Backstage With… Henry Golding reveals why he had to remove the Snake Eyes mask
After his breakout role in Crazy Rich Asians, a role he won after a global casting call, Henry Golding has established himself as a popular leading man.
But his new film sees him taking on a new type of character, the fan favourite Snake Eyes from the GI Joe universe.
The movie tells the origin story of the silent and masked agent, and sees Golding getting to grips with some serious combat moves.
Golding stars alongside Iko Uwais as Hard Master
He told Sky News’ Backstage Podcast it meant learning a lot, very quickly.
“Combat – especially for screen and [using] choreography – it’s all about fluidity, and when you start on day one, you feel like a stick in mud,” he said.
“You’re kind of awkward, you don’t know what that rhythm is like, but after doing it day in, day out, you start having the sixth sense of moving, sliding, having your feet at the correct stance and being able to adjust on the fly as you’re competing against these combatants.
“So the contrast is particularly steep, but it was absolutely wonderful to be able to push myself to that limit.”
Golding said the training led to big changes in his body.
“It sheds off you just because you’re doing four or five hours [a day] of really high, intense cardio, working out these movements.
“So it would just go and shed and I was like, wow, there’s not going to be anything left of me! But it felt great, it did.”
The film is partly set in Japan with production also taking place in the country.
Samara Weaving plays Scarlett in the film, which tells Snake Eyes’ origin story
Golding says that filming on location, rather than using sets, gives the film authenticity.
“Many films [use sets] because it’s easier, it’s cheaper, but truly Japan plays a character of its own,” he said. “It played such an integral role in creating the atmosphere and, I suppose, the feeling of the Arashikage – they are a clan that’s been in Japan for thousands of years and so if we were to just create polystyrene sets it just wouldn’t have that sort of gravitas.
“The producers and the Japanese government really worked together to lock in some of the most amazing locations. We were so fortunate to film at these ancient temples, these castles, these living castles. Not only that, we blocked off literally a whole city block of one of the busiest alleyways and streets in Osaka, or we’d film in Toho Studios – the iconic Kurosawa studios that all the Samurai films have been made at – so on the ground it lends itself to tell more of the story so much more authentically.”
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While fans of GI Joe know Snake Eyes as a man who never says a word after taking a vow of silence, and who is always hidden by a mask, this film explores how and why he became that person.
Golding says it was essential to have the character unmasked and speaking in order to give people a chance to connect with him.
“We need to understand his motivations, we need to understand his journey, his tribulations, his mistakes he’s made, the wrong turns down the very rocky path that he’s chosen and what he intends to do to make amends for that.
“So to be able to do that and to be able to at the same time endear the audience members to him, we needed to have some sort of like eye-to-eye, you need to see the eyes of that man and hear from his own voice, his pain, to truly understand. That was something that we felt so strongly about and was necessary to have in this first origin film.”
Snake Eyes is out in cinemas in the UK now – hear more from the interview in the latest episode of Backstage, the film and TV podcast from Sky News
Taylor Swift has revealed the release date for her new album, The Life Of A Showgirl.
The pop megastar announced her 12th studio album earlier this week but didn’t give many details.
Now, in social media posts and an appearance on boyfriend Travis Kelce’s sports podcast, Swift revealed just what fans can expect from the new album.
Taylor Swift and boyfriend Travis Kelce on the New Heights podcast. Pic: New Heights
The Life of Showgirl, written during the European leg of her record-breaking Eras tour, will be released on 3 October.
It consists of 12 songs, including the title track that features pop star Sabrina Carpenter.
The full track list is:
1. The Fate Of Ophelia
2. Elizabeth Taylor
3. Opalite
4. Father Figure
5. Eldest Daughter
6. Ruin The Friendship
7. Actually Romantic
8. Wi$h Li$t
9. Wood
10. Cancelled!
11. Honey
12. The Life Of A Showgirl (featuring Sabrina Carpenter)
Long-time collaborators Max Martin and Shellback, two Swedish producers who worked with Swift on some of her biggest hits, joined the pop star for this album.
Within four hours of posting the full podcast episode on YouTube, it had already gathered 4.7m views.
The cover of Taylor Swift’s newly announced album. Pic: Republic Records
The back cover of Taylor Swift’s 12th studio album The Life Of A Showgirl. Pic: Republic Records
‘The hardest-working star in pop’
The album follows last year’s The Tortured Poets Department, which was released during the Eras tour.
That tour, with shows on five continents and in 51 cities, raked in more than $2.2bn (£1.62bn) and was the highest-grossing tour of all time.
Read more about Taylor Swift:
Swift’s final London show was the ‘best’
The impact of the ‘excruciating’ Era’s tour
Her new chart record
“This album is about what was going on behind the scenes in my inner life during this tour, which was so exuberant and electric and vibrant,” Swift said during her podcast appearance.
Sky News culture and entertainment reporter Gemma Peplow said after her globe-trotting tour and a swathe of re-releases over recent years, the new album cemented Swift’s reputation “as the hardest-working star in pop”.
Disgraced US film producer Harvey Weinstein is to be tried for a third time in a sexual assault case.
A jury in New York could not reach a verdict in June against the 73-year-old who was accused of raping actress Jessica Mann, and a mistrial was declared.
Judge Curtis Farber has said he wants the new trial to happen before the end of this year.
The same jury found Weinstein guilty in June of sexually assaulting former Project Runway production assistant Miriam Haley in 2006 and not guilty of assaulting Polish former runway model Kaja Sokola the same year.
Weinstein will be sentenced for the guilty verdict in Ms Haley’s case on 30 September.
He denied all of the charges. Throughout the retrial, his lawyers insisted the sexual encounters with his three accusers were “transactional” and “consensual,” and labelled the women as opportunists.
Weinstein was originally convicted of rape and criminal sexual act by the same court in 2020 and sentenced to 23 years in prison for the crimes.
Last year, however, New York’s highest court overturned the conviction, prompting Weinstein’s retrial this summer.
Weinstein was once one of the most powerful people in Hollywood – the co-founder of film and television production companies Miramax and The Weinstein Company, who produced films such as the Oscar-winning Shakespeare In Love, Pulp Fiction, and The Crying Game.
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In 2017, a series of sexual misconduct allegations against him propelled the #MeToo movement.
Some of those accusations later led to criminal charges and his convictions in New York and California.
Before the retrial, Weinstein was also serving a 16-year prison sentence after being found guilty of rape in California in December 2022. He has also denied this charge.
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