Episode 2 of Watchmen's first season gave us rather a lot of Tom to see (in several ways) and left us with even more questions than answers. That is typical of the show thus far. Tom did several interviews to discuss those shocking/mysterious/strange goings on in the country manor.
He revealed to Kim Roots from TVLine that he did use a body double for part of it, and did get to choose who it would be. For the record, he went with a lovely chap named Fergal. He talks about how he got the role of Mr. Phillips, and discussing the show, comics and the original Watchmen at length with showrunner Damon Lindelof.
He also had a chat with TV Insider about the very memorable episode, and more about developing the Mr. Phillips character. The country manor part of the show was quite separate from the rest, and they even "block shot" their bits at Penrhyn Castle in Wales, before the rest of the show was shot in Atlanta.
In an interview with THR about the episode, Tom talks about the difficulty of playing multiple roles, how Sara Vickers (Ms. Crookshanks) kept them all straight, and his approach to playing each with their own set of experiences informing them. Sadly, as Tom says, "they just think they're in Downton Abbey and they end up in Looney Tunes." Working with Jeremy Irons sounds like it was a wonderful experience. He had this to say when asked about his takeaway from working with the legendary actor:
"We had never met before the pilot. We'd had lots of mutual acquaintances and friends, but we went and rehearsed the first scene, the beginning of the horseshoe scene [from the pilot], and then they said, "Okay, everybody out, and we'll set up." I went back to my trailer, and a couple minutes later, there was a knock at the door, and it was Jeremy. He just came in, and sat down, and said, "All right, what do you think?" And he shared his thoughts, and I said mine, and we chatted for a long time. And then he said, "Great. Well, let's go and play." And that was such an important moment from the very beginning to know that he just wants to go and play around in this weird world. Of such a long, illustrious career, he'd never done anything like Watchmen, and so he just wanted to go and have fun with it. And it's quite nice to see an actor who's been doing it for so long still get such childish joy from it. It's nice to know that it's possible to enjoy a career 50-odd years into it. He turned 70 when we were there, so it must be about 50 years in a career, and he lives for it. He loves it and just wants to play around and throw ideas about. And that's the reason I wanted to become an actor: to go and use your imagination, and constructive pissing about, I think, is a good way to describe it. And Jeremy loves constructive pissing about as well. And that was throughout the whole thing."
Watchmen returns tonight on HBO at 9pm with episode 3, entitled "She Was Killed by Space Junk."
