BAFTA-winner Austin Butler has said British star Tom Hardy is one of the most “intense” actors he’s ever had the pleasure to work with.
Elvis star Butler, 32, and Venom actor Hardy, 46, co-star in Jeff Nicols’ forthcoming drama The Bikeriders - which is about a motorcycle gang in the Midwest of America.
The upcoming film - which was due to premiere this year but has been postponed due to the writer’s strike - also stars British actress Jodie Comer.
Speaking to Interview Magazine, Butler opened up about working with Mad Max star Hardy for the first time.
“I pictured him to be this grizzly bear, always serious,” Butler said, but admitted that actually Hardy was “one of the funniest people I’ve ever met”.
“He’d be joking around until action is called and then go into being the most intense guy I’d ever seen,” Butler said.
The film marks Butler’s first project since his Oscar-nominated role as Elvis Presley in Baz Luhrmann’s 2022 biopic.
Speaking earlier this year, he said co-star Tom Hanks had given him some sage advise about his career post Elvis.
Butler said Hanks encouraged him to star in Second World War drama mini-series Masters Of The Air, which was produced by Hanks alongside Steven Spielberg and Gary Goetzman.
Butler told The Sunday Times that Hanks, who played Presley’s manager Colonel Tom Parker in Elvis, said to him: "You have immersed yourself so deeply in Elvis that, for your mental health, it would be wise to go straight into something else.
“If you just jump off the train, you might have emotional whiplash – And, you know, I’ve got this thing I’m producing.”
The series is a sequel to the mini-series Band Of Brothers and The Pacific, which were also produced by Spielberg, Hanks and Goetzman.
Butler will also star in the sci-fi blockbuster sequel Dune: Part Two later this year alongside Timothee Chalamet and Zendaya.
