English actor Will Poulter landed his first film role at the age of 14 in the critically acclaimed Son Of Rambow (2007), directed by Garth Jennings. Appearances in The Chronicles of Narnia: The Voyage of the Dawn Treader (2010), Wild Bill (2012) and We’re The Millers (2013) followed, leading to the young actor winning the BAFTA Rising Star Award in 2014. Poulter has also had a successful career in television, with notable appearances in Channel 4’s School Of Comedy (2009 – 2010), a character-based sketch show with a cast made up entirely of children. In the big-screen adaptation of James Dashner’s successful Young Adult novel The Maze Runner Poulter plays Gally, early inhabitant of the film’s first environment, and complex antagonist of the tale…
How did you feel when you first read the script?
I was really excited about the prospect of being in something that was a true ensemble piece. I think there are strong perceptions about this genre, it appears that people have hard and fast rules about these action-adventure dystopian films; they’re headed up by a young cast and they’re characterized by a lead female, a romantic thread and the world being in tatters.
And actually none of that is the case with The Maze Runner. It’s a male lead, it’s predominantly all men, it’s not about competition or pitting people against each other for the sake of survival, it’s actually about brotherhood and camaraderie, and it’s a little bit more character-driven, with more focus on the identity of those characters and how they relate to one another. I think that’s taken people a bit by surprise, I think that’s refreshing for them.
That’s interesting, because the reaction of a lot of people has been they’re surprised by how intense it is, does that please you?
It really does. We really went for intensity. There’s no denying that visually, it certainly stands out, that is one of its appeals. But the most comforting thing for me as an actor, having read the script, was when I talked to Wes and he showed me all the concept art, and his previz and his illustrations, and his vision for the film in various formats and materials, and he said: ‘Oh, by the way, none of this matters. Because unless we get the characters right, and unless it feels like you guys have been living together for three years, unless it feels like you’re the keeper of the Builders, and Aml is the leader, and Ki Hong is a Runner, and Dylan is Thomas, then I might as well throw away all of this, because if a dish looks good but doesn’t taste right, you don’t get a Michelin star for that.’ And we actually had that conversation over turkey burger, so whether that analogy of mine works, I don’t know. That’s the truth of it, and it was very comforting as an actor to hear that.
So Wes arranged for us to spend a lot of time with each other, we were all staying in the same corridor together, in the same hotel. We felt like we wanted to spend a lot of time to try and develop an organic sense of camaraderie so we all cooked and ate with each other, every meal. We camped with each other in the Glade, which was great, and we did a boot camp that Wes wanted us to do.
He was trying to infuse the film with the kind of vibe from films of old, like Goonies and Lord of the Flies, and those are the kinds of films that I loved. I always compared it to Hook, in the Glade it has a Lost Boys vibe about it, and I think the power shift that occurs between me and my followers and Thomas and his reminded me of the Rufio / Pan dynamic.
What was the toughest day of the shoot for you?
There were a few, it was a really tough shoot. Long, long hours, 100 degrees humidity, 105 degrees Fahrenheit, it was hot so you got sweaty without doing anything at all and you really had to keep fluids up. So there were days where you’d be doing quite emotionally testing stuff in the heat.
I think for me, it was the final scene in the film, just from an emotional perspective. I remember there being quite a long wait and I was down and depressed and on my own for about 9 hours before I got on set because there was a little scheduling mix-up.
The producer said ‘I’m so sorry I brought you in so early.’ and I said ‘No, it’s good, I’m just going to be off in the corner.’ We all got on so well and there was a lot of banter, but that day I was on my own being a bit of a loser. So that was the toughest day, not being able to be sociable and having to take some time for myself, and the wait was pretty excruciating.
And what was the most fun day?
Probably the party scene, the celebration of Thomas arriving, where we burn that big Griever statue that we’ve built. That for me was the most fun, primarily because the cameras were roaming on tracks and that scene played out for about half an hour all improvised. We reset a couple of times but there were these long ten minute takes where we were just drinking this home-made moonshine that presumably my character knocked-up, there was food that Dexter Darden, who plays Frypan, was cooking up, and there was dancing and acrobatics, we were just chatting away and it was an amazing experience, it just felt very real.
The way it was backlit you couldn’t see there were any cameras there, so you were just involved in this world for a minute. It was a very Lost Boys moment, it felt like I was on the set of of Hook.
