Bohemian Rhapsody and SAS Rogue Heroes star Gwilym Lee talks to us about becoming Gareth Southgate as Dear England hits the National Theatre
When Gwilym Lee signed on to take over from Joseph Fiennes, playing England’s transformative football manager Gareth Southgate in James Graham’s remounted and rewritten play Dear England at the National this year, his dad came up with a joke. “He said you’ve got to de-Fiennes the role, or re-de-Fiennes it,” smiles Lee, 41, his chiseled jaw now adorned with a Southgate-esque beard.
He has also been fitted for the manager’s famous waistcoat and has a “small [dental] bridge” to replicate his horsey teeth. “In a moment of high stakes in rehearsals it pinged out of my mouth the other day, but I managed to catch it and pop it back in,” Lee adds. Good save, I say. “I’ve got denture glue now,” he frowns, “which is a little glimpse into the future.”
Like a new broom taking on the England job, he has to make the part of Southgate his own, and to that end he’s avoided watching Fiennes’s performance on NT Live. “He’s a brilliant actor and he created the role,” Lee says. “But I have to find it for myself. And you know, for the first time, this play now has an ending.”….