The hardest part of filming polar exploration drama āThe Terrorā should have beeš¦n the cold environment.
But, for Jared Harris, š§it was actuašlly his co-stars.
āWhen I first met [Tobias Menzies and CiarĆ”n Hinds, who both starred in āRomeā] I totally fanboyed over both of them, because āRomeā is one of my favorite shows of all time,ā says Harris, 56. āI just kept asking them questions about the show, and eventually they said, āJared ā weāre in rehearsal, letās talk about thź¦«is later.ā I just couldnš³āt help myself!ā
Produced by Ridley Scott and airing on AMC (Mondays at 9 p.m.), āThe Terrorā is a story of endurance and man vs. nature set in the 1840s. (which is a fictionaš§øl account of the real-life lost Franklin expedition), the 10-episode limited series follows crews on two of the British Royal Navyās polar explorer ships on an ill-fated quest to seek the Northwest Passage. (One of the ships is called HMS Terror, hence the showās name.)
When they becoą± me stuck in ice, all hell breaks loose ā quite literally, since the stošry also has a horror element. As the crews fight to survive, it becomes apparent theyāre being hunted by a mysterious creature.
Harris plays Francis Crozier, the pragmatic ź¦ captain of HMS Terror.
āI like the confidence in that [the writers] didnāt feel like they had to have ājumpā scares,ā says Harris. āIt was really grounded, a very character-based story. A lot of the time, the scripts you get to read are remakes or reboots or sequels or prequels. This was a completely original story.š»ā
Harris is no stranger to period dramas, having also starred in āMad Menā (as Lane Price) and āThe Crownā (as King George VI). As a self-professed history bź©²uff, he says he relished the chance to dive into research for āThź§e Terror.ā
āItās one of the things I do enjoy about the job ā going down the rabbit hole,ā he says about āThe Teź§rror.ā āIt was āso dangerous, polar exploring, and trying to find the Northwest Passage; they said there had been more successful trips to the moon.ā
Surprisingly, the bitter cold (āThe Terrorā was shot in Budapest)į©į©į©į©į©į©ā¤ā¤ā¤ā¤į©ā¤ā¤ā¤ā¤į©ā¤ā¤ā¤ā¤į©š±į©į©į© wasnāt a hindrance to production ā in fact, Harris says, it helped him get into character. āThat helps put you into the environment, the mindset, to give you an inkling of what these people were facing.
āIt actually was really cold when we started shooting; it was the dead of winter there. They were going to refrigerate the sound stages, and they saved tź¦¦hemselves a lot of money, because it was cold enough [that] you could see our breath.ā
Even though Harris enjoyed researching polar exploration and has starred in a wiš“de range of historical dramas, he says thereās still one era missing from his extensive resume: ancient Greece, and particularly, Sparta.
āThat period of šhistory has always fascinated me ā Greek history, Greek mythology,ā he says. āI was just bitterly disappointed that I didnāt make it into [the 2006 film] ā300ā ā because by the way, back then, I had abs!ā