{"id":500064,"date":"2026-01-07T23:56:15","date_gmt":"2026-01-07T23:56:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/500064\/"},"modified":"2026-01-07T23:56:15","modified_gmt":"2026-01-07T23:56:15","slug":"paul-mescal-on-beatles-movies-and-merrily-we-roll-along-interview","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/500064\/","title":{"rendered":"Paul Mescal on Beatles Movies and ‘Merrily We Roll Along’ \u2014 Interview"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/p>\n

Ask Paul Mescal<\/a> about playing Paul McCartney in the first Beatles movie for Sam Mendes, currently filming at Bovington Airfield Studios outside London, and his face lights up. <\/p>\n

He\u2019s in Los Angeles for a stretch to do promotion for Chlo\u00e9 Zhao\u2019s \u201cHamnet<\/a>\u201d around the Palm Springs Awards<\/a> Gala, Critics Choice Awards (where the \u201cHamnet\u201d team celebrated the inevitable win for Jessie Buckley as Agnes Shakespeare), and the Golden Globes this Sunday. Mescal is dutifully making the rounds of interviews<\/a>, Q&As, and parties \u2014 and is now an Actor Award nominee from the Screen Actors Guild<\/a>.<\/p>\n

But he cannot wait to get back to work strumming the bass left-handed and singing harmonies with fellow Beatles Harris Dickinson as John Lennon and Joseph Quinn as George Harrison. (Barry Keoghan is drumming as Ringo Starr.) They have four movies to shoot \u2014 performing Beatles songs live \u2014 and that means a lovely two-year stretch where Mescal has no promotion duties at all. It makes his heart sing.<\/p>\n

\"Robby<\/a> \"ONE<\/a> <\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s so good when you get to do Zoom press with [\u2018Gladiator II\u2019 co-star] Pedro [Pascal] or \u2018The History of Sound\u2019 co-star] Josh [O\u2019Connor] or Jessie,\u201d he said. \u201cIt\u2019s immediate. It\u2019s such a joy. But I do find that it cranks up this level of imposter syndrome, where you spend so much time talking about it that when you go back to set, you\u2019re like, \u2018Jesus, I better be fucking good,\u2019 because you spent so much time discussing it. I\u2019m just taking a break from promoting because I have nothing to promote!\u201d<\/p>\n

Mescal has been practicing the guitar since October 2024, a process he described as initially \u201cslow, arduous\u201d because he had to switch to his left hand. \u201cBut I can play.\u201d He was already versed on the piano. He has music in him, ever since he discovered his muse playing the lead role in \u201cPhantom of the Opera\u201d in secondary school.<\/p>\n

The Beatles\u2019 mystical bond will come across in the movie, said Mescal. \u201cThere was a period of time in the summer when we were preparing, which was incredibly useful, where it was just me and Harris, which is great for the spirit of the piece,\u201d he said. \u201cWe\u2019re very, very tight, and I could bet my house that that will translate when we see the films. That\u2019s what they had: a complicated, thorny thing rooted in the fact that there\u2019s four people in the world who know what it was like to be in that place. It must have been the most bonding, because you can only hold on to the three guys [on] either side of you. That feels true of what it\u2019s even like to film<\/a> it. It\u2019s an intense responsibility, and we\u2019re leaning on each other to hopefully achieve something special \u2014 it\u2019s thorny and full of ambition and jealousy and love, all of these amazing artistic frictions.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"HarrisHarris Dickinson, Paul Mescal, Barry Keoghan, and Joseph Quinn as The BeatlesCourtesy Apple<\/p>\n

Another reason Mescal is feeling joy playing McCartney: Most of his filmography (his breakout TV series \u201cNormal People,\u201d<\/a> Oscar-nominated \u201cAftersun,\u201d \u201cGladiator II,\u201d \u201cGod\u2019s Creatures,\u201d \u201cAll of Us Strangers,\u201d \u201cThe History of Sound\u201d) has leaned into \u201cheavier territory,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

