Ralph Fiennes on choosing acting roles: “I like characters who have contradictions within them”

In the new film “Conclave,” based on the novel by Robert Harris, Ralph Fiennes is a Vatican insider. The cardinal is tasked with leading the meeting of the entire College of Cardinals in Rome to select a new pope.

The film is partly set in the Sistine Chapel, literally “the room where everything happens” when it comes to electing a pope. But as presented in the film, don't let it go.

Conclave, which also stars Stanley Tucci, John Lithgow and Isabella Rosselini, is a suspenseful thriller with a shocking ending that you just don't expect. As Cardinal Thomas Lawrence, Fiennes navigates the intrigue, even treachery, of papal politics – a reluctant player consumed by doubt. He tells the assembled cardinals: “If there were only certainty and no doubt, there would be no mystery and therefore no need for faith.”

This “Doubting Thomas” is a typical Ralph Fiennes character. “I like characters who have contradictions within them,” he said. His reaction to reading Lawrence's role was, “Oh, I love that, that's a human being.” He is not a saint. He’s a good man trying to find his way.”

“I was raised Catholic and then rebelled at 13,” Fiennes said. “My mother was a staunch Catholic. That's why 'God questions' have been common in my family since I was a child.”

Did he find answers to his own questions? “No, I asked more questions,” he said.

In a key scene with Cardinal Bellini (played by Tucci), Lawrence von Fiennes reveals that even his ambivalent character has ambitions to become pope.

“I used to think that acting was about becoming someone else – you completely changed and were unrecognizable,” he said. “To a certain extent it can be about that. But as I got older, I thought, no. The springboard is yourself.”

To watch a trailer for “Conclave,” click on the video player below:

In “The Return,” which will be released in December, Fiennes, now 61, plays Odysseus, the once proud king who finally returns home after the Trojan War. “He's exhausted. He is emaciated and, I think, not a warrior at all,” he said. “He is weakened as a man.”

Fiennes had to physically change for the role: “We said he should look ropey – like he'd literally been at sea.”

Odysseus slowly regains his identity and finally comes face to face with his wife Penelope, played by Juliette Binoche.

The opportunity to work again with Binoche, a long-time friend, convinced Fiennes to make the film (their third film together). “We were given these famous iconic pieces,” Fiennes said. “It might sound a bit airy and fairy, but I think all the actors have, Oh, this role has come to me and I am destined for it. I don't know how it's going to turn out, I'm supposed to do this, it's come to me and this other person is doing it.“

“The English Patient” was another example for both. The film won nine Oscars, including Best Supporting Actress for Binoche. Fiennes received one of his two career Oscar nominations.

He's played dozens of unique characters, good And bad, both in films and in plays. Alongside Gustave in The Grand Budapest Hotel, he was Voldemort, a noseless monster in the Harry Potter series and a Nazi concentration camp commandant in Schindler's List.

We last saw Fiennes on “Sunday Morning” in 2022on stage as Robert Moses, supremely confident, power-hungry, the man who shaped New York City in the 20th century, in the play “Straight Line Crazy.”

Speaking about acting in New York last week, Fiennes described the excitement of playing arrogance: “You get a sports car that you can rev with anger and contempt, and there's no compromise, and it's shocking,” he said. “But it is exciting to play. This is how you challenge your audience: Argue with me if you dare, you won't win. I know the answer. And that is a big provocation.”

Teichner asked, “Have any of the characters you played influenced your life after you played them?”

“Characters mark you,” Fiennes replied. “There is often a kind of sadness when you enjoyed playing a role and gave it your all. It's not that you let go of the role, but you feel a kind of mental exhaustion. “It takes time” to just shake it away.

But only until another role finds him…

“Sometimes people say, 'What do you want to play?' And I could tick off a few Shakespeare parts or well-known Ibsen parts. But actually it's not like I'm surprised by a new script that I've never heard of and you go, Oooh, yes. Oh my god, what's new? I haven't heard of it, I haven't read the source material. And it all feels, it feels good, it feels right.”

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The story was produced by Mikaela Bufano and Reid Orvedahl. Editor: Carol Ross.

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