How a cat, John Lennon and Henry Cavill's hairspray put a sassy spin on the spy movie

Henry Cavill survived playing a superspy hero in the action comedy “Argylle,” only to find himself flirting with a truly hairy situation while promoting the movie.

Cavill didn’t get to spend much time with feline co-star Chip, so on a red carpet in London, when Chip was being held by Bryce Dallas Howard, Cavill figured he’d give the cute cat “a quick stroke,” he recalls. “Just before I reached out and touched him, I was about an inch away, she said, ‘He can be violent sometimes.’ And I thought, ‘Well, time to pull my hand away before I lose it on camera.’”

The fur flies as well as fists, kicks and bullets aplenty in “Argylle" (in theaters Friday). Howard stars as Elly Conway, a reclusive spy novelist – and beloved cat mom to Alfie (played by Chip) – whose plots are weirdly close to actual secret-agent shenanigans, while Cavill is her literary character Agent Argylle come to meta life.

“Argylle” director Matthew Vaughn, the man behind the R-rated “Kingsman” franchise, was inspired to make a different sort of adventure film after showing “Romancing the Stone” to his daughters during the pandemic. “Right now, the world is dark and moody, and I think the PG-13 (rating) tells everyone it's OK, you can watch it with your family,” he says. “This is a way of escaping and feeling good.”

From flattops and dance moves to an adorable main character and the inclusion of a Beatles tune, Vaughn and his cast discuss how “Argylle” makes its own mark on a familiar genre:

Taylor Swift fandom led to the coolest ‘Argylle’ cast member

When Elly is being hunted by bad guys, she partners up with real-life spy Aidan (Sam Rockwell). Vaughn wanted a device to create fun banter akin to old Cary Grant-Katharine Hepburn movies. “They argued in a way that made you smile,” he says. “I didn't want to make 'Kramer vs. Kramer.'"

So a feline character entered the picture, but “the acting cat was terrible and incredibly expensive,” Vaughn says. His wife, model Claudia Schiffer, had brought home Chip, a Scottish Fold, to daughter Clementine, now 19, after seeing Taylor Swift’s kitties in her social-media posts and the documentary “Miss Americana,” and Vaughn asked to borrow the cat for three months. “It behaved more like a dog in some ways,” says the director, who outfitted Elly with a Swiftian cat backpack.

Chip ended up being a sidekick for the director, as Vaughn drove him to work every day and the cat hung out in his trailer. (Chip also has his own Instagram account.) Howard took note of how comfortable and safe her scene partner was on the set: “Matthew would've been murdered by his own children if anything had happened to Chip.”

'Argylle': Claudia Schiffer's cat Chip is purr-fection at London premiere

Bryce Dallas Howard goes full ‘cat lady’

Of all her movie roles, from the “Jurassic World” films to “Pete’s Dragon” and “Rocketman,” Elly is “probably the closest to me in real life,” Howard says. “I’m an introvert and a cat lady and my mom is a novelist and all of that. It's very fun to play someone who gets thrust into an adventure that's entirely outside of their comfort zone.”

Howard also enjoyed her action scenes and found them to be less physical than dealing with, say, “Jurassic” threats. “I felt a lot more beat up on some of my earlier movies, when you're being thrown around by dinosaurs,” she adds. The “Argylle” fight choreography is “designed so that you aren't getting injured as opposed to like, ‘OK, we're going to set this up. We have an ambulance standing by. Best of luck!’”

Henry Cavill’s Argylle is a warm dude with a serious ‘do

Dancing with Rockwell was one of the things that took Howard out of her “comfort zone” and Cavill also got to show off his disco moves in the “Argylle” opening sequence opposite pop star Dua Lipa (playing nemesis Lagrange). “There is a warmth and protectiveness to that character,” the former Superman says of his new spy role.

But this stoic dude's haircut is serious business: Argyle’s signature flattop pops as much as his Nehru jacket. “When it comes to Matthew, it's all about just going in for big swings. He will say, ‘Don't worry, if it looks crap, we'll fix it somehow,’ ” says Cavill, adding that it’s his real hair with “a lot of hairspray in there.”

'Argylle' makes The Beatles’ ‘Now and Then’ its love song

James Bond movies are long known for their songs, and the “Argylle” soundtrack features “Electric Energy,” a super-funky collaboration between star Ariana DeBose and retro icons Boy George and Nile Rodgers. But the bigger deal is the inclusion of the recently released final Beatles song “Now and Then,” which Vaughn says was “a total honor.”

He reached out to producer Giles Martin about a year and a half ago trying to find a love theme that was “hopeful and romantic and sad, tragic at the same time,” to match one of the movie’s plots.

Martin played Vaughn the song, which was just right in terms of lyrics, rhythm and tone. (Composer Lorne Balfe also incorporated its melody into his score.)

“It was bizarre," Vaughn says. "If someone said John Lennon had seen the movie and written a song for it, you'd believe it.”

The Beatles: Is 'Now and Then' about Paul McCartney? Is it really the last song?

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: 'Argylle' casts a Taylor Swift-inspired cat to break spy movie mold