-Our next guest is a Golden Globe and Emmy-nominated actor
you know from shows like "Chernobyl," "Mad Men,"
"The Terror," and "The Crown."
He currently stars in "Foundation."
The season finale streams November 19th on Apple TV+.
Let's take a look.
-The two emerging powers of the Outer Reach united in marriage.
-Are you going to teach us our own history now, dead man, huh?
The Thespin dog slit her throat on their wedding bed.
-So the legend goes.
-Are you suggesting our history is wrong?
-History is written by the victor,
and neither of you seem to be winning.
-Please welcome back to the show our friend Jared Harris.
♪♪ [ Cheers and applause ]
♪♪
Jared, welcome back.
-Is it too soon? Is it alright?
To occupy the chair once occupied by
the sexiest man alive. [ Laughter ]
Is it alright? -I think so.
I mean, it's very rare to sit in the sexi--
be the next person to sit in the sexiest man's seat.
-I'm getting something. [ Laughter ]
I'm getting something. -We can see.
By the way, we can see it working.
[ Laughter ] -Thank you, Paul.
-It's so lovely to see you, as always.
So, this is a -- you play a psychohistorian in this film.
-Yeah. -There's not a role
you can't play, but when they presented you psychohistorian,
did you think, "This is what I've been waiting for"?
-"What the hell does that mean?" [ Laughter ]
Yeah.
-It's based on a famous science-fiction book.
-Yeah, several books by Isaac Asimov, yeah,
which were the kind of uber text for a lot of science fiction
that followed afterwards like "Battlestar Galactica"
and "Star Wars" and stuff like that, yeah.
-You have tended to be in some darker material.
You were here talking about "Chernobyl,"
which, if you don't know the story, a little dark.
[ Laughter ] -Yes.
-"The Terror," which I -- You know I bang the drum
for "The Terror," a limited series on AMC,
which, if people haven't seen, go back once to "Terror."
Timeless.
In this though, you know, it's both, you know --
things aren't going well, but you are a little bit more
optimistic than maybe we've seen you in previous things.
-Yes, well, actually, the character I play is a --
he's come up with a predictive model for the future,
and although the future he predicts is not one
that the Galactic Empire likes, there is that -- he sees that
there is a way towards a positive ending,
but it's going to take a thousand years to get there.
-We've also talked about the fact
that your characters often die.
-Yes. -Yeah.
This has happened to you again in this show.
-Yeah, it means you keep having to look for a new job.
-Yeah. [ Laughter ]
You're always -- Your agent's always like,
"He's not available now, but he might be soon."
-Pretty soon, yeah. [ Laughter ]
-But you are -- we see you there -- I believe we see you
post-death there, because you are -- this is a good one
for you because you die and you get to come back.
-Yeah, well, it's 25,000 years in the future, so all the ideas
that we're playing with now about being able to download
your consciousness and everything of that,
that's all taken as a given in that world.
-Which is nice, because then, you know,
you get to keep doing the work, you know?
-Yeah. Yeah, I mean -- I don't know.
Would I like that? I mean, you know, there's the whole
tactile feeling of being alive and everything.
I think I'm kind of rooted to that.
-Yeah. You like the touch part of it, but like, eh.
-Yeah, touch, taste, feel -- yeah.
-Not for me, no. -No? Yeah.
-I just like being able to tell people what I'm thinking.
[ Laughter ]
You can just bring me back and let me go.
What about a -- -There's a part for you then.
-Yeah. [ Laughter ]
Do you ever think like, "Hey, what is something I could do
where, you know, Jared Harris could play somebody that
would maybe make it to the end of the thing?"
Like a rom-com, a musical?
-In fact, I just did a movie with my brother Damian.
He's a director, and my younger brother as well, he's an actor.
The three of us were in it together,
and I make it to the end of that story.
-You do? -Yeah!
-So that's very sweet. [ Cheers and applause ]
To some degree, it takes working with family.
-Basically, yeah. People who want to keep you around, right.
