Artist Series: Frazer Hadfield
An interview, a conversation, an interrogation, a manifesto. This is the Lucky Rigatoni Artist Series. I value the searching, the longing, the process. These conversations are gently edited for clarity. When I interviewed Frazer back in March, he was in Paris with his fiancée, Catherine, who was there for work. As we spoke, he ambled along the cobbled streets, along the Seine, and our connection dipped in and out. Hello? Frazer? I can’t hear you? I can hear you, can you hear me?
Frazer Hadfield is an actor and musician living and working in London. He has appeared in the critically acclaimed television program, Frayed, and he loves digestive biscuits.
Kelsey Swintek: Alright we’re going. What did you think of my questions?
Frazer Hadfield: Ya they’re really cool. I feel like every time I talk about acting, it’s in danger of tipping into becoming, sort of, free therapy.
KS: Tell me more about that. Is it just because the delineation of self is so like, overlapped or?
FH: Yeah, I guess so. That's a nice way to put it.
KS: Yeah.
FH: I think the problem is, it is delineation of self. But it's also like—you know how people say, if your hobby becomes your job, get another hobby? I’ve not done that.
Acting for me, the craft of acting and everything, becomes so mixed up in the commercial venture. The commercial sort of business side of it is so shit. Everything gets wrapped up in that, and so the thing that I enjoy doing becomes a shitty sort of business-y thing. You know?
The business-y thing that I am pushing is myself. It’s all a big knotty ball of shit things with a nugget of really great stuff in the middle, that I occasionally get to access. But yeah, I dunno.
It's a funny time you're talking to me about this, actually. I think I'm feeling slightly more optimistic about the whole thing than I was recently. The hard thing about being an actor, especially the sort of the model of actor that I am, which is very much trying to get cast in stuff and do the jobs (rather than putting emphasis on making my own stuff and creating art that way)—I’m very dependent on the industry machine to offer me opportunities to display my craft.
When you see how the sausage gets made, when you see the inner workings of the industry and how unfair and horrible and twisty and knotty it all is. 95% of my time is dealing with that side of things, and you can become quite bitter. I just—Oh my god!
KS: What?
FH: Do you know that terrible Netflix film with Adam Sandler and Jennifer Aniston? Called Murder Mystery or something? I've never heard of it. Anyway, they're making the sequel in Paris at the moment.
Catherine told me that they’re filming in Paris and I've just stumbled across them. So I could see a massive amount of security, a big camera team, and I can see Adam Sandler and Jennifer Aniston sitting on the bridge.
KS: Oh my gosh, that's crazy!
FH: They’re right there. And they're getting paid insane amounts of money.
KS: Laughter
FH: Oh, that's so cool. It's so funny. I'm gonna send you a picture of a live update.
I work on big film sets and things now, and I still get so excited every time I see a film set in the wild.
KS: I love that. What makes you feel excited?
FH: It's the thing that always got me excited about acting. The practical machinery of filmmaking is quite exciting. Like being backstage, in the theater or, seeing the camera people. I always thought that was super exciting.
Seeing the whole thing — how many people are facilitating someone's craft, you know? That's a very, kind of, self centered way of thinking about that. Because it's like, oh, the actors that are doing the real artistic work. I don't mean that. But I always thought it was amazing.
Here’s a look at what I can see here — there's two actors who are standing, probably to do a ten second scene, a quick conversation, and there's maybe a hundred people here.
KS: Wow.
FH: And there's just gazebos everywhere. There's big film trucks, there's dressing trailers, there's loads of security, there's like three cameras.
When I'm doing it myself, it’s somehow not as exciting. But when I see it, it’s like, I wonder what's happening?!!? Just the sort of mystique, peeking behind the curtain and seeing. Everyone stops and takes pictures when there's a film set, because that's all what is it? People are inherently curious about that sort of stuff. I’m now walking completely the wrong direction. There’s something really secret about it, right? I mean, no one else knows what on earth is going on here. Because it’s not publicized. When you film out in the wild, when you're not in a studio, anyone can stumble across these sets. It might be the next big film in the world that's being shot and you happen to be in the background, or walking past and you see it on the big screen. That’s happened to me a few times.
KS: There's actually like, quite a lot of films made in Pittsburgh.
FH: Yeah, sure, it's exploding right? They've just built massive studios there.
KS: Yeah, I don't even know, but they frequently film like in the streets like five minutes from our house.
FH: I also imagine its cheap and can double as a lot of places in America.
