Post by Kate on May 19, 2007 9:47:22 GMT -5
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'I would have done it for free'
May 19 2007
It’s the hottest film of the year, starring Sienna Miller, Keira Knightley and Welsh actor Matthew Rhys. While the female leads deal with the paparazzi lining up to catch a glimpse of them frolicking around in the movie about Dylan Thomas’s life, Rhys has more pressing things on his mind. He tells Claire Hill – the only writer allowed on set – what’s up
by Claire Hill, Western Mail
DRESSED in baggy corduroy brown trousers, braces, wellington boots and with a paisley scarf knotted around his neck, Matthew Rhys is peering over the top of a hill calling out greetings to me. The pathway to him is a difficult, steep climb. The road has turned into channels of mud, churned up by trucks, cars and trailers after days of inclement weather and a stream of traffic to and from set.
This is week two at unit base on the set of The Edge of Love, the first movie to be made about Dylan Thomas.
Rhys, from Cardiff, plays the Bard; paparazzi favourites Sienna Miller and Keira Knightley provide the glamour.
It’s a big film, with a big cast, and the eyes of the world are on its stars, with the paparazzi already camped out, trying to catch exclusive shots of the actors in action.And Rhys, for one, is feeling the pressure.
It is lunchtime on Tuesday: the rain has stopped and the sun is trying to break through the clouds in New Quay, where a large chunk of the movie is being made.
Extras in head scarves and dressed in the frugal yet stylish garb of World War II Britain negotiate the ground to the catering truck, careful not to fall and dirty their costumes.
They stand next to the crew, all in a uniform of jeans and mud-spattered boots, taking time out from their working day.
At the back of the temporarily erected site sits Rhys’s trailer, or “Dylan Thomas” as it reads on the door. To his left is the domain of his on-set wife Miller – playing Caitlin Thomas – who is stood outside having a cigarette while talking on her phone.
For a Welshman playing arguably the most famous Welshman, Rhys’s trailer is appropriately decorated. A Welsh flag hangs on the wall, he has copies of the Western Mail on the table – “to catch up on the rugby” – and a book of Thomas’s poetry and his biography. It should be a relaxed scene but somehow it isn’t.
Weeks ago, I had spoken to Rhys in Los Angeles. At the time, he told me how excited he was about this role, saying the chance to play Thomas was a dream come true for him.
There is no doubt that he still feels that way on set in West Wales. It’s just that now the reality of what he has taken on has started to set in.
While his fellow cast members Miller and Knightley – playing Vera Killick, Dylan’s first great love – are acting in the shadow of photographers desperate to get a shot of them, Rhys knows his scrutiny is much closer to home.
As he puts it, “It’s the one character as a Welshman you don’t want to f*** up.”
There is, undeniably, a pressure for Rhys to succeed in this film.
Thomas’s legend, character and canon have lived on long since his untimely death in New York on Monday, November, 9, 1953.
Elevated to iconic status, both Wales and Dylan Thomas are often muttered in the same breath, as if the two are inextricably linked.
As a proud Welshman, Cardiff-born Rhys knows there will more than a critical eye drawn over his performance in his homeland. People will have opinions on everything from his accent, his look and how his Thomas acts.
“I am just putting the pressure on myself,” he admits.
“I haven’t been this nervous for a long, long time – not since The Graduate [with Kathleen Turner]. That was a big deal for me and that was seven years ago.”
He calls it “typical actor’s paranoia” because on set no-one – absolutely no-one – is worried about Rhys’s performance.
Everywhere you turn, people are ready to sing his praises and proclaim him as perfect for the part.
Respected director John Maybury and producer Rebekah Gilbertson (granddaughter of the Killicks) are convinced he’s captured Thomas’s essence.
And Thomas and Caitlin’s own daughter Aeronwy – surely an authority – has said the Rada-trained actor just “is” her father.
Gilbertson has also gone as far as pronouncing that Rhys is one of the best actors of his generation.
But back in his trailer, Rhys remains modest.
The star of American smash hit series Brothers & Sisters is at pains to explain why, in the face of such confidence in his ability, he is still working himself up in knots trying to get the details just right.
