Joe Alwyn: the Crouch End boy taking Hollywood by storm

On the stage of a private screening room in The May Fair Hotel, a six-foot-one, 26-year-old Crouch Ender is shifting uncomfortably in his seat. In front of him is an audience that includes Hugh Laurie, Lily Cole, Jay Jopling, Stanley Tucci and both of his parents: all of whom are here for the unveiling of his first-ever film, Billy Lynn’s Long Halftime Walk.

Joe Alwyn’s discomfort might be down to the fact that, on stage, the film’s director — three-time Oscar winner Ang Lee — is midway through singing his praises. ‘One minute into the first audition, for me it was a done deal,’ gushes the man behind Brokeback Mountain and Life of Pi. ‘He was an absolutely top-notch talent. I could smell it from two miles away.’ Or it might be down to the fact that he is very, very new to all of this.

When Lee called two years ago, Alwyn was still training, in his final year of studies at the Royal Central School of Speech and Drama. Now he’s the toast of Tinseltown, with The Hollywood Reporter having recently dubbed him ‘The Next Big Thing’.

Even by La La Land standards, it has been an extremely swift rise. So when we meet a few hours prior to the screening, it does not come as a surprise that he admits to being out of his depth from the off. With zero film, zero television and only some drama school stage work under his belt, he had no idea what to expect from the audition process for Lee’s ‘anti-war, pro-soldier’ project. An adaptation of Ben Fountain’s bestseller, the film tells the story of a 19-year-old Texan marine and reluctant hero of a firefight in Iraq who, with his platoon, is paraded as part of the half-time entertainment at a 2004 Thanksgiving American football game. ‘Even after they asked to see me in New York, I didn’t realise the gravity of it, or the opportunity,’ he says, scratching his head. ‘I didn’t think it was necessarily going to happen — it was just an adventure to go over there and meet Ang.’

There was only one problem. At the audition, Alwyn was so lacking in expectation, that he packed light. Very light. ‘I’d never been to America, and I was told I’d be going home the next day. So I turned up with a tiny little rucksack and a pair of boxers and a T-shirt. And it was freezing and snowing in New York. I wore all the layers I had with me to try and a) be warmer and b) beef myself up to look something like a soldier. And then,’ he exhales, ‘it very quickly spiralled.’

Alwyn was asked to stay on in New York and meet the producers. Then he was asked to fly to Atlanta for screen tests. It was explained that ‘a studio is normally going to take a known face in a lead role because that’s what will bring people to see it, and bring budget.’ But Lee was determined to get his man. Alwyn ran out of hope that he’d be going home any time soon. And he also ran out of pants. ‘As I was going to the airport to fly to Georgia, we literally ran across the road to go to Gap to grab some boxers and T-shirts,’ he smiles.

After a week in Atlanta, Alwyn was finally able to fly home — briefly. On his first day back, he was sitting in his childhood bedroom when his agent called at 1am. The part was his. ‘I texted my mum and dad in their room, “I got it,”’ he says. ‘And then three days later I was gone.’

Alwyn is the son of a psychotherapist mother and documentary-maker father. ‘When I was growing up my dad was away a lot,’ he says. ‘He did a lot of work in crisis zones, places like Uganda or Rwanda. When your dad comes back from a faraway land with bows and arrows and spears wrapped up in a carpet... that’s cool.’ Nonetheless, he doesn’t think his dad’s career behind the camera had any bearing on his ‘secret’ desire to pursue a career in front of it. Similarly, when it came to understanding the PTSD that afflicts battle-scarred Billy, he bats away the suggestion that his mum might have been able to provide some professional insight. ‘I mean, she’s good with people and she’s good at listening, and if I want to talk about something, she’s great. But she’s my mum.’

He attended the fee-paying City of London School, but quickly heads off the notion that he’s another actor riding opportunities born of privilege. ‘I got there on a combination of scholarship and bursary,’ he says. ‘And because it offers bursaries and scholarships, you had people from all over. I liked that.’ Later, he studied English and drama at the University of Bristol, then continued his studies back at Central. It was here, in his final months, that his new agent suggested making an audition tape for Lee, who — as producer Marc Platt later noted — had ‘searched and searched’ in his efforts to find the right Billy Lynn. It turned out that an unknown, unproven Brit was just the chap he was looking for.

On set, Alwyn found himself in almost every scene, many of them heavy two-handers with his more experienced co-stars — Kristen Stewart, Garrett Hedlund and Steve Martin. He, of course, knew of Stewart, and her fame (though he clarifies that rumours of him being a ‘Twihard’ are wildly exaggerated). ‘Probably unconsciously I learnt from her,’ he notes. ‘I think we were both feeding off each other. But we talked about the scenes, particularly the final one, because it’s quite intense and emotional. So we made a decision to just jump in and do it.’

Two months after his film debut, Alwyn landed another, very different, literary adaptation of Julian Barnes’ Booker-winning The Sense of an Ending. By the time it’s released in April, he will be shooting a psychological thriller called Keepers, which will co-star Peter Mullan and Gerard Butler.

Despite his lack of experience Alwyn is already wary of the fame game. Yes, people recognise him now a bit — he was asked for a selfie in Soho recently while listening to music (he was an adolescent Eminem obsessive who now likes a bit of everything). No, he won’t be telling us his relationship status. Yes, he really should get a place of his own, but he’s in no rush to leave the sanctity of his mum and dad’s. His mates are still the mates he’s had from the age of 12.