Looking back at the career of Matthew Goode, you can’t help but wonder if he’s very brave, or simply a masochist. Of course, he’s appeared in a selection of British classics such as Downton Abbey and The Crown, as befits an English actor of his status, but it’s his choice of roles in high-profile adaptations that force you to question his sanity.
In 2008, Goode took on the role of Charles Ryder in Julian Jarrold’s movie adaptation of Evelyn Waugh’s Brideshead Revisited, a role that had already been immortalised by Jeremy Irons in the 1981 BBC drama — a show that revolutionised TV drama in an era before HBO and Netflix.
The following year, he played Ozymandias, the strangely loveable sociopath at the centre of Zack Snyder’s adaptation of Alan Moore’s graphic novel Watchmen, a book widely regarded as the "greatest comic ever written", and one that was deemed “unfilmable” by Moore himself.
Now, he’s stepping up to play Robert Evans, the Paramount Studio executive who oversaw production on The Godfather, and gave the film's producer Albert S Ruddy (played by Miles Teller in the show) his big break. The Offer is a fascinating look at the troubled making of Francis Ford Coppola's mob classic, considered by many to be one of the greatest movies of all time.
“The responsibility is huge, and it was terrifying,” Goode tells The National. “You have to remember also, I don’t mean it in a bad way, but if I was a golfer I’d be described as a ‘journeyman pro’, possibly even an amateur by some.
"Sometimes you just don’t have a choice, though, so I made this, and I still don't quite understand how they thought I could pull Evans off.”
Such disarming modesty seems misplaced when viewed in the context of Goode’s impressive CV. One person who didn’t share Goode’s reservations was The Offer’s director Dexter Fletcher.
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