“I thought, ‘I am going to love this job’,” he confides to me. “I was looking forward to it so much... then a few people started saying things to me like, ‘It’s such an honour [to play Dylan]’.”
It’s feeling other people’s expectations acknowledging his own very high standards which is making him determined to do this part justice.
It’s not that Rhys, who has graced the big screen in Very Annie Mary and House of America, is turning into a method actor to get the role right.
He snorts with laughter when I ask if he is getting people to call him Dylan when the cameras stop rolling.
But that doesn’t mean he isn’t working hard to “nail” Thomas.
The accent is one of the key things he is focusing on.
There is no film footage of Thomas, and in the few audio recordings of him reading his poetry or simply talking, the poet – who had elocution lessons as a child – adopts a somewhat theatrical English accent.
Rhys believes, though, that we in Wales will expect Thomas to have a Welsh accent.
“Not that many people know what he sounds like,” he says.
“When they think of Dylan, they think of [him sounding like Richard] Burton. Dylan Thomas used to put on this theatrical voice but if you put on a ‘put on’ voice [when you are playing him] it sounds like bad acting.
“Then in the pubs he would put on this character, this accent and voice that some people thought was fraudulent but some really enjoyed.”
Matthew knows all of this from reading biographies of Thomas and listening to his voice on CD.
To prove his point, he heads to the CD player set into the trailer wall, where one of Thomas’s poems is started on cue.
The voice is booming and staged, and very English, highlighting his dilemma.
He has in some ways played Dylan before when he took on the role of First Voice in Under Milk Wood, to critical acclaim.
“Then the director wanted me to try and do it as Thomas, and not the Burton way that people know.”
That is helping him a bit to ‘get the voice’ as it were but on director John Maybury’s instructions he is trying not to focus too much on this aspect of the part.
He says, “The director has said to me he’s not interested in a biopic or a documentary about Thomas; he wants [his] essence.”
He’s still finding though that the question of how he sounds niggles at him, but that’s what happens when you give a Welshman this part – you get that extra level of passion.
It’s probably not a good time to bring up the fact that his friend and fellow Welsh thespian Michael Sheen is rumoured to be playing the same role in another Thomas film later this year.
But Rhys is not so stressed that he can’t take a spot of gentle ribbing and some questions about which actor will be the better – accent-wise at least.
All he will say is, “I know Sheeny will nail it [the accent].”
As for his own performance, you sense that Thomas’s ghost could come back, pat Rhys on the back and tell him he’s doing a good job – but even then still he’d question the praise.
Putting on two stone in weight for the part, Rhys wanted the extra pounds to go on his face to give him the famous Thomas jowls.
Instead it has turned into a beer pot that is only discernible if he breathes out and arches his back.
He laughs and jokes when I demand that he displays it, jumping up and posing.
The look is important to getting Rhys into the role and the right mindset.
He has a wig of dark curls to offset his blue eyes which can easily burn with intensity and then twinkle with a mischievous glint. This very Thomas trait is also a typically Rhys one.
Focusing on a year in Thomas’s life, the film is the baby of producer Rebekah Gilbertson and writer Sharman Macdonald, Knightley’s mother.
It was six years ago that Bala-born Gilbertson decided to use the story as a film to adapt at film school; the tales had been part of her upbringing.
The story is based on her grandparents, Vera and William Killick, and their close friendship with Dylan and Caitlin Thomas.
As Vera joins the Thomases in New Quay her husband goes to war, only to return later to have rumours about affairs ringing in his ears.
He vents his frustration by scaring Thomas with a machine gun after an argument in The Black Lion pub and narrowly escapes a stint in jail.
Decades later, and after William’s death, Gilbertson started work on the film and was approached by Macdonald, who wanted to write the script.
When Macdonald’s famous daughter became interested in, and attached to the project as an actress, The Edge of Love – or The Best Time Of Our Lives, as it was originally titled – quickly took off.
The cast and crew already have one successful week of filming under their belt, and as well as capturing the interest of the world’s media they are positive about heading into the heart of the filming.
It is still early days, though. So far, the location scenes have been precursors to the main action, which will be filmed at Pinewood Studios.