And he won\u2019t have to sell his film with Richard Linklater either: another music movie, Stephen Sondheim musical \u201cMerrily We Roll Along,\u201d which is filming in eight or nine installments with gaps in between as they move forward in time. Mescal has already shot four times over four years, but will wait seven more for the next one. \u201cWhen I have to promote that, I\u2019ll be trying to remind people that I exist when I\u2019m 45,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Yes, singing Sondheim is hard. \u201cHe\u2019s the gold standard,\u201d said Mescal, who plays the gifted musical songwriter Frank, who morphs into a Hollywood star. \u201cThere\u2019s definitely parallels you could draw with someone like Sondheim and Shakespeare. He\u2019s the gold standard of musical theater, and Shakespeare is the same with the written word. And you could say McCartney is the same in terms of his composition and his lyricism. And there\u2019s even music in how Shakespeare writes, as there is in Sondheim. There\u2019s definitely a through line there.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"JessieJessie Buckley, Chlo\u00e9 Zhao, and Paul Mescal at the 37th Annual Palm Springs International Film Festival Film Awards held at Palm Springs Convention Center on January 03, 2026 in Palm Springs, California.Michael Buckner\/Variety<\/p>\n

While playing Shakespeare in \u201cHamnet,\u201d Mescal did not view him as an intellectual. \u201cI don\u2019t think Will would even describe himself as an intellect,\u201d he said. \u201cWe assume that because he\u2019s the great writer. The reason that [Will and Agnes] connect is because they\u2019re both heart-driven, and there\u2019s a physical connection. A lot of work has to go into that first 40 minutes, because it\u2019s brief. The more I see the film, the part of the film that I enjoy the most is the opening: the proposal around the pile of shit. It\u2019s so fun. I\u2019m proud of the chemistry that me and Jessie have. It\u2019s a real thing, and it\u2019s hard to do. She makes it easy.\u201d<\/p>\n

Producer Steven Spielberg suggested adding another scene with Hamnet between father and son: the swimming scene. \u201cThe first scene that we shot was \u2018will you be brave?,\u2019 he said. \u201cThat scene was there. I did an improvisation with Jacobi [Jupe] when he first came into audition \u2014 \u2018will you be brave?\u2019 \u2014 and he ran with it. So that made it into the script, which is a testament to Chlo\u00e9, hearing what the actors want to say and making it work. Then the great Steven Spielberg said, \u2018We need to have another scene where you feel like father and son are connected for that to then be shattered.’\u201d<\/p>\n

\"HAMNET,\u2018Hamnet\u2019 \u00a9Focus Features\/Courtesy Everett Collection<\/p>\n

One major difference between Maggie O\u2019Farrell\u2019s original novel and the movie (which she co-wrote with Zhao) is that Will is not 18 years old. Mescal turns 30 next month, and Buckley, 36, is six years older. \u201cI don\u2019t feel like you miss that,\u201d said Mescal. \u201cYou fully get when Will is proposing to her and bringing the glove that he is a young man who desperately wants to be in love with this person, have sex with this person, be connected to this person, which feels like a young man\u2019s impulse. And then you see when he\u2019s older. But also, the scheduling and the scenes dictate a certain weight in the body that you can\u2019t intellectualize. You\u2019re just doing it.\u201d<\/p>\n

One late-night scene between Agnes and Will is hard to watch, dramatizing the profound distance between her earthbound herbalist mother and his drunk and frustrated writer. \u201cI\u2019ve never gone down the road of drinking on set,\u201d he said. \u201cWhat\u2019s important about that scene to me is that I felt safe with Chlo\u00e9 and Jessie to try things I haven\u2019t tried before. I feel real pain for Jessie, because up until that moment, you feel like a real chemistry and connection, but on that day, we weren\u2019t able to find each other, and I know that feeling of being in love with someone deeply, but you are wildly frustrated by your work. She has no clue what\u2019s going on, and he doesn\u2019t really know what he\u2019s trying to communicate. He\u2019s from Stratford. He doesn\u2019t come from a cultural hub where, \u2018Oh, I know what it is to be a writer.\u2019 It\u2019s this weird form of inarticulacy that is so moving, and true. You don\u2019t have to be William Shakespeare to understand that.\u201d<\/p>\n

