Nicholas Hoult’s handsome face was enough to get Chris Evans in a flap when he popped along to TFI Friday and became the focus of an impromptu photo shoot, much to the actor’s embarrassment.
Even mere mention of his model good looks clearly embarrasses the 25-year-old.
“You don’t really think about that,” he says, when asked whether his photogenic features have ever meant he’s been overlooked for a role.
“In terms of character, it’s that thing of trying to disappear into it and make it feel real and honest. If you do that, that’s half the battle – and then make-up people and costumes and all those things help.”
His latest role marks a dark departure for Hoult, who famously played the angelic-looking but socially awkward Marcus Brewer in 2002’s About A Boy, opposite Hugh Grant.
In Kill Your Friends, an adaptation of John Niven’s satirical 2008 novel, he plays Steven Stelfox, a 27-year-old A&R man who’s willing to do (literally) anything to get to the top.
“He’s basically scared of being normal and being a member of the general public. He sees himself as being elite and at the top of life,” explains Hoult, who was born in Berkshire and first appeared on screen in 1996, in comedy-drama Intimate Relations and a small part in TV’s Casualty.
“He’s a very odd character but John Niven’s writing is very twisted and dark. And I thought it was funny. The script made me laugh and I enjoyed this little foray into the music industry.”
The story is inspired by Niven’s own experiences in the music business, where the writer saw “incredible greed and terrible behaviour” – he’s remarked that the movie’s been 20 years in the making (“Ten years living the life described, then five years between writing the novel and getting it published, and then five years between the screenplay and development hell”).
This hard slog is doubtless due to the content being deemed too controversial, its characters without remorse or the comeuppance typically demanded by the audience or reader.
The action’s set in London, 1997. Britpop, Blur, Oasis and Radiohead rule the airwaves and Cool Britannia is in full-swing. Against this backdrop, Stelfox – fuelled by greed, ambition and drugs – is searching for his next hit record.
Sexist, racist, or as one of the film’s producers Will Clarke, puts it, “one of the most despicable characters to grace our screens”, Hoult confesses he initially found the script jaw-dropping.
“There are a lot of lines I couldn’t repeat,” the actor admits. “And he’s got a way of stringing together sentences and describing things where you just sit there and go, ‘Woah!’ It’s a bit shocking, but that’s what makes it so enjoyable, because it’s such a strange speech pattern that this guy has.”
Another producer, Gregor Cameron, who approached Niven to option the rights at the end of 2008, always had Hoult in mind for the anti-hero. This is after spotting him in the teen drama series Skins, and noticing how sympathetic he could make his essentially unsympathetic character, Tony Stonem.
For his own part, the actor was up for the challenge of depicting someone so morally corrupt. “I thought the character was interesting, someone who is extreme but still has an enjoyment and a pleasure, despite all the horrible things around him, and will do terrible things but in a way that you still, hopefully, somehow manage to like him.”
Hoult, who starred in 2009’s A Single Man, and Warm Bodies and Jack The Giant Slayer in 2013, was nine years old when the book was published, and admits that while the creative industries are still known for their excesses, it’s nowhere near as debauched as it once was.
“I mean, you hear stories about Peter O’Toole and some of those old boys having some fun, it’s fun to listen to,” he says, laughing. “I think the Eighties and Nineties were much more hedonistic and extreme, and you could get away with a lot worse behaviour. Nowadays, because of the business aspect of these industries, it’s a lot more tame. Bad behaviour isn’t tolerated because there are many people as talented who will do it without the fuss.”
Has he ever gone to extremes to get a role?
“I’ve never done that thing of dressing up as the character or turning up unannounced, but just being well-prepared to get a role,” he reveals. “That’s not really extreme, that’s just hard work and what you should be doing.”
Hoult has fought for a role though, including the upcoming Rebel In The Rye, in which he’ll play The Catcher In The Rye author J.D. Salinger.
“That one I did fight for and chase, but that’s right. If you want to play something, you’ve got to prove that you can do it.
“I think sometimes it’s weird when you get cast in something but you don’t even know whether you can play that character,” he adds. “That’s an odd thing, turning up on set on the first day and you’re like, ‘I don’t know whether my vision of this character is going to be what they expected’.”
As one of the industry’s rising stars, the work is non-stop.
He’s already shot Equals, a thriller set in a world where emotions have been eradicated, which also stars Twilight’s Kristen Stewart.
There was speculation that they might be more than just co-stars when the pair were spotted looking close and laughing together at the Venice Film Festival.
“I must’ve said something funny,” Hoult offers, grinning. He describes the shoot as “phenomenal”.
“Kristen and Drake (Doremus, the director) are two of my favourite people I’ve worked with, really inspiring to be around and I’m proud of the film.”
And then there’s X-Men: Apocalypse, where he’ll reprise the role of Hank/Beast alongside on-off girlfriend Jennifer Lawrence, which is due for release next year.
“It’s set in the Eighties this one, and Apocalypse (voiced by Oscar Isaac) is the villain. He’s brilliant in it and I think it’s going to be quite a spectacle from what I’ve seen taking place on set. It’s going to be fun.”
Kill Your Friends is released on Friday, November 6