Do you have the time you need to spend with your director when you're making a film as complex as this?

BB: Less so on this one, because I come from a theatre background, I'm used to a month's rehearsal, which obviously on a film you don't get, at all. But they're very good, it's a very patient set, because you've got special effects, animals and children. So it's a very patient family feel to the set. If you need the time, you can certainly have it.

But at the same time, there's a lot of pressure on such a big budget movie, to get every shot on time. Often, you might have to sit on the horse, and look slightly up and to the left, as opposed to, "what's my motivation for this bit." Sometimes you just have to do that. And it's frustrating as an aspiring, eager actor, wanting to do everything by the book, but then you watch a couple of tiny bits back and you realise that, "actually, I should have looked up and to the left, and just shut up."

Sometimes I think there's definitely a case for that, but at the same time when you come from theatre, from sort of through lines and motivations, there are moments when it's frustrating, you know, when you feel you've done a great take, but you the horse was a little antsy during it so you have do redo it for the horse, so whatever.

When you first read the book, what did you think of Prince Caspian as a character?

BB: Well, obviously I had a slightly different image of him, because when you're eight, you imagine him being around your own age. That's how you read books like that, when you're that age, and he also has curly blonde hair, and all this. So you imagine something slightly different, and obviously my image of it was tainted from the TV series.

But Caspian is also a character that things basically just happen to, C.S. Lewis doesn't really spend time fleshing out character. He might describe it in an adjective, like Susan the gentle, or Peter the magnificent, but Caspian doesn't get one, so you're blind from that point of view. He's more of an everyman, than a proactive hero or proactive anything, really.



So we had to find our way with it and we made the decision to make the Telmarines... you know, in the book it says "descended from the Pacific islands, and women and pirates", so they made a decision to make them that swarthy European bearded race. And I'm the only young one. So obviously when they decided to make them Spanish-esque, that gives you a different sort of view on what they're trying to achieve. And so I could draw inspiration from the actors playing the rest of my family, and playing the generals, who presumably I've been trained by as a young man, and all this.

So I'm guessing you did get an opportunity to define who this guy was?

BB: Yeah, from my point of view, absolutely. It was a new take on it, and by necessity, because the kid actors have grown up now, because William is 21, and Caspian's the same age as Peter. We had to make a decision to make them the same age and slightly more mature, slightly older, because otherwise you've got 20 year olds running around, pretending to be kids, which is insane.

And also because in the Dawn Treader, you've got more of an established man; because they were intending to shoot them back to back, it was more sensible to have a 26 year old playing younger, than a 15 year old trying to play a king. It would be farcical in this day and age, and I think with all these stories, you have to make them more accessible and more contemporary for the audience it's aimed at, and also audiences who have enjoyed the first one have grown up slightly too, to I think it's a valid change.



But it was all those things I was telling you about earlier; his ambivalence about being a leader, his concern about whether vengeance is the best policy, his discovery that he has to turn in his own family because they've murdered his own father, those are the things that are really interesting about Caspian to me. And I'm sure those weren't the things that were interesting to me about Caspian when I was a kid. I'm sure when I was eight, the thing that was cool was the fact that he was a kid who had a sword, and a horse.

Are you hoping to carry on and make the next film? Are you signed on for that?

BB: I am, I'm signed on for the Dawn Treader, we start at the end of the year, in November I think.

That's quite a quick turnaround after the release.

BB: Well it was going to start straight away, but then we had problems with the strike, and exam schedules for children, and little things like that, so we're taking our time with it, which I think is probably sensible. The first one was great, and this one's going to be even better, no doubt. You have to take the time to make the next one better.

And presumably at least it'll give you a chance to rest after what'll be some incredibly intensive international press and PR.

BB: Well you know, I'm 26, who wants to rest? I want to make films, so we'll have to see what's on the horizon.