-When were your early -- like when you -- you started
a little bit later I guess in this field,
and what were your early auditioning stories like?
-Actually I do remember a story where I auditioned for
Mel Gibson's "Hamlet,"
and we went down to the studio to do a screen test.
We all had to -- We had to get on a train to get there.
And when we get there, there's a car to pick us up.
And I'm about a year out of drama school,
and quite coincidentally two of my classmates
from drama school were there.
They're auditioning for Laertes, a good part.
-Yeah. -Right?
I'm auditioning for a part that has no lines.
Right? [ Laughter ]
So they've given me Horatio to read.
We get into the car that's going to take us there.
The driver pulls out a clipboard, and he goes,
"I'll just make sure I've got everybody here."
And he looks at the clipboard and he goes,
"Hmm, Jason Isaacs reading Laertes. Okay.
James Purefoy reading Laertes as well.
I've split you apart."
And he goes, "Jared Harris reading Horatio
although he cannot be cast in this part."
[ Laughter ]
-What a terrible thing to hear in front of your friends.
-Right in front of my friends, and I'd been lying to them
going, "oh, I'm up for Horatio. I'm up for Horatio."
[ Laughter ]
-What are you -- You've been on the other side.
You've directed as well.
And so you've auditioned actors.
What's some advice you would give to young actors who think
that there's something, I don't know, to the interactions
you have before you actually start doing the work?
-I think, well, first of all, when you go in to audition,
the first thing they want to find out is, "Are you crazy?"
-Yeah. [ Laughter ]
-Because no one wants to hire crazy.
-Right. -So basically they sort of
chat to you a bit.
Don't talk too much.
That's what I think because what I watched was --
I'd watch people who would chat and then they would sort of --
they would go, "Oh, I know somebody that you know"
to the showrunner or the director.
But you don't really know what
that person thinks of that person.
And quite often what would happen is
they would say something about "Oh, we know someone in common."
And when they went out of the room,
they go, "God, I can't stand that person."
And now all they remember is
that you're connected to that person.
-Yeah. -So say as little as possible.
-Say as little as possible.
-Get to the audition part as quick as you can.
That's my advice.
-You obviously take the craft very seriously.
So much so, explain to us all
why you broke into a zoo after hours.
[ Laughter ]
-You know...
[ Laughter ]
Decisions that you make late at night
after too many pints of beer...
-Yeah. -Yeah.
-If it ends in a zoo, it's a bad decision, yeah.
[ Laughter ]
I think it might be -- like, not just a couple pints.
[ Laughter ] -No, it was several.
We were -- I was at drama school and we were graduating,
and one of the things you have to do in drama school
in the second year is you do animal study.
So you go every week to the zoo.
You study an animal, then you come back to the class
and then you try and mimic the animal
and your observations of the animal.
And at the end of the term, you have zoo day where everybody
in the school and the teachers come and you're in the gymnasium
and everyone is there doing their animals,
so it's like they're visiting the zoo, right?
[ Laughter ] So I had --
The one that I had did was a gorilla.
And I felt like I'd bonded with this gorilla.
And we were saying goodbye to all of our friends
and everything, and I thought we should go and say goodbye
to our animals who we had bonded with.
And so, yeah, we went to the zoo, broke into the zoo.
[ Laughter ]
-How happy was the gorilla to see you?
-Well, they were asleep. -Yeah, I would imagine.
-Yeah, they were lying around. We couldn't find them.
Although at one point the guy I was with decided to, like,
bullfight, if you like, with a mountain goat,
who aren't fooled by the coat, you know?
[ Laughter ] -Yeah.
-They're not fooled by that. They go straight for you.
-Right, yeah.
Yeah, It's a mistake to think just because a bull is fooled.
Two very different animals.
-Completely. Their horns. [ Laughter ]
-Well, we all do appreciate how seriously you took it.
And by the way, the results show.
-Thank you very much.
-And thanks so much for being here. Congrats on the show.
-Thank you again. -Jared Harris, everybody.
The season finale of "Foundation" streams
November 19th on Apple TV+.