Brendan Gleeson as Winston Churchill in the HBO Film “Into the Storm.” Photographer: HBO / Susan Allnutt.

Historical dramas are about what happens when people, ordinary people, get into what the Chinese call ‘interesting times’.

On May 31, 2009, at 9 pm Eastern Time, Into the Storm premiers on HBO.This historic drama depicts Sir Winston Churchill during World War II, when he served as Britain’s prime minister. Veteran actor Brendan Gleeson portrays the complex, often contradictory prime minister. Gleeson’s extraordinary career has seen him cast in such diverse roles as Hamish Campbell in 1995’s Braveheart, Walter "Monk" McGinn in Gangs of New York, and Professor Alastor "Mad-Eye" Moody in the Harry Potter films. He was nominated for a Golden Globe award for his portrayal of the hit man Ken in 2008’s In Bruges. Recently, he spoke with ArmchairGeneral.com in an exclusive interview about his career, about portraying Churchill, and about his own grandfather, a member of the Connaught Rangers in World War I. Into the Storm is presented by HBO Films in association with BBC, a Scott Free production and a Rainmark Films production of a film by Thaddeus O’Sullivan; written by Hugh Whitemore.

Subscribe Today

• Subscribe to Armchair General Magazine
• Subscribe online and save nearly 40%!
 

ArmchairGeneral.com: Your film career contains an interesting mix of character-driven historical dramas along with films heavy with special effects, like the Harry Potter movies, Beowulf, and Mission: Impossible II. Do the two genres place different demands on you as an actor?

Brendan Gleeson: Yeah, I tend to search out variety as much as I can. I try not to do rubbish, number 1, but I do try to take on one project a year that has real artistic merit and is a real artistic challenge. When that’s done, I can go do something fun like Harry Potter. I try to not to get over-grim about it. I think the movie business needs to remember that we need to entertain people.

ACG: What is it that attracts you to history-based films?

BG: There’s a very interesting thing that happens to an actor in terms of historical projects. In any film the huge challenge is to make people believe something happened. If you do a historical film and do it with integrity, you don’t have to convince them this is real. They know it’s already happened.

Historical dramas are about what happens when people, ordinary people, get into what the Chinese call "interesting times," and we see how they react. As an actor, you can’t be the real person, but that’s where imagination becomes important, to show how they might have felt, how they might have reacted.

ACG: In particular, what appealed to you or challenged you about playing Winston Churchill?

BG: He’s such a complex individual. His resilience and self-belief and facing down a situation so much greater than he was at the time—his ability to make people realize they were more than they thought they were.

Coming from my background (growing up in Ireland), I was aware of what it was like to sit across from him at the table. He was very tough, very bullish while negotiating Irish freedom. So for me it was interesting to sit on his side of the table for awhile.

A lady once said, when you first meet Winston you’re aware of all of his faults and you spend the rest of your life discovering his virtues. The longer I portrayed him, the more I saw his virtues.

Help Armchair General by bookmarking to