Watch this face

He has starred alongside some of the most prestigious Hollywood actors but who exactly is Hugh Dancy? Catherine Gee finds out

By Catherine Gee

Hugh Dancy is currently being promoted as the next ‘one to watch’ hoping to follow in the footsteps of fellow Brits Clive Owen and Hugh Grant to a career that could rival any aspiring actor who was lucky enough to be born in LA.

For someone few people have heard of, Dancy’s working career has included films with Helen Mirren, Clive Owen, Keira Knightley, Jessica Alba, Brenda Blethyn and Bob Hoskins amongst others. But, considering his latest film is a starring role alongside John Hurt in the powerful Shooting Dogs, the 30-year-old actor from Stoke is rather laid back about it all. “I thought I would be star struck by John but he turned out to be distinctly unfrightening. I remember doing one tricky shot which was a continuous take that involved lots of extras running around and was all quite hard to choreograph so we did it about 15 times.

“But you know when you get it right you really feel a sense of satisfaction and I remember him singing Elvis songs and thinking that’s great that someone loves their job as much as that after a fairly substantial time of doing it.”

The film itself is set in Rwanda during the genocide of the Tutsis. Dancy stars as a young teacher in a school which soon becomes both a military base and a refugee camp. “I wouldn’t say it was harrowing to film. Of course there were days that were more difficult and there were moments which, just because they were in Rwanda by definition you would hear some terrible stories. Day-to-day it’s a matter of working so you’re just concentrating on finishing the day’s shooting, it was only when I came back that I felt more like I had an emotional hangover. You finally have a chance to sit down and absorb what you’ve seen.”

Any film which deals with such powerful subject matter is automatically under great pressure to tackle it responsibly without undermining the struggle of those involved or falling into overdramatisation. “It’s a tricky subject to approach in any way but I think it’s really well balanced. You don’t see too much that you become desensitised to it even though it’s very clear what’s going to happen. I think also what I’m pleased with is it’s not trying to ram home any political points. It’s just entertainment even if it is entertainment of a more thought provoking type.”

After finishing the shoot in Rwanda, Dancy then appeared briefly in his second Michael Caton-Jones film which, as something of a change, is Basic Instinct 2. “It was a contrast, though I was only there for three days. It was the same bunch of people from Rwanda, so one minute I was in the sub-Saharan desert and the next in the east end of London in a load of fetish gear.”

The idea of Dancy in fetish gear is surely something that will appeal to his legions of teenage fans who have sprung up on the internet, to which he admits he is “flattered”. He has a particularly kind demeanour which will win him many more as his fame grows, though he hasn’t had to deal with much of it directly yet. “I did get stopped the other day by a girl. She asked who I was and then she immediately ran out of things to say so she just said ‘Um‚Ķ keep things up for British acting!’ It was very funny but actually really sweet.”