Paul Mescal: The Puppy Interview

I feel overwhelmed by it all. This guy likes the smell of my bum. My name is Paul Mesco. Today, I'm with BuzzFeed and I'm going to be playing with some puppies. Bring in the puppies, please. Oh my god. Hello. Yeah, you like me, don't you? You're the best. Oh, this is fantastic. They kind of make you like nearly want to cry. Yeah, I was a big fan of the first film. I saw it when I was like 15. Left a massive impression. Come here, come here, come here. There's lots of pee, which is great. I haven't actually spoken to him. I hope like at some point along this press tour that we'll touch face. It's okay, they're just playing, right? Probably the first day filming in Morocco, there was about 400, 500 extras. They dressed the set and that was a pretty special day. This one likes me the most, I feel like. First time I met Denzel Washington was in Morocco. We were filming a scene in the like regional Coliseum and Denzel had his first scene up in the box. And it took me about two days to muster the courage to say hello. Yeah, he's just one of the most extraordinary actors ever. Yeah, these are like mini gladiators. So on this, I took a couple of military costumes that I got to wear and so I have three of them in storage somewhere. Oh, poor little buddy, poor little buddy. You have no control over your bowels. I was on a flight to LA and somebody was watching all of us strangers on the plane. And I was walking to the bathroom and it was at the moment where I think me and Andrew Scott are sleeping together for the first time. And I was walking back from the bathroom, made eye contact with the person who was sitting there and it was kind of a wordless exchange. Oh, they like the belt. Do you like the belt? Training process for gladiators is like pretty extensive. I think I did about two or three months of parkour training to get into it. It was like horse riding and sword fighting and lots of other things. Their little hearts are going so fast. This is your best day. They keep slipping on the thing. They're all pretty intense because the heat is like 42 degrees Celsius. I don't know what that is in. All of them were pretty intense. The one with the rhino taking the biscuit, I would say. You like me the most. You're the best boy or girl. Pedro is notoriously a very funny man. We would do like proper rehearsals of the sword fighting. And then we would do... Come here, come here. There's nothing back there. What was the question? The question being... Laughing would have been mostly involving Pedro. When we would rehearse the fights, we would do like say more camp versions of the fights. And then to us being on camera would be pretty hyper-masculine. Pretty well versed in my candy and chocolate intake. Do you know what I haven't tried? I haven't tried it. I know it's a separate question, but In-N-Out burger. I need to try that. I'm not a big fan of American slang. Maybe that's because it's like I've watched too much television growing up. So whenever I hear it, it almost sounds fake. You're causing hassle, buddy. You're coming up here. Surprised that I auditioned for... I don't remember. My brain's not really working at capacity at the moment. So this guy likes the smell of my bum. This guy's just firmly having a field day. It makes it not appropriate for a lot of the audience if you go in there, buddy. Dogs. I like words of affirmation. Acts of service and words of affirmation, I would say. This is fantastic. This is my love language entirely. I love True Detective. I could go back to True Detective season one at any given moment. Oh yeah, I also love Slow Horses. Watched that recently. It's this guy's leading the charge against the shadow, I think. And one of them is leading a charge against my ass. No, I think it's this guy. I'd love to play like a character like in something like Phoebe Waller-Bridge wrote. So let's say Fleabag would be great. Me, Josh, Daisy, Andrew. We all went into like an Irish comedy sitcom for like, shot it for three months. Had a great time. Let's say that, an Irish sitcom. I had a massive crush on Cheryl Cole when I used to watch The X Factor. So I would say that, yeah, Cheryl Cole. And now kiss. I normally listen to kind of whatever. I make a playlist for characters that I'm working on. Whatever I'm working on, I'll just kind of stick that playlist on when I'm going for a run. I love McGee. He's fantastic. Highly recommend. Do you ever wonder what's actually going on in their heads? Like, do they just see like Chin and they go bite? I have said like, I would love to start working with the directors that I've worked with again at some point because I think you start building a relationship in a shorthand. But there's like, I would love to work with like, Corsese or Denis Villeneuve or anyone like that. There's no shortage of amazing directors out there. I do stand by the point of like, would love to come back and work with some of my friends again. The thing that actually probably inspired me to be an actor was, I did a school musical. I played Phantom of the Opera when I was like 16. Didn't really like fall in love with cinema or anything until I kind of went to drama school. So it was the act of being on stage. I played the Phantom in it. Bad makeup included. This guy is breaking my heart. Andrew's like the king of breaking people's hearts. He does it with such levity that like, that film wasn't as heartbreaking to kind of make on a daily basis as it probably maybe took an audience to watch, I would say. This one's got the right idea. I think this one just lost the energy quicker. Didn't have enough to eat for breakfast. Marriage Story religiously would break my heart. Marriage Story probably consistently I would go to. Like the last scene when Adam Driver's reading the letter and Scarlett Johansson's in the doorway and he's reading it to his son. The only thing I know about it is that anybody who does deeply consider like astrology, like my friends will be like, oh, you're classically Aquarius. I feel like when you Google the things and they just tell you the good things, they're like, you're the best, you're extraordinary. Like, no, this guy was having a great time until you came over and started bullying. They don't know how tiny they are. They think they're like... I mean, it's too on brand, but like I distinctly remember reading Normal People and it's the kind of book that if you haven't read it and you're in your like early twenties to early thirties, I think you'll feel very seen by it all. Here he is. This is the guy who likes getting in there. You were having a great time and your board's ruined us. No, we're not. This is going to continue for two hours. The wildest was probably when Normal People had just come out. I was running along and being spotted. Like it was kind of one of the maybe first couple of times that I'd ever been recognized. A lady was cycling kind of pretty quickly and she goes, oh my God, is that Paul Mesco slamming the brakes and came over the top of the bike? To which you're then like nursing a stranger, but then she's also asking for a selfie. It was pretty wild. I feel like those things are just mad. Like there's just so many cameras at various different junctions that you're like... I don't know how to answer that question. If any of you want to adopt these beautiful little boys and girls, please head over to Wags and Walks. Thank you, Buzzfeed. This has been really fun. Please go to watch Gladiator, which comes out on November 22nd. Thanks for watching.