And Rhys himself is waiting to film scenes that will provide the emotive backbone of the movie and give him the chance finally to sink his teeth into the dialogue and the drama of The Edge of Love.
He says, “It is quite good to start off with the bitty scenes [in New Quay]. We will have the really big, big scenes in Pinewood, by when we should have hit our stride.”
Pinewood for the last two weeks of filming will offer the actors shelter from prying eyes, because on location in Wales every moment of the process is under intense scrutiny – not just from the tourists or residents, who gather to watch the day’s filming, but from the press.
The attention was inevitable, given that two of the hottest British female leads in film – Miller and Knightley – are at the centre of the action.
Pictures of them in costume or just relaxing in Wales can sell for thousands of pounds but the paparazzi, who have besieged the set since the first day of filming earlier this month, are after something more implausible.
When the film was first announced, actress Lindsay Lohan was linked to the Caitlin role and she reportedly told MTV that the movie has “somewhat of a lesbian undertone”.
Chinese whispers being what they are, this developed into lesbian kisses and a fabled menage a trois.
The cast and crew have always maintained these scenes didn’t exist in the original draft and in fact the only naked body to be seen is that of Rhys – filmed in the bath, quite alone.
A baffled Macdonald even said of the rumours, “What sex scene? It’s a friendship between women. Does one have to define that as lesbian? I don’t mind, but really!”
Yet this hasn’t stopped the hunt for “the kiss” picture which has led to photographers hiring boats – and sinking in once instance – off the West Wales coast. Or falling out of trees in an attempt to catch the ultimate cash cow.
“It is like a herd of locusts,” says Rhys, who still can’t get over the attention the film has attracted.
“I’ve seen [their behaviour] on television, but I never realised what they were like before. All you get is click, click, click.”
He rolls his tongue and imitates a myriad of cameras going off in one go.
“It’s fine for me. I don’t feel the intrusion – but it is bad for the girls.”
He feigns mock offence, throws his hand to his forehead and cries, “They’re [the paparazzi] not interested in me, the b******!”
As lunch break ends, the crew head down to New Quay’s pier to set up for an afternoon of filming.
Crowds are held back behind barriers and about 40 crew members work, and wait, on the pier.
In the background, dolphins can be seen in the sea and, yards away, behind a police line on the beach, 12 photographers stand in a line.
There they have a perfect view of the actors through their long lenses.
And today, they’re in luck because Miller and Knightley are shooting scenes which feature them hugging and running down the pier with the wilful abandon of young, carefree women.
All eyes are on the duo as make-up artists apply the touch-ups, Oscar-nominated costume designer April Ferry makes sure their authentic ’40s outfits are intact, the stills photographer shoots away and the DVD director doubles up on footage with director Maybury, who is glued to his Super 8 camera.
It’s a longer wait to see Rhys in action as Thomas, as his scene is one of the last of the day.
Cast members slowly arrive, including singer Lisa Stansfield, a three-legged dog, a few babies and a toddler dressed in a striped jumper and wellies while, on the sand, crew members build sandcastles next to a striped windbreaker and deck chairs.
When he finally arrives on set, Rhys looks comfortable – no hint of his trepidation now – and follows Maybury’s direction to lie relaxed in a wooden boat, marooned on the beach.
With his legs out of the boat and a striped parasol placed over his face, he seems happy and confident from where I’m standing.
With little fanfare – there are no loud calls of “Action!” or “Cut!” – the scene begins.
While Knightley’s Vera holds her baby in her arms, Miller’s Caitlin comes to her husband in the boat, swigs from a bottle and climbs in for an embrace.
It’s not the kiss the photographers have been waiting for, but they still snap away.
Encouraging the toddler, who is playing the Thomases son Llewellyn, to join them in the boat, Rhys lifts him over his head and they play out a wonderfully happy scene.
Idyllic and picturesque it may be, but this is the calm before the storm in the film and seems to capture perfectly the relationship between the Killicks and the Thomases.
It’s rather different from Rhys’s first scene as the famous poet, when he tapped into his fiery temperament and argued with his on-screen wife.
A couple of months ago, this scene would have been played out with Hollywood favourite Lindsay Lohan, until she pulled out of the project.
