Theatre and Sydney Theatre Company, running until March 24, at the Gate Theatre Dublin.
- Booking at www.gatetheatre.ie
