The actor talks challenging expectations, embracing complex roles, and his complicated relationship with action.

PHOTOGRAPHY Nino Muñoz&nbsp;
STYLED BY Luca Falcioni

Taron Egerton has a theory.
The Welsh actor, 36, who stars alongside Charlize Theron in Netflix’s action-adventure-horror mashup&nbsp;Apex, looked to one of his favorite performances—Anthony Hopkins as Hannibal Lecter in 1991’s The Silence of the Lambs—for inspiration in playing Ben, a cannibalistic, human-hunting villain living in the Australian outback. “You’re always shooting for the stars,” says Egerton, shaven-headed and wearing a light gray crewneck sweatshirt, his striking blue eyes gazing into the distance. “The genius of what Tony Hopkins does in that movie is you can feel it’s so him, in terms of how he’s cultured, gentlemanly, and refined. That’s who Tony Hopkins is. And my equivalent is that I’m probably a petulant man-child.” In other words, Egerton believes that the most compelling performances emerge when an actor leans into the qualities that are most authentically his own—even when portraying someone monstrous.
Egerton began acting at 19, when he enrolled at London’s Royal Academy of Dramatic Art. There, he learned the Stanislavski method. It informs the “forensic” way he prepares for every role, immersing himself in a character’s history long before cameras start rolling. “Knowing as much as you can about a character’s past excites your imagination and leads to other things, even if not all of it becomes relevant,” he says. Only a year after graduating, Egerton landed his breakout role as Eggsy in Matthew Vaughn’s raunchy, bloody, and uniquely English 2014 spy thriller Kingsman: The Secret Service, catapulting him to fame and establishing him as an action lead. He later reprised the role in the 2017 sequel, Kingsman: The Golden Circle.

In 2019, Egerton cemented himself as more than an action star with his critically acclaimed turn as Elton John in the biopic Rocketman. The performance showcased his intoxicating charisma, but it also revealed a remarkable emotional intelligence and the total physical commitment he’s willing to bring to a role. Perhaps even more impressively, Egerton actually sang the songs for the film, which earned him the 2020 Golden Globe for Best Actor in a Motion Picture—Musical or Comedy, along with a BAFTA nomination. His omission from that year’s list of Oscar contenders remains one of awards season’s most enduring head-scratchers.
The 2020s have seen Egerton continue to expand his range. In Apple TV’s 2022 miniseries Black Bird, he delivered one of the darkest performances of his career as Jimmy Keene, a convicted drug dealer recruited by the FBI to befriend a suspected serial killer behind bars. The role led to Egerton’s first Emmy nomination, establishing him as a dramatic force before he returned to the action-thriller genre for Netflix’s 2024 hit Carry-On, in which he played a TSA agent blackmailed by a terrorist on Christmas Eve. The film became a global phenomenon, racking up 97 million views in its first 10 days and cementing its place among the streamer’s most-watched original films.
Next up, Egerton will star opposite Zazie Beetz and Chris Hemsworth in the crime thriller Kockroach, based on William Lashner’s 2007 reimagining of Franz Kafka’s 1915 novella The&nbsp;Metamorphosis. He’ll also star in Everybody Wants to Fuck Me, a comedy-thriller set against the nightmarish landscape of modern dating that premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival in September. Here, Egerton speaks to L’OFFICEL about why he doesn’t enjoy filming action movies, how he built the villain at the center of Apex, letting go of other people’s perceptions, and the ways his approach to his acting has evolved since he first arrived in Hollywood.

L’OFFICIEL:&nbsp;What excited you about playing Ben in Apex?
TARON EGERTON: All actors feel like they have sides of themselves that don’t get seen. The thing about playing such a villainous role, an antagonistic role, is there are fewer rules. There’s a chance to be really expressive and free and to do something that’s fun, particularly when it’s just two people in a landscape with a guy who’s completely out to lunch. I’ve loved all the roles I’ve played, but there are no two ways about it: I like the things that feel less obvious. I thought it was a great chance to do something really fun. And everybody was open to me being weird and trying new things. It was a really great process in that regard.
L’O: What were some of the weird things you added to the character that weren’t in the script?
TE: There were two big things: The whole dance sequence [in which Egerton dances to “Go” by the Chemical Brothers as he sends Theron’s character out to be hunted by him] was me, and the teeth [scene late in the film, where Ben reveals his real, fang-like teeth] was me. Those were ideas I had going into it that I felt would be fun. Look, it’s not reinventing the wheel; it’s not the first time a villain has danced in a movie. But it was my attempt at a Buffalo Bill–esque moment [a reference to the killer’s unsettling dance to “Goodbye Horses” by Q Lazzarus in Silence of the Lambs.]
L’O: That kind of moment is pretty essential to defining who these characters are, especially when we have a limited understanding of them.
TE: The thing that’s so unnerving about seeing someone be creative or expressive is that it humanizes them. It’s really inconvenient to humanize someone who does deplorable things. That’s my little bit of amateur psychology for you.