Rhys goes along with my suggestion that it was meeting him that put her off. “Yeah, what happened there?” he laughs. “I had a cup of coffee with her and she’s no longer on the film.
“It’s all shrouded in secrecy”, he adds playfully before saying, “I’m not saying she bottled it.”
He’s delighted with his “new” on-screen wife Miller, though.
“I was really very happy when I heard Sienna was Caitlin. She has a lot of Caitlin’s qualities – she is the life and soul, spirited and is like a whirling dervish. She brings all that.”
The cast all bonded weeks ago in the rehearsal period, during which they even went to the real Wheatsheaf pub.
Legend has it that this is where Thomas first spotted Caitlin Macnamara drinking gin. It was an instant attraction that inspired him to walk up to her, lay his head in her lap and ask her to marry him.
“The first few days were very easy,” recalls Rhys. “We were all sat around the table talking, and very little has changed.”
As one of the oldest of the main cast – Cillian Murphy, who plays William, is two years his junior – the Welshman says he failed miserably at bonding with his female counterparts on subjects like children’s television.
Joking that he is old at 32, he launches into a anecdote that his discussion of Will o’ the Wisp with his two main co-stars was met with blank faces.
“When I was 10, Sienna was three and Keira was just two,” he explains.
But playing a Thomas in his 20s should be no problem for Rhys, who managed to pass for a teenage Romeo in an RSC season only three years ago.
And as for bonding, at least the cast could all turn “method” and head down the pub for a spot of team-building over a few drinks.
“We had a lot of wine. Well, the characters were big drinkers,” he says in their defence.
“We are getting on well though. I am always loathe to say it as it is very rare that you don’t get on with other actors. But it is true.
“Everyone really cares about the film. Keira obviously has a strong link to it as it’s her mother’s script, but Sienna really cares for it as well.”
From 10am to 10pm or 8am to 8pm for eight weeks, everyone involved with the film is giving it their all.
For Rhys it is a personal challenge, his own steep hill to climb as a Welshman playing the ultimate Welshman.
But he wouldn’t change the journey for anything. “I would have done it for free,” he says.
For him, you know this really is a job of a lifetime. And one he’s doing straight from the heart.
'I would have done it for free'
May 19 2007
It’s the hottest film of the year, starring Sienna Miller, Keira Knightley and Welsh actor Matthew Rhys. While the female leads deal with the paparazzi lining up to catch a glimpse of them frolicking around in the movie about Dylan Thomas’s life, Rhys has more pressing things on his mind. He tells Claire Hill – the only writer allowed on set – what’s up
by Claire Hill, Western Mail
DRESSED in baggy corduroy brown trousers, braces, wellington boots and with a paisley scarf knotted around his neck, Matthew Rhys is peering over the top of a hill calling out greetings to me. The pathway to him is a difficult, steep climb. The road has turned into channels of mud, churned up by trucks, cars and trailers after days of inclement weather and a stream of traffic to and from set.
This is week two at unit base on the set of The Edge of Love, the first movie to be made about Dylan Thomas.
Rhys, from Cardiff, plays the Bard; paparazzi favourites Sienna Miller and Keira Knightley provide the glamour.
It’s a big film, with a big cast, and the eyes of the world are on its stars, with the paparazzi already camped out, trying to catch exclusive shots of the actors in action.And Rhys, for one, is feeling the pressure.
It is lunchtime on Tuesday: the rain has stopped and the sun is trying to break through the clouds in New Quay, where a large chunk of the movie is being made.
Extras in head scarves and dressed in the frugal yet stylish garb of World War II Britain negotiate the ground to the catering truck, careful not to fall and dirty their costumes.
They stand next to the crew, all in a uniform of jeans and mud-spattered boots, taking time out from their working day.
At the back of the temporarily erected site sits Rhys’s trailer, or “Dylan Thomas” as it reads on the door. To his left is the domain of his on-set wife Miller – playing Caitlin Thomas – who is stood outside having a cigarette while talking on her phone.
For a Welshman playing arguably the most famous Welshman, Rhys’s trailer is appropriately decorated. A Welsh flag hangs on the wall, he has copies of the Western Mail on the table – “to catch up on the rugby” – and a book of Thomas’s poetry and his biography. It should be a relaxed scene but somehow it isn’t.