But my favourite scene to perform was between Dylan and I, where he goes back into the Maze having been told not to go in, and we clash; that’s an improvised scene. It’s not the sort of opportunity you think you might have on a film like this, but me and Dylan got to do that and it was so awesome, it was so much fun. Dylan’s such a good actor, he’s a guy that does comedy and drama as well, and he’s really strong in this film. Really strong.
The Grievers are great movie monsters, what did you think of them when you saw them onscreen?
They are terrifying, they really are great movie monsters. Wes is a self-confessed movie geek, and he said they were a priority for him, he wanted them to be truly terrifying and he managed to do that, they are horrible things. They’re horrible, I really am a wuss like that, I’m squeamish, they’re horrible.
It’s the combination of biological and mechanical, the fact that they’re fused, and they have this essence of all of these creepy-crawlies, everything that could possible gross you out. They’re maggoty, slug-like, spider-like, they have scorpion tails whatever you’re scared of, it’s there. And they’re vicious as well, the way that they kill these kids – and you see it – it’s really, really horrendous. There are no moments where someone gets knocked on the head and they fall down dead, they’re getting skewered and spiked and ripped apart.
You’ve done some fan events, what’s that interaction like for you?
It’s great, in terms of Maze Runner fans, you can’t ask for any better form of support – they’ve been behind us from day one on Twitter and so on. It alleviated the pressure to see how happy they were in terms of casting choices, and what was going on.
James Dashner is very close to his readership, he has a very good relationship with them, and he was keeping them informed along the way, and they just seemed so happy – all the images, all the clips, they’ve just been so excited.
You’ve got The Yellow Birds coming up, which is another book adaptation, what can you tell us about that? It’s an amazing book, isn’t it?
It’s an incredible book, and I’m very lucky to be involved. That’s a film that I’m due to do next year. It’s something that’s close to my heart, I really love the project. It’s about two soldiers in Afghanistan, fighting at the early stages in the current war that we’re in. And it’s an investigation into the death of one of my character’s best friends, it involves me, it has me as a suspect.
And you’re reuniting with your Maze Runner costar Thomas Brodie-Sangster on Shoplifters Of The World, what’s happening with that?
Thomas and I have been attached to that for a number of years now, potentially as many as three, but it’s never gone ahead. I hope it happens because I’m a massive Smiths fan.
I auditioned for the part that Thomas is playing, it was this homosexual rocker, I did the audition and they got back to me and said ‘I’m sorry, it didn’t work out for you, we didn’t really believe it.’ I said ‘Fair enough, but could I just have a part? Can I just be in the background, playing the triangle? Whatever it is, I want to do it. I’m a Smiths fan, I think this movie is incredible. Just please let me do something, I’ll be a runner, anything. So they gave me this part, and slightly wrote it for me, which was really sweet. And Thomas got the part I originally auditioned for.
Then we worked together on Maze Runner and initially, we both auditioned for each other’s parts. I auditioned for Newt and Gally, and he auditioned for Gally and Newt, which was really weird. So we’ve crossed paths on a couple of occasions.
For anyone who hasn’t seen The Maze Runner, can you explain what WCKD is?
It stands for World Catastrophe Kill Zone Department, but we don’t know what it stands for, we’re trying to work it out. As we understand it, they are the people who have put us here, and we don’t know if they’re an organization, one person, whether they’re surveying us or what’s going on.
You made Son of Rambow, about a little boy who makes a film that’s almost like Maze Runner, did making Maze Runner take you back to that time?
Yes, I think it did – being out in the wild, being outdoors – I’m a proud Londoner, I love the urban environment, but it’s awesome to be able to go back to nature occasionally. And the sense of adventure that comes of being out in the wild as a young kid, running around, that stuff really excites me, so it really did take me back.
It must be really exciting to be working with Wes at this stage of his career, because I feel like he’s really going places.
It’s so exciting to work with him this early in his career, because I feel like his career is going to kick off in an unbelievable way, I feel like he’s going to be that guy people talk about. Years from now people will say ‘Do you realize that Maze Runner was his first film?’ He’s just phenomenal and the opportunity to work with him now is just so awesome, I’m so grateful for that. I think he only really considered casting me because of Son of Rambow, which is crazy – he saw that and wanted to give me a shot, I’m just so grateful that he took it.
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