L’O:&nbsp;What was the hardest part of making this film?
TE: Making a movie is just really hard. It’s a Herculean effort from several hundred people. But that [rural Australian] accent’s hard. It’s the hardest accent I’ve done. And then it was tremendously stressful and exhausting doing all of that action. I find action really hard.
L’O: That’s interesting, because you seem to do a lot of it.
TE: The thing I hate about action is that you have to pre-plan it. Other genres have scenes that are predetermined by the words on the page, but it always feels like there’s an infinite number of ways to get from the start of one scene to another. And there are so many thought processes, motivations, and reasons why a character might be doing something. The better the writing, the more paths available there are to you. But with action, it’s not like that. So I find myself getting bored a lot of the time and feeling like I would rather be doing drama, because I find it more creative. I do find that after a period of time, I lose interest in action.
L’O: Action also requires a lot, physically. How did you train for Apex?
TE: It was basically just not eating enough. I mean, sure, I did a lot of physical training because he’s this very active climbing, all-terrain, kayaking guy. But I was also just playing a guy who’s out in the woods, living off meager rations and foraging for whatever. So there were not a lot of burgers.

L’O: Ben is an easy villain to like at first because you think, Oh, this is a very charming man who I would probably talk to in the woods.
TE: When it was originally sent to me, he was written as really assured and hyper-masculine—the kind of guy you imagine has his own wildlife show or looks like he should be running a coffee shop in Silver Lake. Just a man of the woods with a big bushy beard and a top-knot, a mixture between masculine and hipster. On the page, he was one with the wilderness; I read it and thought he was absurd. It’s always more interesting to me when there’s an extra dimension to someone, so rather than him just being this wild man of nature, what if he really wants to be that but isn’t doing the best job of selling it? That’s what the path became. I think it’s much more interesting when a guy is trying to pretend that he’s good at those things.

Photographed by Nino Muñoz for L'OFFICIEL October 2026 Issue.

L’O: What was your favorite part about sharing the screen with Charlize for most of the film?
TE: She so fits the mold of the action star. She is so good at it. She’s like the female equivalent of Tom Cruise. There is a straightness and a strength and a stoicism to her, and it’s very fun to be an antagonistic force opposite that. It’s easy to imagine wanting to break through her tough outer veneer. She is the complete opposite energy to me, because I can’t sustain being that serious for that long. So we make quite a good odd couple, I think.
L’O: You complement each other pretty well.
TE: We’re a strange pairing, but for that reason it works.
L’O: After such an intense shoot, how do you unwind?
TE: One of the things I find most difficult about being an actor is that it’s very on for a very concentrated period of time and then it’s very off. When I finish a movie, often I have quite a pronounced sense of purposelessness that I have historically filled with unhealthy behaviors that I’m trying to get a handle on. I am getting better at it; I wish that watching a long stream of movies would do it, but it’s a little more existential than that. I wouldn’t change it—every fucking job has its challenges, but with the freelance nature of what I do, I find the downtime to be tricky.

L’O: Is there something you’ve learned about the industry or acting in general that you didn’t know earlier in your career?
TE: Every time I do a project, I learn about myself as an actor. It’s my great love—I love doing it and the challenge of it. Nobody wants to hear that it’s hard, but it’s the hardest thing I’ve ever done. It’s also the most rewarding. There’s a balancing act that happens as you’re trying to navigate being present which is interesting. You’re also filtering out things that aren’t helpful and managing your emotions... It’s a bizarre thing, but it’s amazing when it clicks and you feel like you know where you are, what you’re doing, and why. When you feel a sense of flow, it’s the best feeling in the world. What I’m learning about myself now is that I’m happiest when doing things that explore a more challenging facet of myself. I like strange roles. I like roles that are a little bit ugly. I like characters who are at odds with themselves. I suppose we’re all at odds with ourselves.
L’O: It’s shocking, but some people aren’t.&nbsp;
TE: Maybe that’s true. Maybe there are people out there who are really in a good rhythm with themselves. There are certainly a lot of the things that I’m asked to do and presented with that are maybe less strange and interesting than Ben. You can’t always play the flashy psycho role, but I definitely know that I’m comfy in that space, doing something that someone else might be less comfortable doing. I get more self-conscious when I’m doing a role that’s more down the line—I like parts that feel like they don’t quite fit. In Kockroach, I play this guy who has the trappings of a lot of the parts I’ve played: a cocksure, assured swagger. But what you learn about him is that he’s profoundly at odds with who he is, and is hiding things about himself. He’s trying to fit into a hyper-masculine world without being able to. There’s something about that existential dilemma that I really understood.