Weeks ago, I had spoken to Rhys in Los Angeles. At the time, he told me how excited he was about this role, saying the chance to play Thomas was a dream come true for him.
There is no doubt that he still feels that way on set in West Wales. It’s just that now the reality of what he has taken on has started to set in.
While his fellow cast members Miller and Knightley – playing Vera Killick, Dylan’s first great love – are acting in the shadow of photographers desperate to get a shot of them, Rhys knows his scrutiny is much closer to home.
As he puts it, “It’s the one character as a Welshman you don’t want to f*** up.”
There is, undeniably, a pressure for Rhys to succeed in this film.
Thomas’s legend, character and canon have lived on long since his untimely death in New York on Monday, November, 9, 1953.
Elevated to iconic status, both Wales and Dylan Thomas are often muttered in the same breath, as if the two are inextricably linked.
As a proud Welshman, Cardiff-born Rhys knows there will more than a critical eye drawn over his performance in his homeland. People will have opinions on everything from his accent, his look and how his Thomas acts.
“I am just putting the pressure on myself,” he admits.
“I haven’t been this nervous for a long, long time – not since The Graduate [with Kathleen Turner]. That was a big deal for me and that was seven years ago.”
He calls it “typical actor’s paranoia” because on set no-one – absolutely no-one – is worried about Rhys’s performance.
Everywhere you turn, people are ready to sing his praises and proclaim him as perfect for the part.
Respected director John Maybury and producer Rebekah Gilbertson (granddaughter of the Killicks) are convinced he’s captured Thomas’s essence.
And Thomas and Caitlin’s own daughter Aeronwy – surely an authority – has said the Rada-trained actor just “is” her father.
Gilbertson has also gone as far as pronouncing that Rhys is one of the best actors of his generation.
But back in his trailer, Rhys remains modest.
The star of American smash hit series Brothers & Sisters is at pains to explain why, in the face of such confidence in his ability, he is still working himself up in knots trying to get the details just right.
“I thought, ‘I am going to love this job’,” he confides to me. “I was looking forward to it so much... then a few people started saying things to me like, ‘It’s such an honour [to play Dylan]’.”
It’s feeling other people’s expectations acknowledging his own very high standards which is making him determined to do this part justice.
It’s not that Rhys, who has graced the big screen in Very Annie Mary and House of America, is turning into a method actor to get the role right.
He snorts with laughter when I ask if he is getting people to call him Dylan when the cameras stop rolling.
But that doesn’t mean he isn’t working hard to “nail” Thomas.
The accent is one of the key things he is focusing on.
There is no film footage of Thomas, and in the few audio recordings of him reading his poetry or simply talking, the poet – who had elocution lessons as a child – adopts a somewhat theatrical English accent.
Rhys believes, though, that we in Wales will expect Thomas to have a Welsh accent.
“Not that many people know what he sounds like,” he says.
“When they think of Dylan, they think of [him sounding like Richard] Burton. Dylan Thomas used to put on this theatrical voice but if you put on a ‘put on’ voice [when you are playing him] it sounds like bad acting.
“Then in the pubs he would put on this character, this accent and voice that some people thought was fraudulent but some really enjoyed.”
Matthew knows all of this from reading biographies of Thomas and listening to his voice on CD.
To prove his point, he heads to the CD player set into the trailer wall, where one of Thomas’s poems is started on cue.
The voice is booming and staged, and very English, highlighting his dilemma.
He has in some ways played Dylan before when he took on the role of First Voice in Under Milk Wood, to critical acclaim.
“Then the director wanted me to try and do it as Thomas, and not the Burton way that people know.”
That is helping him a bit to ‘get the voice’ as it were but on director John Maybury’s instructions he is trying not to focus too much on this aspect of the part.
He says, “The director has said to me he’s not interested in a biopic or a documentary about Thomas; he wants [his] essence.”
He’s still finding though that the question of how he sounds niggles at him, but that’s what happens when you give a Welshman this part – you get that extra level of passion.
It’s probably not a good time to bring up the fact that his friend and fellow Welsh thespian Michael Sheen is rumoured to be playing the same role in another Thomas film later this year.
