Life Lately
British actor Adam Pearson stars in one of the most interesting films of the year, A Different Man, which hopes to change misconceptions about disability. He tells ZERO.NINE all about meaningful conversations with the audience, being able to make mistakes and why no one needs to see what he’s having for dinner on social media.
Interview Brenda Otero Styling Kate Barbour Grooming Charlie Cullen Film Bo Morgan Photo Assistant Toby Nima Photography JC Verona It’s been a big year for Adam Pearson. The Croydon-born actor and disability rights campaigner plays Oswald in ‘A Different Man’, a charismatic character which has made the Londoner one name to watch ahead of awards season. Along with his co-leads Sebastian Stan and Renate Reinsve, he hopes the film gets to change perceptions around visual difference, and specifically around his condition, Neurofibromatosis.
Full look Ioedle
You are fully immersed in the promotion of ‘A Different Man’. Life lately must be pretty busy.
Everything about acting is fun. I guess [promotion] is part of it, you don’t come to this world and don’t expect to work hard, if it was easy everyone would be doing it. You have to do it like it’s the first time ever in each interview, so it’s enjoyable for everyone.
It’s a very positive attitude. Is it something that you had to acquire through working in the industry?
You get in and you have to be as resilient as you can be. You have to go in and make the point. I don’t want to get any gig because I was the best disabled guy they saw, I want to get it because I was the best guy they saw, bar none.
Your role in ‘A Different Man’ was written specifically for you.
The director, Aaron Schimberg and I worked together in a previous film, called Chained for Life. I played a shy, retiring character, and because of that my performance was underrated, because people thought it was Adam in real life, which isn't the truth. So he thought he’ll write something gregarious and out there that is closer to me, and let me show a bit of range and craft as an actor.
Would you say that the film changes viewers’ perceptions on disability?
You always hope, at least to get people thinking. I don't want to change what people think: I want to change how they do it. It’s a more sustainable way to change society. It’s very easy to hold up banners or wag fingers, but I'd rather hold up mirrors and start conversations with an audience. We’ve navigated that fine line very well and I am happy with the response I got.
Full look Ioedle Sneakers Adam’s own
“I always try to be their good guy in the room.”
Blazer Ioedle T-shirt Hawes & Curtis
This leads us to that cringe corporate inclusion video in the movie.
It’s a lot more real than you think! We changed a few words, it's still very much taken from videos that you find online and remarkably accurate. We turned the dial a bit, and parodied it, but it’s mainly what we found out there in the wild.
What advice would you give to a company looking to get better
Inclusion works best when it’s not made a thing, when it happens organically. If you’ve got to watch a corporate video not to be awful to disabled people, I don’t know how to help you! Who’s going to watch the video and go, oh I get it now!
I think the best approach is to go and meet people where they are rather than where you wish they were, because people don’t know what they don’t know, and you need to strip it right back and get into building blocks. Everyone is scared to say the wrong thing, but without potentially getting it wrong and being corrected things are not going to move forward. We are all going to sit in vows of noble silence, and nothing is ever gonna change. I feel bad about people trying to navigate this area because no one told them how to do it and when they try and get it wrong, they just get shut down by the Twitter mob. It’s awful, you have to be able to make mistakes.
What’s your relationship with social media?
I am navigating it better recently. I was speaking to Sebastian (Stan) about it and he came off it two years ago, and got into my psyche. Now I don’t need to look at it all the time. Young people now judge their success by their social media metrics. It’s a soulless way to go about life, preparing our behind the scenes to other people’s greatest hits and thinking that’s how the real world works, but nothing can be further from the truth. If we all looked up from our phones a bit more and embraced the world around us, maybe got over ourselves a little bit, we'd all be much happier. And no one needs to see what I’m having for dinner!
So for you it’s mainly a professional tool.
I'm trying to. Highlighting stuff or promoting it. Every now and again you can post something short and funny, but it has become a hellscape of nonsense. Trying to cut through has become a bit impossible and now I'm trying to do things in person. Don’t get me wrong, it has its pros, it has made the world smaller and easier, but equally it has made us a lot more insecure.
Full look Ioedle Sneakers Adam’s own
“Inclusion works best when it’s not made a thing.”
Blazer Ioedle T-shirt Hawes & Curtis
“Everyone is scared to say the wrong thing, but without potentially getting it wrong and being corrected things are not going to move forward.”
Turtleneck Hawes & Curtis Trousers Ioedle
‘A Different Man’ shows that, despite what society tells us, our problems don’t disappear when we change our physical appearance. But there are many other themes.
What’s good about the movie is that there are other things in there that make you think, and you have to watch it several times. I'm also not a fan of hand-holding in storytelling, you want the audience to know how to get there on their own without us having to break it down and explain them. Complex things need to be complex, and that’s what we've done well. When even two years later people start thinking about it or having conversations about it, we can go: yep, mission accomplished. We had screenings in the States and over here we had people from various charities and organisations in the area of disfigurement, visual difference or whatever one wants to call it. The biggest compliment that we could get was: ‘Thank you I feel seen, I feel heard, I feel represented for the first time in quite a while in cinema’. So that’s something I take incredibly seriously.
You have said that when you were a teenager your armor was language. Did it help during those years?
Helped and hindered me slightly. I didn't use it particularly well. When you combat aggression and hostility with yet more aggression and hostility you’ll only end up with loads of the same. If I could go back again I’d probably be a lot kinder and a lot more softly spoken about the whole thing. Now that I’m older and hopefully wiser, it’s the case of trying to wake up every day and be better than yesterday, whatever that looks like. Make interactions as good as you can make it given the circumstances.
You have worked on TV and as a documentary maker, how was that process from being behind the camera to in front of it?
I always try to go to work, do my work, and try to be nice to everyone because you don’t know who you're going to meet on your way up, or on your way back down. People tend to forget that no matter where you are, people need to like you, particularly in the creative industries. They say good news travels fast, bad news travels faster and if you’re not good, people will know and that will cost you a lot of work. I always try to be their good guy in the room.
A decade after ‘Under the Skin’ was released, your work in that movie still resonates with people.
All down Jonathan Glazer and Scarlett Johansson. I came into that film with no acting training, beyond a bit of messing around at school. I was very fortunate, I had a really good director and an incredibly good coach. To give me room to learn what I was doing. Without ‘Under the Skin’ nothing would be happening.
Blazer Ioedle T-shirt Hawes & Curtis
About Adam
Adam Pearson (born 6 January 1985) is a British actor, presenter and campaigner. He made his acting debut in the 2013 film Under the Skin. He has Neurofibromatosis and has been involved in outreach programmes to prevent bullying associated with deformities.
You can follow him on Instagram
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