Acting is my great love; I love doing it and the challenge of it. Nobody wants to hear that it’s hard, but it’s the hardest thing I’ve ever done.

L’O: Have you felt that way since you started acting or has it been an evolution?
TE: I was still a decade away from having any idea of who I was at 22 or 23. I don’t think you can have the self-awareness required to know what you want out of your choices at that age. It’s something I’m still figuring out. I get scared that I’ve carved this niche out for myself that doesn’t speak to who I am. I don’t really watch action. I suppose I don’t really want to be an action star. I mean, it’s something that I enjoy... But a part of my ego blares when someone says, Oh, you’re the guy who does action. That’s always just felt like a path that has happened; I’ve done other things that feel like they’re more representative of who I am. It’s probably a fucking lame thing: I want to be seen as a serious actor, and being an action star doesn’t feel like that, or something. But that’s the way that I’m perceived, and I shouldn’t worry about the way I’m perceived.
L’O: No, you shouldn’t. But as an actor, you always will.
TE: One of the difficult things about being a known person is you’re constantly confronted with the perception of yourself. And actually, as we all know, the key to being a happy, healthy, functioning person is to not give a fucking shit about how you’re perceived. You ask if I’ve learned anything—I am trying to give less of a shit about how I’m perceived. I’m a committed actor. I’m somebody that works hard to do the best I can do and I don’t have any foibles about that, which is a nice feeling because I care. It’s all the shit of the industry, the fluff, that I find harder and more challenging.

I get scared that I’ve carved this niche out for myself that doesn’t speak to who I am.

L’O: You have a comedy, Everybody Wants to Fuck Me, which just premiered at TIFF last month.
TE: Yeah, I loved making that. It was a great script and it’s very autobiographical. It’s genre-leaning, but it’s inspired by the experiences of Jonathan Schey—who wrote and directed it—as a single man in London reflecting on his behavior. He spins it into this horror comedy, and there are some bloody great actors in it [including Jessica Henwick, Mia McKenna-Bruce, and Charly Clive].
L’O: Is this film more reflective of the projects you’re interested in pursuing, to be perceived as that kind of actor?
TE: Well, we’ve already decided that we don’t give a shit about shit. But it’s a real filmmaker-driven piece, something different and arresting in the sense that it’s like, That’s a fucking weird little movie. And it definitely is reflective of me. I like to do things that feel authored and with a really distinct personality and idiosyncrasy. Jonathan is absolutely that. He’s got a very distinct viewpoint.

L’O: Have you seen any other projects lately that you really loved?
TE: I was blown away by Obsession. I thought it was absolutely unbelievable. What Inde Navarrette did in that movie... There’s a tier of performance where I watch it and go, How the fuck are you doing that? I don’t know how you’re doing that. It’s just so clever. And, in Tár, there’s that scene on the stage where Cate Blanchett is being interviewed and she’s interjecting and speaking over the person interviewing her. It’s got this brittle, self-satisfied, dominating quality. The moment I watched it, I was going, Oh my God, that’s a masterful artist who’s so in command of her craft.

L’O: On that note, are there any actors, directors, or writers you still hope to work with?
TE: There are so many filmmakers, for sure. Listing them in an article flies against something of who I am.
L’O: That’s okay. You’ve already worked with a lot of amazing people in your career, too.
TE: I really have. I’ve been incredibly fortunate. I really just want to keep working. I’m so lucky and I’m operating in such a privileged space to have variety, and movies of different sizes, and opportunities to work with the same people again. All I want is more of the same. And to be grateful.

GROOMING: Sonia Lee
PRODUCED BY: Alexey Galetskiy and Ashton Wilson
PHOTO ASSISTANTS: Kevin Faulkner, Gray Hamner, and Kurt Mangum
STYLING ASSISTANTS: Nico Brocchin, Eugenia Gamero, and Monty Jackson

Taron Egerton Is Going Off Script

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