In part one of my article based on my conference call with Eoin Macken (Sir Gwaine), Adetomiwa Edun (Sir Elyan), Rupert Young (Sir Leon), and Tom Hopper (Sir Percival), these Knights of the Round Table talked about their characters’ relationships on Syfy’s hit British series, Merlin, the series color-blindness, and a sexy photo shoot.
Throughout the call, these sword-wielding gents showed they had great senses of humor, as when they were asked if there was anything in upcoming episodes that they would like fans to be looking for, and one quipped, “You should probably look to see how many hair flicks Eoin Macken does in an episode.” And Macken shot back, “I think, if fans can start the episode where Tom wears anything on his arms, that would be epic.”
Auditioning to be a Knight of the Round Table
But before you can have such teasing camaraderie, actors have to audition. Did they watch Merlin before they got cast? “I did because Merlin is a wonderful show,” Macken said, “and I heard about it so often.” Edun admitted to watching “the whole first three seasons.”
Young gave a more typical answer for a busy actor. “When you auditioned for the show, you -- normally -- I had a couple of days so I tried to watch as many as I could.” He then added, “Since being in it, I've watched it even more.” And finished by teasing, “My mom makes me.” Hopper leapt on that answer and added, “We all now watch the show because we're all narcissistic.”
This prompted a journalist to ask for more information about their initial auditions and getting started in their respective roles. Hopper said that when he heard he was up for Percival, he did research and came to the audition in character. But what they decided on for the character turned out to be different than what he had prepared from his research. “But basically the audition is that you get your script,” he said, “and you read it through with the director and if you're right for the part, then they'll give you the offer.”
For Young, the story was different. “When I first auditioned, I was up for two parts. One was Sir Leon, which I now play. And the other was another part who actually died another night. Luckily, they cast me as Sir Leon. Otherwise, I wouldn't be employed anymore.” But even so, Sir Leon was only meant to be in a couple of episodes. Instead, they kept bringing him back. “I've kind of developed the character with the writers so it's been quite exciting.”
“I just sent a video being topless in a bed,” Macken quipped, “and that was my audition.”
Character Growth
In terms of having the characters grow and develop through the season, Young said, “What's been quite lovely, or nice, for the group of us working together is managing to get the kind of relationship we have off-screen into our characters. So it was quite nice to get that group dynamic which the writers found and also we found off-screen.”
Macken presented the opposite viewpoint in typical British jest. “I think the characters have regressed since we began and initially written very well and then we came in and ruined it. So they might have to save it for a really solid ending.”
Working with Colin Morgan and Bradley James
That jesting led to a question of what it was like to work with Colin and Bradley, to which someone quipped, “Are they in this show?”
“What's actually genuinely great with working on Merlin is the actors on Merlin are all of a really high caliber,” Macken answered. “They're bringing some great guest stars and so forth like Nathaniel Parker and different people.” Nevertheless, the mainstays of the show are Colin, Bradley and Katie, he said. “Colin and Bradley, in particular, are both brilliant and it is always great working with them. And as people, Colin's Irish and Irish people are generally great, and Bradley's British and that's cool, too. So it's great working with them.”
“As you can tell, there's a lot of banter between the boys here and it's all a lot of fun,” Hopper elaborated. “So having us all together, working with those two … it's been great working with those guys on their journey of making the show … they're good people … very good actors.”
Young on the other hand called them the hardest-working people he’s met. “I know it sounds like we're sucking up to them, but they generally are brilliant…. They're working flat-out for 8 months, and so they make us all raise our game. Two great people to work with.”
“I guess our interaction with them is,” Edun finished, “as a group, it's slightly different. Like Bradley is very much one of the lads and we have a lot of good times with him. And Colin is just like one of the warmest, nicest sort of most generous people you'll ever meet.”
“The Darkest Hour” Episodes
The two part opening of season 4 was quite spectacular and enjoyable for the audience. Each of them did a terrific job in it. Was there anything they found particularly enjoyable?
Young indicated that the first thing that came to mind was that it was a new experience for the show, because they were now shooting on 35-mm film. “Everything was bigger and better and so when we were filming, it was us coming back together after being away from each other for a few months and it was the first time the unit of knights was really huge. So it just felt much more exciting.”
“I think what was fascinating about the opener,” Macken added, “was the fact that because it was a much darker tone than the previous series and because we had this great big quest feel and it was all of us together, as Rupert said, going on an adventure, and with the Dorocha -- which had a lot of special effects -- we didn't really know what was going on, which kind of lends to what was happening with the characters. Because you can't see the Dorocha and we didn't know what was happening, our confusion was real and that was really great.”
“The scale of the first two episodes was massive,” Edun said. “We shot in some fantastic locations that were really evocative and added to the experience of shooting it, which was a lot of fun.”
Bringing up the Dorocha begged the question of how tough was it to work with so many special effects? “I think what's quite interesting is when you're filming them,” Young explained, “you don't actually know what you're trying to attack. So if somebody tells you attack from all sides while looking in this general direction and hold a flame, you do it to nothing. And so it's not until you actually watch the episode that you go, ‘Oh wow, that is actually quite scary.’"
“When you're acting -- acting is about reacting,” Macken added. “You need to react off someone doing something to you. The Derocha don't really give you anything back, so it was hard to act.”
That answer prompted Young to fire back, “It's like working with Eoin.”
Favorite Scene
And finally, the boys described their favorite scene to do. Macken said his favorite scene was between Rupert and himself in either episode 7 or 8 this season. “There's an episode that mainly focuses on the knights, so I'm sure the fans will look after that because we're pretty brilliant in it. And the scene -- it was quite interesting because a lot more conflict between the knights in terms of creating a different dynamic to our relationship. So I enjoyed a scene with Rupert which we had in the forest which got quite heated and it was fun.”
“Tom and I did a little bit at the opening of the series which was quite fun,” Edun added, “rescuing the children from the Dorocha. That was good. And then following on again from what Eoin said, I think that, if I may call it the knights' episode, it has some really nice stuff -- interplay between us all -- all four of us, which was a lot of fun to do.”
Hopper agreed with both Edun and Macken. “Certainly my favorite had to be saving the kids with Adetomiwa in episode 1. That was a lot of fun. And saying again really, I think the knights' episode -- which is, I believe, episode 8 of this series -- so I think for all four of us it was a lot of fun to do that though because we all got to get a peek or hint of something that was really on the story line of the episode. So that was a lot of fun.”
“Same,” confirmed Young. “As I have said, it's the first time we all go out and I think the characters developed a little bit in those, as Eoin said, conflicts. That was the most fun to shoot. The rest were not quite as fun.”
In ending, the four Knights expressed their appreciation for their American fans: “Thank you, America. You're beautiful.” And “We love you, America.”
Return that love by watching Merlin on Syfy on Fridays at 10 pm ET/PT.
Crystal Taylor - I'm a writer of TV one-hour scripts, screenplays, novels, short stories, articles, and poetry. I'm most proud of a story (episode outline) ...