But Rhys is not so stressed that he can’t take a spot of gentle ribbing and some questions about which actor will be the better – accent-wise at least.
All he will say is, “I know Sheeny will nail it [the accent].”
As for his own performance, you sense that Thomas’s ghost could come back, pat Rhys on the back and tell him he’s doing a good job – but even then still he’d question the praise.
Putting on two stone in weight for the part, Rhys wanted the extra pounds to go on his face to give him the famous Thomas jowls.
Instead it has turned into a beer pot that is only discernible if he breathes out and arches his back.
He laughs and jokes when I demand that he displays it, jumping up and posing.
The look is important to getting Rhys into the role and the right mindset.
He has a wig of dark curls to offset his blue eyes which can easily burn with intensity and then twinkle with a mischievous glint. This very Thomas trait is also a typically Rhys one.
Focusing on a year in Thomas’s life, the film is the baby of producer Rebekah Gilbertson and writer Sharman Macdonald, Knightley’s mother.
It was six years ago that Bala-born Gilbertson decided to use the story as a film to adapt at film school; the tales had been part of her upbringing.
The story is based on her grandparents, Vera and William Killick, and their close friendship with Dylan and Caitlin Thomas.
As Vera joins the Thomases in New Quay her husband goes to war, only to return later to have rumours about affairs ringing in his ears.
He vents his frustration by scaring Thomas with a machine gun after an argument in The Black Lion pub and narrowly escapes a stint in jail.
Decades later, and after William’s death, Gilbertson started work on the film and was approached by Macdonald, who wanted to write the script.
When Macdonald’s famous daughter became interested in, and attached to the project as an actress, The Edge of Love – or The Best Time Of Our Lives, as it was originally titled – quickly took off.
The cast and crew already have one successful week of filming under their belt, and as well as capturing the interest of the world’s media they are positive about heading into the heart of the filming.
It is still early days, though. So far, the location scenes have been precursors to the main action, which will be filmed at Pinewood Studios.
And Rhys himself is waiting to film scenes that will provide the emotive backbone of the movie and give him the chance finally to sink his teeth into the dialogue and the drama of The Edge of Love.
He says, “It is quite good to start off with the bitty scenes [in New Quay]. We will have the really big, big scenes in Pinewood, by when we should have hit our stride.”
Pinewood for the last two weeks of filming will offer the actors shelter from prying eyes, because on location in Wales every moment of the process is under intense scrutiny – not just from the tourists or residents, who gather to watch the day’s filming, but from the press.
The attention was inevitable, given that two of the hottest British female leads in film – Miller and Knightley – are at the centre of the action.
Pictures of them in costume or just relaxing in Wales can sell for thousands of pounds but the paparazzi, who have besieged the set since the first day of filming earlier this month, are after something more implausible.
When the film was first announced, actress Lindsay Lohan was linked to the Caitlin role and she reportedly told MTV that the movie has “somewhat of a lesbian undertone”.
Chinese whispers being what they are, this developed into lesbian kisses and a fabled menage a trois.
The cast and crew have always maintained these scenes didn’t exist in the original draft and in fact the only naked body to be seen is that of Rhys – filmed in the bath, quite alone.
A baffled Macdonald even said of the rumours, “What sex scene? It’s a friendship between women. Does one have to define that as lesbian? I don’t mind, but really!”
Yet this hasn’t stopped the hunt for “the kiss” picture which has led to photographers hiring boats – and sinking in once instance – off the West Wales coast. Or falling out of trees in an attempt to catch the ultimate cash cow.
“It is like a herd of locusts,” says Rhys, who still can’t get over the attention the film has attracted.
“I’ve seen [their behaviour] on television, but I never realised what they were like before. All you get is click, click, click.”
He rolls his tongue and imitates a myriad of cameras going off in one go.
“It’s fine for me. I don’t feel the intrusion – but it is bad for the girls.”
He feigns mock offence, throws his hand to his forehead and cries, “They’re [the paparazzi] not interested in me, the b******!”
As lunch break ends, the crew head down to New Quay’s pier to set up for an afternoon of filming.
Crowds are held back behind barriers and about 40 crew members work, and wait, on the pier.
