Theo James adopted different voices for his parts in The Monkey
Theo James gave different voices to the twin brothers he portrayed in the comedy horror film 'The Monkey'.
Theo James had to master different voices for his two roles in 'The Monkey'.
The 40-year-old star portrays twin brothers Hal and Bill Shelburn in Osgood Perkins' comedy horror flick – which is based on Stephen King's short story of the same name about a cursed toy monkey – and wants to use his voice to present the different personalities of the two siblings.
Speaking to Collider, Theo said: "I wanted to make sure those two characters were comedic but in very different ways.
"Hal is a kind of repressed everyman, so I wanted his speech to be a little unsure so he would stutter and repeat words. Also, the way he moves, he doesn't move directionally; he moves as if kind of being pulled along. He's unsure all the time.
"Bill is the opposite of that. When he moves, he moves with direction. He speaks clearer. His voice is a little more grounded.
"But it was a challenge to make them as different as possible, but then they're identical twins at the same time."
'The Gentlemen' actor was also pleased to be working with Perkins' high-quality screenplay.
James said: "If you've got a good script, that gives you the anchors. Sometimes, as an actor, you think you can fix things. In reality, if you don't have the pillars of a great script, it's very hard.
"You (also) want a confident director who knows with exactitude what kind of tone he wants, and that's exactly what Oz was with this.
"There were times with the tone when I was like, 'Oh, is that too much, man? I don't know.' He was like, 'Trust me, it's all good', and he pulled it off."
Perkins revealed that he wanted to put his own humorous spin on King's story in the movie – which also features Tatiana Maslany and Elijah Wood in the cast.
The 51-year-old filmmaker said: "What I wanted to do was I wanted to express what Stephen King means to me, more than holding the book open with one hand and typing with the other and doing some kind of straight adaptation, which I don't think he expected.
"He certainly didn't ask for it. I think he's a much bigger mind than that. So I think he sort of tacitly welcomed the idea that I would fill this thing out with a personality that was my own, but the intention was always to do it with reverence for him because he's the greatest. I can't ignore that. In fact, not only can I not ignore it, but I want to highlight it."
Perkins added: "The idea was always to try to create something that was fun because I've always found Stephen King's writing to be really humorous, really sort of sly and sophisticated.
"So I thought it could be much more than just a haunted or freaky toy movie – that it could actually resonate about families and about parenthood and sort of the melancholy of living, which to me permeates all of Stephen King's stuff."