Of course, the main focus on \u201cHamnet\u201d is the ending<\/a>, which moves audiences deeply. Zhao discusses the grieving mother\u2019s inability to let Hamnet go. And what happens on the Globe stage at the premiere of \u201cHamlet\u201d was that Agnes was able, because it was not Hamnet, to let him go. The moment they recreate from the book\u2019s ending is the look between Will, on stage as the ghost king, and Agnes, pressing up against the stage, as their eyes meet.<\/p>\n

\"HAMNET,\u2018Hamnet\u2019\u00a9Focus Features\/Courtesy Everett Collection<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m probably most proud of how robust that collaboration was between the three of us, between me and Chlo\u00e9 and Jessie, that we arrived at the end,\u201d said Mescal. \u201cMe and Chlo\u00e9 have a disagreement \u2014 that still we see differently \u2014 about where their marriage and relationship exist at the end. There is something shattered and repaired in a certain instance in that look, and for me, I don\u2019t know how I can see Agnes and not feel like it\u2019s a new beginning. Maybe it\u2019s the romantic in me, and maybe it\u2019s where I am in my head and my heart. That was always to me what that moment is. It\u2019s so moving that that moment is connected to Agnes on the wedding day, saying, \u2018Look at me, look at me.\u2019 And Will turns around, and it mirrors that.\u201d<\/p>\n

Mescal recognizes that his role is in support of the titanic performance given by Buckley. \u201cIt\u2019s robust, and this force of nature opposite you in Jessie, you have to meet that,\u201d he said. \u201cWhenever the dust settles on award season, it is a performance that \u2014 if I had seen [it] in drama school \u2014 people should be studying. She plays the context. I don\u2019t think you can play what Agnes goes through in a way that is not Greek. [What] she goes through \u2026 it is huge. It\u2019s massive.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"HAMNET,\u2018Hamnet\u2019\u00a9Focus Features\/Courtesy Everett Collection<\/p>\n

William Shakespeare is a tough role to carry off because he\u2019s not always likable. He abandons his family to pursue his art. \u201cWill is a complicated person to play,\u201d said Mescal, \u201cbecause he\u2019s not the focus, but he is also William Shakespeare. So you\u2019re trying to sit on the choices that make him forgivable for a lot of the film? You\u2019re committing to the concept that it is essentially from Agnes\u2019 point of view. You were seeing William leave when his son has just died, and you want the audience to resent him for that, but then in that moment, it leaves a lot of pressure on landing the plane from my side, that people understand that he was expressing his grief away from home and in his art.\u201d<\/p>\n

Finally, for Mescal, that climactic look was \u201ca feeling of heartbreak and relief,\u201d he said. \u201cThank God you get to see this. Thank God you understand why I had to go away.\u201d<\/p>\n

Next Up: <\/strong>After Mescal finishes the Beatles films, he will return to his first love: theater. He earned raves as Stanley Kowalski in \u201cStreetcar Named Desire\u201d in London and Brooklyn, and will mount two more, \u201cA Whistle in the Dark,\u201d and \u201cDeath of a Salesman.\u201d Yeah, the big one. \u201cI\u2019ll finish the Beatles,\u201d he said. \u201cI\u2019ll go onto the stage for 2027. And then I\u2019ll promote the Beatles in 2028.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Ask Paul Mescal about playing Paul McCartney in the first Beatles movie for Sam Mendes, currently filming at…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":500065,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29],"tags":[5800,171,1020,100615,1149,975,15801,24494,67,132,68],"class_list":{"0":"post-500064","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-music","8":"tag-awards","9":"tag-entertainment","10":"tag-film","11":"tag-hamnet","12":"tag-interviews","13":"tag-music","14":"tag-oscars","15":"tag-paul-mescal","16":"tag-united-states","17":"tag-unitedstates","18":"tag-us"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115856525799353644","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/500064","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=500064"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/500064\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/500065"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=500064"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=500064"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=500064"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}