Rafferty Law: Jude Junior is here

The last time I laid eyes on Rafferty Law, near his home in Primrose Hill, he was six years old, a cherub crowned by a mass of blond ringlets. It was the summer of 2003. A few months later, the break-up of his parents, actors Jude Law and Sadie Frost, would be considered the end of a brief Britpop cultural era. The time of Rafferty Law’s birth marked the triumphant rise of New Labour, Cool Britannia and the so-called Primrose Hill set, a 1990s echo of the Bloomsbury set, which lured our attention away from Hollywood to the lives of the inhabitants of a small enclave in North London. For just under a decade, the exploits of the Primrose Hill set became the centre of the paparazzi’s world. The legends remain in the collective London psyche, but time has moved on. So much has happened since — the release of Frost’s candid autobiography, detailing her struggles with postnatal depression, multifarious headlines on the daily status of Law’s subsequent relationships, most notably with Sienna Miller, and, of course, phone-hacking — that I’m curious to see how their eldest son has turned out in the midst of all of this.

Rafferty Law is now on the eve of his 18th birthday, and as I sit in the reception of Soho’s Select model agency waiting for him, I can’t help imagining Jude Law’s furrowed brow hanging over me with a touch of menace. I’m about to take his son’s interview virginity, so to speak, and as I’ve met both his parents on several occasions, I feel rather nervous — Dad is not exactly a fan of the press at the best of times, let alone when it concerns one of his young brood. Suddenly, a face pops up before me. Composed, with steel-coloured eyes and fine bone structure, it could belong to Jude circa 1994 in his breakthrough role in Paul WS Anderson’s Shopping (the film in which he fell in love with Rafferty’s mother) were it not that it is also so feline, a physical quality passed down from Frost.

He introduces himself as Raff and holds the lift for me as we make our way to a nearby café — his parents have done a good job on his manners. ‘I don’t really like the name Rafferty,’ he confides later in a gentle mockney accent, an updated version of his father’s. Law is witty, laid-back and open, not defensive as I was expecting. He is a little excited, though, because he turns 18 tomorrow and will finally be ‘legal’. A big night out with his friends is planned at Soho club The Box, as well as a family dinner at The River Café along with his girlfriend, former England rugby captain Lawrence Dallaglio’s daughter Ella; their burgeoning amour has been well-documented on Instagram of late (more on this to come).

There are even more reasons for Law to be energised. He recently made his fashion debut as a model for DKNY, and Tiger of Sweden, as well as appearing in the pages of British Vogue. More importantly to Law, his band The Dirty Harrys — which he founded a year and a half ago with his best friend Marley Mackey, son of Pulp’s bassist Steve and stepson of Love magazine editor Katie Grand — are now playing regular gigs around London. Blur and The Clash are his biggest musical inspirations. Luckily for Law the Younger, these bands are not just distant guitar heroes. ‘I did work experience for Blur for two weeks when they were rehearsing for their reunion gig, because Damon [Albarn] is really good friends with my dad. I tuned their guitars and stuff,’ he says. He also knows Paul Simonon, The Clash’s erstwhile bass player. ‘He’s such a lovely guy. I know his sons Louis and Claude from around.’ Cora Corré, the daughter of Agent Provocateur founders Serena Rees and Joe Corré (whose parents are punk mavericks Vivienne Westwood and the late Malcolm McLaren), is one of Law’s best friends. ‘She has the coolest family, but she never talks about it. She’s so over it,’ he laughs fondly.

The connections are endless. It was somewhat inevitable that the progeny of the close-knit Primrose Hill set would eventually take over the baton and form Primrose Hill Mark II. Anaïs Gallagher, daughter of former locals Noel Gallagher and Meg Mathews, is a friend of Law’s sister, 14-year-old Iris. Then, of course, there’s Lila Grace, daughter of Iris’ godmother Kate Moss (who is married to The Kills frontman Jamie Hince); not to mention Radio 1 DJ Nick Grimshaw, the godfather of Law’s 12-year-old brother Rudy and a close friend of his mother. ‘I’ve known Grimmy forever. Somehow, he ended up living in the basement of my mum’s house after he moved down from Manchester when he was 20. I don’t know where he came from, he just appeared. Then he started pretty much living in the house itself,’ he sighs with mock weariness.

