Jude Law’s body double has been revealed (Picture: Gilbert Carrasquillo/GC Images)
Jude Law’s body double has been revealed as a down-to-earth Lincolnshire local who took up working as a film extra after a long career in IT.
The new film Firebrand sees Jude Law unrecognisable at the Tudor King Henry VIII and Alicia Vikander as his sixth wife Katherine Parr.
The film focuses on Katherine’s attempts to plot against her husband as he becomes more ailing and grotesque with a pungent, ulcerated leg, which torments him with pain and torments everyone else with the stench.
In some scenes in the film, the character is nude. Reporter, Kevin Maher, for The Times said in his review: ‘A gasp-inducing shot of Henry’s enormous rolling buttocks suggests that Law has partaken in some alarmingly detrimental weight gain (he hasn’t!) or else clever editing, and a substitute posterior, is at work.’
Metro.co.uk’s reporter Tori Brazier also commented in a review: ‘There’s a sense that the actor revels in this realness of Henry’s decaying and flabby body, with another striking shot showing his pale, wobbling and fleshy behind (surely that of a double) as he avails himself of his marital duties with poor Katherine.’
For this role as the historical figure, Jude, 51, did indeed need a stand-in for nude scenes, and the man for the job was a former IT manager with the civil service named Dale Farrow.
Fairly new to the business, Dale revealed that he thought he might get to be a background character in a soap, and never expected to be standing in as Jude Law’s butt-double in a huge cinematic release.
‘I didn’t want to work full-time again, I just wanted something to do to fit around other things and someone suggested signing up to an extras agency,’ explained Dale, 60, to LincsOnline.
‘I thought I would end up playing darts in the back of the Woolpack in Emmerdale or something. There were no expectations of having any sort of extra input.
Jude plays the Tudor King in the new film (Picture: Larry Horricks/Prime / Avalon)
Dale’s larger proportions made him ideal for this body double gig (Picture: Facebook)
‘Then they said I would be a body double for the lead actor,’ he added. ‘They couldn’t tell me anything more about that at the time.’
He revealed that he had no idea who he’d be doubling: ‘I’m quite a big chap so I tried to work out who it could be – possibly Nick Frost or someone like that. I didn’t stop to think that the main actor would be wearing body suits to make him look bigger.
‘At the end of the meeting they said, “By the way, it’s Jude Law”. I thought “wow – we’re dealing with acting royalty!”’
Dale worked with Jude for this blockbuster movie (Picture: Facebook)
Dale revealed there was a bathing scene that meant he worked alongside Jude while sitting in a bathtub.
‘Because it was a sound take, Jude was sat behind me while I was bathing, humming along as if it was him being washed,’ he recalled.
‘He then had to sit where I’d been with a big blue sheet from the neck down,’ he said explaining the visual effects that added Jude’s head to Dale’s body.
Speaking on the WTF podcast with Marc Maron, Jude spoke about this body double role and revealed that it wasn’t his own butt that appeared on screen.
‘It was Henry’s a** that’s all I’ll say. Let’s just say it was Henry’s a**,’ he told the host.
The film was released in cinemas last week (Picture: Michael Mccarthymet)
The actor revealed he was unable to put on the amount of weight required to play the role in the time they had before shooting, so they resorted to a double.
‘When I first started talking to Karim [the director Karim Aïnouz] about it, there were two roads. One was trying to [gain weight] or, it’s just not going to be possible. In the time I had, there was just no way I was going to be able to put on that weight.’
The actor explained that for other scenes they relied on costume tricks: ‘I let it go, we did it in other ways, gained weight in other ways but never to that size.’
Jude added. ‘We put on weights and padding and all sorts of things to create the scale and presence of the man.’
Firebrand is out in cinemas now.
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