Last night the building site in central London that used to be Leicester Square was restored temporarily to its former glory for the premiere of War Horse. We were there, and managed to have a few very interesting conversations with some of the cast and crew of the movie, including Jeremy Irvine, who spoke about his experience working with Spielberg, Emily Watson on how seeing the play affected her performance and Richard Curtis on the influence Blackadder played on the script.

JEREMY IRVINE – ALBERT
ON WORKING WITH HORSES
I’m not really an animal person, I wasn’t expecting to at all. Within a week I was bleary eyed like everyone else. I’m a sucker for them now. And you have to, because you can’t really fake that.

ON WORKING WITH SPEILBERG
Just to have lines is an honour – just to be in a movie. To be in a film from Stephen Speilberg is beyond what I can take in. He’s a lovely man.

EMILY WATSON – ROSE NARRACOTT
ON THE INFLUENCE OF THE PLAY ON HER PERFORMANCE
I saw Bronagh Gallagher play it – she was wonderful, and that amazing, gritty strength that she had – she came on stage all guns blazing right from the off.

ON ROSE
I think she has very fierce love. She’s very tough about it. She tolerates her husband’s drinking because she knows he’s damaged by war. She has to teach her son respect for his father, and ultimately going to war teaches him that.

RICHARD CURTIS – SCREENWRITER
ON THE CONSTRAINTS OF ADAPTING AN EXISTING PROPERTY FOR A CREATIVE DIRECTOR LIKE SPIELBERG
What was interesting is that, when Stephen first asked me to do it, I didn’t say yes, I said ‘wait’, then I went away, and came up with the ten things that I thought I should do. Then Stephen gave me eight marks out of ten, and I did those eight things, so in a way, we were always working on the stuff that I had wanted to do in the first place, and then, of course, it was his reaction to that stuff.

THE INFLUENCE OF BLACKADDER ON THE FILM
The only thing I’ll say is that Blackadder did teach me that you could deal with the most serious thing in the world, and put in a few jokes still. So I did feel free, once in a while, to try and be a little bit funny.

EDDIE MARSAN – SGT FRY
WORKING WITH SPIELBERG
He’s like all the very successful ones, his enthusiasm hasn’t waned. He’s still as enthusiastic as he was when he made his first film. That seeps through, you become enthusiastic, you enjoy it, and you relax.

ON THE DIFFERENCES (OR LACK OF) BETWEEN WORKING ON LARGE PROJECTS AND SMALL
My job as an actor is to be able to do it in any conditions, in any environment, and to be consistent. I just turn up and do it really, I don’t worry about the size. When the camera’s on me, it’s just me.

ON WHO HE WOULD LIKE TO WORK WITH NEXT
I’d love to work with Shane Meadows, I think he makes great films.

PATRICK KENNEDY – CHARLIER WAVERLY
ON THE DYNAMIC BETWEEN HIM, HIDDLESTON AND CUMBERBATCH
We did five weeks of horse training together beforehand, which was a great bit of acting research. I knew Benedict very well, we’d worked together before. I didn’t know Tom that well, so we got to work together, get to know each other and work on our parts while we were doing our horse training. It was perfect training to be cavalry officers in the film. We were all playing such different characters, so there was a friendly competitiveness about the horse riding, but apart from that it was very supportive.

ON THE CAVALRY CHARGES
We did that scene. Anytime we were on camera, we did that charge. That was one of the most exciting moments of my life. You’re sort of crying with the adrenalin at the end of it, and you get some sort of imaginative insight into what a cavalry charge would have been like. There were 200 horses we were doing it with.

DAVID KROSS – GUNTHER
ON FILMING HIS FINAL SCENE IN THE FILM
I remember when we were shooting it, it was really horrible. It was dark, and the light was shadowy, so it didn’t feel very nice. We did the little stunt ourselves, and there was a loud noise, and we fell down. It was horrible, but also it’s good to get shot in a film at some point.

ON HIS RELATIONSHIP WITH THE HORSES, AS WELL AS ON-SCREEN SIBLING LEONHARD CAROW
It was great, because we had such a long preparation – about two months. We were around the horses a lot, and we felt safe around them. That helped, I think.

ON HIS FUTURE CAREER
I think the best thing would be that I don’t really care about the language, that I can do English films and German films and it doesn’t really matter. It’s all about the project in the end.

CELINE BUCKENS – EMILIE
ON EMILIE
I feel like I can relate to the character because she’s very stubborn, and so am I, unfortunately. She’s a great character. The horses are an inspiration to her, and give her a will to live, which I think is really inspiring.

THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN EMILIE AND HER GRANDFATHER
Neils Arestrup [the Grandfather] is such a wonderful actor. He made the job easier for me because just watching him is breathtaking. I get along really well with my grandmother, so I could relate in that sense.

ON THE SOURCE OF THE LIGHTNESS IN THE TONE OF HER SECTION OF THE FILM
It’s a moment of lightness in a film where there’s quite intense war sequences. I think it’s a bit of everyone, because obviously the acting’s vital, but Michael Morpurgo’s story, originally, is what makes it so light.