Interview: Dominic Cooper

Outspoken, controversial, coarse. Dominic Cooper tells Tony Earnshaw about playing legendary painter AJ Munnings in a new biopic.
Dominic Cooper as AJ Munnings and Emily Browning as Florence Carter Wood in Summer in February and as Uday Hussein, son of Saddam, in The Devil's Double, below.Dominic Cooper as AJ Munnings and Emily Browning as Florence Carter Wood in Summer in February and as Uday Hussein, son of Saddam, in The Devil's Double, below.
Dominic Cooper as AJ Munnings and Emily Browning as Florence Carter Wood in Summer in February and as Uday Hussein, son of Saddam, in The Devil's Double, below.

In the 1940s Alfred “AJ” Munnings was President of the Royal Academy and a knight of the realm. As one of our greatest living artists he had the Establishment running through his veins.

But flash back 30 years to 1913 and Munnings was at the heart of a swinging band of painters locked away in blissful isolation in Lamorna, in west Cornwall. Here Munnings was the charismatic leader of a colony of like-minded souls that included Harold Knight and his wife Laura (later Dame Laura). And it was there that he embarked on a marriage that was to end in disaster and, ultimately, tragedy.

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The biopic Summer in February charts the tumultuous love affair between Munnings and aspiring artist Florence Carter Wood.

Dominic Cooper’s career has enjoyed a tremendous upswing in the last few years. First came The History Boys. Then Mamma Mia! Then The Duchess and An Education. Then Tamara Drewe and The Devil’s Double.

“Munnings is such a wonderfully broad character with so much personality – and people had so much to say about him,” says the 35-year-old Londoner.

“There is a fantastic recording that went out live on the wireless just before he stepped down as president of the Royal Academy, which gave an indication of who this man was. He went on and on, rambling about his disdain toward modern art and change in the art world.

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“Obviously I’m playing him much younger, but you get an immediate idea of his opinions. Some people found him utterly obnoxious and impossible to get on with and others quite enjoyed his directness and opinionated views on everything.”

Munnings’ obnoxious nature is evident in Summer in February. Here is a man utterly confident in his abilities as a painter and equally confident in his charm with the ladies. He may have been a great artist but he was also shallow, a philanderer, a needy attention-seeker and a boorish bully.

The film, directed by Christopher Menaul, hints at Munnings’ darker side. One sequence shows him threatening his new bride for the sexless state of their union. Indeed Florence (Emily Browning) took cyanide on her wedding day. She survived but it was hardly the best start to a marriage…

“To play Munnings is great fun because he doesn’t care what people think,” adds Cooper. “He knows what he likes. He is a skillful artist and wonderfully creative. He enjoys people and he enjoys offending people and seeing how far he can push them. All of that is really enjoyable for an actor to play. I hope some of the nuances of his personality come through – it’s very bold and very strong.”

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In Menaul’s film Munnings is surrounded by friends, acolytes and fellow artists. Yet his closest friend was not an artist. Gilbert Evans was a part-time soldier who organised working spaces for the painters in the colony.

To assist in setting female hearts racing he is played by 29-year-old Dan Stevens, aka Downton Abbey’s Matthew Crawley. Two rival heartthrobs in one film. Cooper laughs at his memories of people’s reactions.

“People seem to ask him [about Downton] a lot. It’s difficult when you’ve been in something as successful as that because you feel you should appreciate it for what it is and what it’s done for you and your career. And at the same time it’s one of those things that just sticks with you and people will always talk about. You have to just find a way of enjoying that. It’s the same with Mamma Mia! with me. It’s always mentioned on a daily basis.”

Playing Munnings meant Cooper, perhaps inevitably, tried his hand at art. “You’re desperate to be remotely good at it, which I wasn’t. We had lessons. It was important for us to look like we knew what we were doing. We all aspire to be good. I was always dreadful at it and still am.”

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Did he go down the Method route and practice until his hands bled? Cooper smiles.

“Not a great deal but just enough to make it look like you understood the distance and the relationship between the brush and the canvas. Unlike most films we were all in this one particular area – this beautiful part of Cornwall, Lamorna Cove.

“There was this old country pub that they actually drank in, called The Wink. There was only ever one customer sitting at the end of the bar. We sat there every evening and discussed the issues of the day and the project exactly as they would have done. It was wonderful to have that companionship.”

Summer in February (15) is on nationwide release.

History boy to renowned artist

Dominic Cooper was born in 1978 in Greenwich, London. He trained at the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art (LAMDA), graduating in 2000. He first worked in television and film before making his stage debut in Mother Clap’s Molly House at the National Theatre in 2001. 
Cooper was involved in Alan Bennett’s 2006 play The History Boys from its first reading. He also toured with the production to Broadway, Sydney, Wellington and Hong Kong and appeared in the film adaptation of the play. He was nominated for several awards for both the stage and film versions.