Interview
It’s all go for Hunger Games star Sam Claflin. He talks fatherhood, sweet deprivation and Jennifer Lawrence with Anna Smith.
The teenaged Sam Claflin wanted to be a footballer, but it wasn’t to be. “I broke my ankle at 16 and I was like, right. I can’t do that, I need to do something else. Then I found drama. When I put my mind to something, I stick to it. I am good at following it through”.
Now 29, he’s certainly followed it through. After his breakthrough in 2011’s Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides, the Ipswich-born actor starred in films including Snow White And The Huntsman, Love, Rosieand The Riot Club. But it’s his role as Finnick in The Hunger Games series that has won him millions of fans, some of whom are very dedicated. “I have an amazing group of friends, I’d like to say, as opposed to fans, ” he says, “They’re called Sam Claflin Fans and they’re incredibly loyal and respecting of me and my life and my privacy. They turn up to every premiere, they always have a sign and let me know where they are going to be. My Mum and Dad know who they are so they say hello. Hunger Games fans generally are very mature for their ages.”
So, in case you haven’t read the books, what does the final Hunger Games film have in store for Finnick? “It’s definitely another layer of his personality that comes out,” he says, “He gets married then joins forces with the rest of the gang and goes on the assassination mission. As you can imagine, things get a little dark and twisted”.
Claflin enjoyed working with co-star Jennifer Lawrence in the finale. “She’s very much the same person she’s always been. I think her mantelpiece has changed – it has a few more awards and shiny things on it – but I met her just before all that hit and she hasn’t changed a bit. I like to think she’s the same Jennifer we’ve grown to love. She’s exactly what it says on the tin – she hasn’t got airs and graces and is very real”.
Claflin strikes you as being cut from the same cloth: he’s always a genial, well-mannered interviewee with a winning smile. Still based in the UK, he lives with his wife, actress Laura Haddock (The Inbetweeners Movie), who is expecting their first child. “We’re very supportive of one another,” he says proudly, “I think the longest we’ve been without seeing each other is a month. We’ve been quite lucky that when one person’s working, the other one’s available, so when she was working recently I had time of and I could go to see her.”
So what’s next for the father-to-be? “I’ve just finished a film called Me Before You, a romantic drama with Emilia Clarke about a quadriplegic and the relationship between him and his carer. It was very challenging physically, I had to lose a lot of weight. There was a dark period for about three weeks. I had to cut out sweets. Beer, that was a tough one”.
He’s also making a brief appearance in Snow White sequel The Huntsman – “I literally just showed my face” – and will star in war film Their Finest Hour and a Half. “It’s a romantic comedy set in World War II about war movies.” Any other challenges he’d like to embrace? “There are so many. The list is endless. I try to change it up as much as I can.”
Meantime, that fan base continues to grow – he has more than 600,000 followers on Twitter. “I don’t know how many of them actually care about what I say, they just like to think that I listen”, he says modestly. “If you do say a word back, they have a tendency to want you to say anything. It doesn’t matter what it is. I don’t really enjoy social media but I like it to the point that you have the ability to change someone’s life. To think that David Beckham would have tweeted me as a kid, I would have gone all over the place to show that off. We have the ability to do that now, it’s pretty incredible. I think the fact that you have noticed someone exists can mean so much to them. As much as I don’t think I have that power as much as someone like Jennifer does, to think there are people out there who do say that they love me and are inspired by me…it’s really quite moving. So, long live Twitter!”
(With thanks to Anna Smith for the top photo)
It’s all go for Hunger Games star Sam Claflin. He talks fatherhood, sweet deprivation and Jennifer Lawrence with Anna Smith.
The teenaged Sam Claflin wanted to be a footballer, but it wasn’t to be. “I broke my ankle at 16 and I was like, right. I can’t do that, I need to do something else. Then I found drama. When I put my mind to something, I stick to it. I am good at following it through”.
Now 29, he’s certainly followed it through. After his breakthrough in 2011’s Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides, the Ipswich-born actor starred in films including Snow White And The Huntsman, Love, Rosieand The Riot Club. But it’s his role as Finnick in The Hunger Games series that has won him millions of fans, some of whom are very dedicated. “I have an amazing group of friends, I’d like to say, as opposed to fans, ” he says, “They’re called Sam Claflin Fans and they’re incredibly loyal and respecting of me and my life and my privacy. They turn up to every premiere, they always have a sign and let me know where they are going to be. My Mum and Dad know who they are so they say hello. Hunger Games fans generally are very mature for their ages.”
So, in case you haven’t read the books, what does the final Hunger Games film have in store for Finnick? “It’s definitely another layer of his personality that comes out,” he says, “He gets married then joins forces with the rest of the gang and goes on the assassination mission. As you can imagine, things get a little dark and twisted”.
Claflin enjoyed working with co-star Jennifer Lawrence in the finale. “She’s very much the same person she’s always been. I think her mantelpiece has changed – it has a few more awards and shiny things on it – but I met her just before all that hit and she hasn’t changed a bit. I like to think she’s the same Jennifer we’ve grown to love. She’s exactly what it says on the tin – she hasn’t got airs and graces and is very real”.
Claflin strikes you as being cut from the same cloth: he’s always a genial, well-mannered interviewee with a winning smile. Still based in the UK, he lives with his wife, actress Laura Haddock (The Inbetweeners Movie), who is expecting their first child. “We’re very supportive of one another,” he says proudly, “I think the longest we’ve been without seeing each other is a month. We’ve been quite lucky that when one person’s working, the other one’s available, so when she was working recently I had time of and I could go to see her.”
So what’s next for the father-to-be? “I’ve just finished a film called Me Before You, a romantic drama with Emilia Clarke about a quadriplegic and the relationship between him and his carer. It was very challenging physically, I had to lose a lot of weight. There was a dark period for about three weeks. I had to cut out sweets. Beer, that was a tough one”.
He’s also making a brief appearance in Snow White sequel The Huntsman – “I literally just showed my face” – and will star in war film Their Finest Hour and a Half. “It’s a romantic comedy set in World War II about war movies.” Any other challenges he’d like to embrace? “There are so many. The list is endless. I try to change it up as much as I can.”
Meantime, that fan base continues to grow – he has more than 600,000 followers on Twitter. “I don’t know how many of them actually care about what I say, they just like to think that I listen”, he says modestly. “If you do say a word back, they have a tendency to want you to say anything. It doesn’t matter what it is. I don’t really enjoy social media but I like it to the point that you have the ability to change someone’s life. To think that David Beckham would have tweeted me as a kid, I would have gone all over the place to show that off. We have the ability to do that now, it’s pretty incredible. I think the fact that you have noticed someone exists can mean so much to them. As much as I don’t think I have that power as much as someone like Jennifer does, to think there are people out there who do say that they love me and are inspired by me…it’s really quite moving. So, long live Twitter!”
(With thanks to Anna Smith for the top photo)
