The original film earned Australia’s Russell Crowe an Oscar in 2001 – and it looks like Irish It boy Paul Mescal could be on track for a trophy of his own when Gladiator II hits cinemas on November 14.
It’s been a meteoric rise for Mescal, who shot to fame during the pandemic for his starring role opposite Daisy Edgar Jones in 2020’s Normal People adaptation. It was his first screen role fresh out of drama school and he hasn’t stopped booking gigs since.
But it’s not all work and no play for the guy who brought Gaelic football shorts to the forefront of fashion. It’s also worth mentioning he’s now the leading man in singer Gracie Abrams’ life.
The 28-year-old, who’s now officially in his blockbuster era, tells WHO that landing the role in the Ridley Scott epic is life-changing. In the movie, he plays Lucius, the grandson of Rome’s former emperor Marcus Aurelius, and the son of Lucilla and Maximus, played by Crowe in the original.
It’s a case of deja vu in the sequel, when Roman soldiers led by General Marcus Acacius (Pedro Pascal) invade, killing Lucius’ wife and forcing him into slavery. If it’s anything like the original, fans are likely to need a hefty box of tissues at the ready.
Earlier this year, Crowe memorably revealed to an interviewer that he was “slightly uncomfortable” with Ridley Scott creating a sequel to the original Gladiator – and Mescal admits there’s “a lot of pressure” to continue the legacy.
“I think this film wears the legacy of the first film with intense pride and honour, but I think it takes it in a direction that drives that honour and respect through the roof,” he tells WHO. “I think it’s made by the only man who could ever touch it in Ridley Scott. And personally as, like, his friend and his long admirer, I think it’s one of his finest pieces of work that I’ve seen in recent times, and I’m so utterly proud of his work, my work and everybody. I don’t think anybody can take that away from us.”
The associated hype positions the film as the most anticipated cinema release of 2024 – and being part of it means the world to Mescal.
“In casting me, this has totally changed my life … This film, to my mind, [is] one of the most epic I’ve seen, if I do say so myself, in the last 10, 15 years,” he says with a laugh.
Mescal’s giggle is one of the many things about him that have scored him a legion of fans. It’s a trait that stood out in his role as Connell in Normal People. And it might be something Abrams has found herself loving, too. Mescal and the 25-year-old singer were first linked when they were spotted on a date in London earlier this year. They’ve been seen numerous times together since. However, Mescal is uncomfortable about the interest in his private life.
“The speculation has been kind of mad for the last x amount of years,” he recently told GQ. “I’m not comfortable inviting any access into that part of my life. How I am in my private life is so precious to me because I get very little of it, and it might be public interest, but it’s not public-obligated information.”
What he will talk about, though, is work. And how Lucius is unlike any character he’s taken on. “Lucius represented something to me that I had never done before,” he says. “Somebody who is quite front-footed through the two-and-a-half hours … It’s something that has been kind of latently within me, something that’s more muscular, something that’s more full of something that people hadn’t seen.”