Charlie Hunnam On Modeling, ‘Sons Of Anarchy,’ And Role In ‘Crimson Peak’
Charlie Hunnam is a man who does not take long to open up about his life and career. The British star, who reached the sandy shores of Hollywood as a relative unknown, has today established himself as an actor who is not only loved for his insanely good looks, but also for his pumped-up, masculine character roles. And when you consider that Charlie Hunnam started his career playing the 15-year-old gay character Nathan Maloney in Queer as Folk, you begin to appreciate Hunnam’s penchant across the acting spectrum.
But the show that skyrocketed Charlie Hunnam’s popularity was Kurt Sutter’s drama, Sons of Anarchy, and following the end of the show last December, he has been sought highly by both film directors and TV producers simply because they know bringing Charlie Hunnam on board guarantees sophistication coupled with large doses of jazziness.
And that is not all. Charlie Hunnam is as much in demand by fashion labels who want the Brit star to become the face of their brand. Recently, Hunnam was in Milan, smoldering alongside Dutch supermodel Doutzen Kroes in a shoot for Calvin Klein’s new fragrance, Reveal. Speaking to Details about his career post-Sons of Anarchy, Charlie Hunnam also touched on a few personal memories — like the days when he started out as a model.
“When I was a kid, I got spotted by a model scout that wanted to represent me, and they sent me one modeling job. I did one job for them, and then a catwalk shoot for Kangol caps, and decided modeling was not for me. They had an acting division as part of this agency as well, and I said, ‘Well, I don’t want to model, but if you want to send me on some auditions, I’m in film school, I want to be an actor. So if you want to represent me, that would be great.’ And they, eh, weren’t really interested, and I just badgered and badgered and badgered them, and they finally sent me out. I ended up getting the first job that they sent me out on.”
Charlie Hunnam also admitted that he was such a fan of Calvin Klein since his younger days that becoming the brand’s face for one of their fragrances was a truly humbling experience for him.
“I was super-flattered and excited about the prospect of working with Calvin Klein, and doing a Calvin Klein fragrance specifically, because I always really liked what they did. Back when I was a kid, I used to tear pages out of magazines and stick them on my bedroom wall—I had the Eternity ads on my wall and the CK One ads. My whole childhood, those were on my wall, and cut to 20 years later, being asked to be the face of one of Calvin Klein’s new fragrance is kind of surreal.”
Isn’t that just the sort of thing Charlie Hunnam’s fans love him for? But, of course, they also love him for playing the sensitive bad boy, Jackson “Jax” Teller, on Sons of Anarchy. Charlie Hunnam opened up about leaving the show after seven years.
“I put everything I had into that show. I lived it as much as I could. I never got in a car the whole seven years. I was only on my bike and rolling around with a bunch of real bikers and occasionally acting like a maniac. Finishing the show felt like a real celebration—we finished at the right time. The tendency when something’s generating a s**tload of money is to keep on doing it, beyond where it’s reached its natural conclusion, and I was so happy that everyone had the discipline and the integrity to not do that with Sons of Anarchy.
But saying good-bye to the character was a motherf***er. As stupid as it sounds, it really felt like a genuine bereavement, because he was this guy that I loved and hung out with constantly for seven years. It was a lot tears for, like, two or three weeks, every time I thought about it. Then one day, I woke up and was like, ‘Okay, it’s time to move on. RIP, Jax Teller.’ “
And he has surely moved on. Next up for Charlie Hunnam is Guillermo del Toro’s gothic-horror fantasy film, Crimson Peak, and the actor talked about what it was working with the Mexican director, and his part in the film.
“It’s beautiful, it’s him absolutely in his wheelhouse. It’s a classic Gothic romance set against a backdrop of this very rural house in the middle of nowhere. Everybody did a great job, Jessica [Chastain] absolutely killed it, she’s wonderful in the film. I think it’s one of Guillermo’s best films, if not maybe his best film. I’m actually not really in it that much, it’s really Mia Wasikowska, Jessica, and Tom Hiddleston’s film, and when I’m in it, it’s significant, but I really just did it because I love Guillermo and wanted to work with him again. If it had been anybody else, I probably wouldn’t have taken the role. I had to turn down a lot other stuff to be free to do that. People were like, ‘What the f*** are you doing?’ but I’m doing exactly what I damn well please. That’s my answer.”
Well, we would love to see Charlie Hunnam continue doing what he likes to, because almost invariably, those are things we like, as well.
As Youth Health Magazine reports, apart from Crimson Peak, Charlie Hunnam is also gearing up for the summer release of Knights of the Roundtable: King Arthur and in The Lost City of Z, a must-watch movie co-starring Brad Pitt and Robert Pattinson.
[Photo: calvinklein.com, Wikimedia Commons, Frederick M. Brown / Getty Images]