All this is simply everyday life to Law. Such frissons with the musical scene extend back generations on his mother’s side. Frost, who grew up in Primrose Hill, was married to Spandau Ballet guitarist Gary Kemp from 1988 to 1995, with whom she has a son, 24-year-old Finlay. Her stepfather, the rock photographer Robert Davidson, photographed Frank Zappa and The Move, and her father, the late David Vaughan, was a psychedelic artist in the 1960s, who painted Paul McCartney’s piano and The Kinks’ car, as well as helping to organise one of Jimi Hendrix’s first gigs at the Roundhouse in Camden. The Dirty Harrys recently played an acoustic set at a retrospective of Vaughan’s work, put on by Frost and The Kinks’ Ray Davies.

But Law’s father is not without his musical influences: ‘My dad took me to my first ever gig in New Orleans when I was seven: Robert Plant from Led Zeppelin.’ As a child, the young Law also played saxophone, practising on the very instrument that his dad played as a beatnik rich kid in The Talented Mr Ripley.

Law was three when his father appeared in Anthony Minghella’s film: ‘I was so young. It’s just a blur, but I remember flashes of sunny Italy, and there are pictures of me running around with long, blond curly hair,’ he cringes. He often attended film sets on his father’s films. ‘Sherlock Holmes was cool. Robert Downey Jr. What a legend. My dad introduced me to him on set, and he just said, “Iron Man or Batman?” And I said, “Iron Man, definitely.” And he was like, “Good answer.” One of my favourite films of my dad’s is Dom Hemingway. I went to the premiere last year with my girlfriend. The opening scene! Jesus!’ This refers to Hemingway’s rapturous soliloquy dedicated to his own penis, delivered while on the receiving end of an act of fellatio in prison.

He has also witnessed his father’s thespian renaissance with turns as Hamlet and Henry V. Surely only a short leap would be needed for Law Jr to follow his actor father on to the stage and screen. Rudy has already appeared in a short film, produced and directed by his mother, but Rafferty insists that, although he has acted in school productions and enjoys going to see plays regularly with his theatrephile father, music is where his heart truly lies. ‘I did feel a bit of pressure when I joined my first boarding school [Bedales in Hampshire]. In my drama lesson, I think everyone thought: “Oh God, he’s going to be so brilliant.” Then they realised that I wasn’t that good, so they just let me get on with it.’

He is aiming to get an A* in his A level drama, which he is studying alongside English and photography at a college in Hampstead. ‘I’ve never been that hard-working, just enough to get by. I got an A, B and a C at AS level. The goal is to move them all up one grade. Once I’ve done that and shown my parents that I can work, then I can go and do my own thing,’ he says. ‘My dad is very strict. My mum is more chilled. If I miss a lesson, my dad comes down on me really hard.’ I ask Law if he’s a bit of a rebel — it wouldn’t be a surprise, given the laws of nurture and nature. ‘I don’t like being told what to do a lot of the time. That’s why boarding school didn’t go so well with me. I’ll conform if I respect my teacher, but if a teacher is rude to me, I’ll say something back to them.’ Fair enough. He has his father’s strong sense of justice. ‘I try to do the right thing. Sometimes my parents or school will disagree with me, but I’ve never gone out of control.’ Still, press rumours have circulated that Law Sr confided in his son’s godfather, Jonny Lee Miller, about his concerns for Rafferty’s welfare; to which Miller (allegedly) replied: ‘Jude. You were a maniac at 17. He’s a carbon copy of you.’ Indeed.

Law Jr does admit to being a difficult child. ‘I was pretty naughty. Very loud. I slept in my parents’ bed until I was six. They say they lost their social life for about five years. They’d spend hours trying to get me to sleep, and by the time they came downstairs, their friends would all have left.’

That’s not the way the press painted things. In those early years, his parents were deemed to be the ringleaders of the Primrose Hill party, their every movement followed by attendant paparazzi; dissected, speculated upon, scandalised and regurgitated. True or not, there has been a lot of muddy water under the proverbial bridge.

I wonder if he was ever embarrassed by his parents’ behaviour back then. ‘I used to hate it when my parents danced. My dad dancing? And my mum? It’s like the worst thing,’ he laughs. ‘But I’m nearly 18 now and I’ve seen pretty much everything they can do that’s embarrassing. So I’m past that stage now. They can’t really embarrass me any more.’