In the background, dolphins can be seen in the sea and, yards away, behind a police line on the beach, 12 photographers stand in a line.
There they have a perfect view of the actors through their long lenses.
And today, they’re in luck because Miller and Knightley are shooting scenes which feature them hugging and running down the pier with the wilful abandon of young, carefree women.
All eyes are on the duo as make-up artists apply the touch-ups, Oscar-nominated costume designer April Ferry makes sure their authentic ’40s outfits are intact, the stills photographer shoots away and the DVD director doubles up on footage with director Maybury, who is glued to his Super 8 camera.
It’s a longer wait to see Rhys in action as Thomas, as his scene is one of the last of the day.
Cast members slowly arrive, including singer Lisa Stansfield, a three-legged dog, a few babies and a toddler dressed in a striped jumper and wellies while, on the sand, crew members build sandcastles next to a striped windbreaker and deck chairs.
When he finally arrives on set, Rhys looks comfortable – no hint of his trepidation now – and follows Maybury’s direction to lie relaxed in a wooden boat, marooned on the beach.
With his legs out of the boat and a striped parasol placed over his face, he seems happy and confident from where I’m standing.
With little fanfare – there are no loud calls of “Action!” or “Cut!” – the scene begins.
While Knightley’s Vera holds her baby in her arms, Miller’s Caitlin comes to her husband in the boat, swigs from a bottle and climbs in for an embrace.
It’s not the kiss the photographers have been waiting for, but they still snap away.
Encouraging the toddler, who is playing the Thomases son Llewellyn, to join them in the boat, Rhys lifts him over his head and they play out a wonderfully happy scene.
Idyllic and picturesque it may be, but this is the calm before the storm in the film and seems to capture perfectly the relationship between the Killicks and the Thomases.
It’s rather different from Rhys’s first scene as the famous poet, when he tapped into his fiery temperament and argued with his on-screen wife.
A couple of months ago, this scene would have been played out with Hollywood favourite Lindsay Lohan, until she pulled out of the project.
Rhys goes along with my suggestion that it was meeting him that put her off. “Yeah, what happened there?” he laughs. “I had a cup of coffee with her and she’s no longer on the film.
“It’s all shrouded in secrecy”, he adds playfully before saying, “I’m not saying she bottled it.”
He’s delighted with his “new” on-screen wife Miller, though.
“I was really very happy when I heard Sienna was Caitlin. She has a lot of Caitlin’s qualities – she is the life and soul, spirited and is like a whirling dervish. She brings all that.”
The cast all bonded weeks ago in the rehearsal period, during which they even went to the real Wheatsheaf pub.
Legend has it that this is where Thomas first spotted Caitlin Macnamara drinking gin. It was an instant attraction that inspired him to walk up to her, lay his head in her lap and ask her to marry him.
“The first few days were very easy,” recalls Rhys. “We were all sat around the table talking, and very little has changed.”
As one of the oldest of the main cast – Cillian Murphy, who plays William, is two years his junior – the Welshman says he failed miserably at bonding with his female counterparts on subjects like children’s television.
Joking that he is old at 32, he launches into a anecdote that his discussion of Will o’ the Wisp with his two main co-stars was met with blank faces.
“When I was 10, Sienna was three and Keira was just two,” he explains.
But playing a Thomas in his 20s should be no problem for Rhys, who managed to pass for a teenage Romeo in an RSC season only three years ago.
And as for bonding, at least the cast could all turn “method” and head down the pub for a spot of team-building over a few drinks.
“We had a lot of wine. Well, the characters were big drinkers,” he says in their defence.
“We are getting on well though. I am always loathe to say it as it is very rare that you don’t get on with other actors. But it is true.
“Everyone really cares about the film. Keira obviously has a strong link to it as it’s her mother’s script, but Sienna really cares for it as well.”
From 10am to 10pm or 8am to 8pm for eight weeks, everyone involved with the film is giving it their all.
For Rhys it is a personal challenge, his own steep hill to climb as a Welshman playing the ultimate Welshman.
But he wouldn’t change the journey for anything. “I would have done it for free,” he says.
For him, you know this really is a job of a lifetime. And one he’s doing straight from the heart.