Q: Your performance in "Fish Tank," oh my god! Now this is also terrific... I never read my production notes before I go in (to see the movie). I didn't know that that young girl was not, like, just out of RADA. (laughs)

A: Yeah, I know. I know. Katie Jarvis. They picked her up – She was found on a -

Q: On a subway platform?

A: Yeah, on a railway platform, yelling across at her boyfriend.

Q: Or the tube? Or a train?

A: It was the overland, actually. She was shouting across at her boyfriend. (They were having a fight.) And the casting director sort of called her over, and asked her, would she be interested in doing a film? And I think she was like "What?," and thought they were joking. And there is she, up on the screen, a phenomenal talent. I've been saying about her – she's got this amazing ability to find the truth in all these scenes. There's no affectation in her acting. There's no vanity. She's just straight down the line.

Q: Yeah, she's amazing! And the process! You didn't see a script before you signed on to do this movie?

A: No.

Q: You're one of the hottest actors in the whole world now. So you just said "I'll do this"?

A: Well, I don't know about that.(laughs)

Q: I think you are. Well, in my book.

A: Oh, thanks, man. Well, you see, I'd seen "Red Road," and it really impressed me. What impressed me about Andrea (Arnold, the Academy-award winning writer/ director) and obviously, she carries it through with "Fish Tank," is the way that she portrays characters. There's no judgment on her part, when she writes them, or when she delivers them on screen. They're ambiguous. She doesn't make it easy for an audience to go "OK. Here's your hero" and "Here's your villain." Everybody's got elements of both of those things. And they're very ambiguous. And I think that's what makes it interesting. Because that's what we're like in life, as human beings –

Q: Yes, it's complex. It's three dimensional.

A: They can be hurtful towards one another. They can be damaging. And then they can also be very nourishing and very supportive. The two go hand-in-hand.

Q: Yes, your character, Connor starts off just being like The Guy – who's with The Mother, their tryst. (They're having a torrid affair.) And then he, well, we don't want to give the movie away. But he turns out to be all these other things. And it's quite wonderful. Did you shoot this in sequence?

A: Yes.

Q: And you didn't know what was coming up? And you hadn't seen the script?

A: No, I hadn't. No, what happened was I would get, like, on Friday, I would get what was happening the next week. I would get those scenes. So I could work on it on the weekend and take it day by day from there on. And then, we just sort of went along and did it. But I had a pretty good idea of what has going to happen. From sort of the beginning really.

Q: Cuz we in the audience, don't. So that's why I'm not going to go into the second part of the movie. Because it's such a surprise. That twist is terrific.

A: Yeah. No. She's a master at that. That's why I wanted to keep him as just sort of an ordinary guy, like you said. Because these things are within all of us, the capability...

Q: What is his job?

A: He works in like a — He's a security guard.(Both laugh) His main weakness is he's got a lack of responsibility and he doesn't face his problems very well. He runs away from them, as opposed to trying to confront them. But I think he's sort of a good natured guy.

Q: But we end up liking him immensely at the end of it. We're pulled back and forth. Which is wonderful.

A: Which I think was her plan.(laughs) That's what she does so well.