Claire Foy and Paul Bettany talk 'messy, complicated' roles on A Very British Scandal
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On the new season of A Very British Scandal, Paul Bettany and Claire Foy play the Duke and Duchess of Argyll whose acrimonious divorce, in which many salacious aspects of the pair's marriage were revealed, became headline news in the early '60s.
"It's a story of two people who meet, who marry, and their ultimate divorce that ends up happening, which is messy and complicated and they're both messy and complicated," says Foy. "But I also think it's a bigger story of how their relationship was played out in public, and how they used the media, and how the media portrayed them, and particularly her, and how played the legal system in the UK, and how it was all in the man's favor."
Alan Peebles/Amazon/BBC/Sony Pictures Television Paul Bettany and Claire Foy return for a new season of 'A Very British Scandal'
Bettany describes his character as "a real no-goodnik. I play an impoverished aristocrat in need of a new source of income and he finds one on a train in [Foy's character]. He's a drunk, a pill-popping bore, and then they play a divorce out in public, and his class surround him and protect him, and she is then cleaved from the herd and thrown to the wolves."
The three-part show features many acrimonious moments between the two characters. After shooting such a scene, was it all smiles between the two actors, or did they skulk back to their respective dressing rooms in a Method-induced rage?
"Different sort of actor, dear," says Bettany. "I can't play like that."
"We don't go in for that sort of stuff," agrees Foy.
"No, I can't play like that," says Bettany. "I feel like that would be a miserable way to work. You have a common goal, whatever the scene is. You've just been terribly mean to each other, but it feels great. If you feel like you might have achieved the purpose of the scene, that's a great feeling."
"Yeah, and you have to feel quite safe with the other actor to be able to be so intimate," says Foy.
"Intimate" is perhaps not the right word to describe one fantasy sequence in which Foy's character advances on Bettany's Duke with an ancient battle axe and informs her husband that she is going to "chop your f---ing hands off."
"That was sort of ludicrous," says Foy. "It's very weird when you're doing a dream sequence as an actor, because you're trying to root everything in reality. At the time, Anne (Sewitsky), the director, was like, 'I'm not sure this is going to be in it.' So that just made me go, oh great, then I'll just go for it then, it'll be funny. And then, there you go, it's in it!"
Although A Very British Scandal is very much a period piece, Foy believes that the show's themes have resonance today, particularly the way in which the media '60s media effectively 'slut-shamed' the real-life Duchess.
"I think sometimes it's easier to look back than to look at what's happening at the moment," says the actress. "By doing that, you're able to look back at where we've come from and realize how little or how much has changed. In this case you realize how little has changed, fundamentally. I think from the outside things have, but I don't think underneath they really have. I think the same rules apply."
A Very British Scandal premieres on Prime Video April 22. Watch the show's trailer below.
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