KS: Yep, exactly. I think like famously all the Batman movies were made here. [Note: blatantly not true. The Dark Knight Rises was filmed here.] There's just enough unique-ish buildings in Pittsburgh and also like nothing-buildings and just like houses. You get it all! You get downtown, houses, whatever.
FH: You've got like a high-rise city view, which can double as any big city in the world.
KS: Yeah, yeah.
FH: Just talking about the mechanics of filmmaking makes me so excited. Even the job that Catherine was doing — watching her scout the locations in London, to try and see which streets they can make look most like Paris. Just things like that.
You'll watch the series and assume it's set in Paris. I watched something the other day that was set in the UK. It looked like the UK (it was Peter Rabbit. Catherine had to watch for work, I didn't voluntarily watch Peter Rabbit). But it's set in the Lake District, in the UK. But I know it was all shot in Sydney. It’s fascinating to see the bits of Sydney that that could maybe look a bit like, I don't know, Manchester, or whatever. Anyway, that was a boring aside.
KS: But so I'm happy that you're excited. Thank you, Jennifer Aniston and Adam Sandler and Netflix for facilitating this conversation. But so I started off with a kind of like, big picture question because, this is called an ‘Artist Series.’ You act for film and stage, you sing, you dance—
FH: I definitely don’t dance. Where you get dance from?
KS: Your COVID dance parties? Sure you don't dance professionally. But like, you could if you had to.
FH: One of my first auditions out of drama school, I turned up, I didn't really know what it was. It was for a musical. I turned up and thought I was going to sing. I had a song prepared and was dressed in boat shoes and chinos. I walked in and everyone was in active wear, stretching. The guys had their legs up over their heads, in splits.
I walked in and was like, oh fuck. It was a dance score for Priscilla Queen of the Desert. And so I was like, absolutely not. I rang my agent and walked out.
KS: Oh my god. I wish you did it.
FH: You hear horror stories. That's a common actors worst nightmare: he turns up to a dance audition and can't dance. I was living that nightmare.
KS: Okay, I'll edit that out. Fine. You don’t dance, or you don't audition for dance. But do you consider yourself an artist? How do you define being an artist in your work?
FH: We talked about it a little bit before. It's hard to delineate between the artistic creative side of things and the the horrible knotty business side of stuff. And so—oh my god, that's a massive dead rat.
KS: Ew.
FH: Because 95% of what I do is the business, struggling, horrible side of things, which is entirely transactional, and I'm made to feel so disposable. Not intentionally, it's just the way that the way that everything operates. Quite often, I don't feel like an artist. You know what? I don't really consider myself an artist.
When I think of actors who I'd consider artists, they are my peers and my friends who are the ones who are making their own stuff, finding that sort of creative outlet all the time, and that’s their main drive. The things that I do now, I often feel like a very small cog in a bigger machine. Even when I'm on set, doing kind of exciting things. There's not often that much room for me to be an artist, you know, within that kind of rigid framework. When I do theater, I kind of settle into a theater run, then yeah, I feel a bit more like an artist. I really only feel like an artist in fits and starts. It's quite a fleeting feeling. I feel like an actor. I feel like a professional actor rather than artist. They become very different things to me.
I really only feel like an artist in fits and starts. It's quite a fleeting feeling. I feel like an actor. I feel like a professional actor rather than artist. They become very different things to me.
KS: What's hard to identify is the way you measure success as an actor, from my point of view, as someone who knows nothing, but a really good actor is someone who you can't tell if they're acting, right?
FH: Sure.
KS: And so, the honing of your craft is not necessarily to make yourself as yourself as possible, but instead, as malleable to what the writers and directors and producers have intended for you to be. The work and the craft of what you're doing is most often, when it's done well, unseen, you know what I mean? Only people who really know you intimately can see how well you're doing, because they know who you are, and who you're being. Does that resonate?
FH: Is that how actors define success?
KS: I don't know. I think that like, yeah, I don't know.
FH: I guess that's one way. There’s sort of two strands to this all. There's a successful actor who is successful at acting. A good actor who is good acting and his craft is strong, you know? I know plenty of the most amazing actors that just have never worked professionally and will never get the opportunity to do that.
KS: Right.
FH: And then I know lots of actors that are shit, shit-shit at their craft and are massively successful, and are stood on a bridge in the middle of Paris doing a massive budget Netflix film, you know?
KS: Yeah.
FH: That’s not fair—I actually think that they’re quite good. But you know, you know what I'm saying?
KS: I do.
FH: Being an actor is so intrinsically wrapped up with being a celebrity, or being—actually, it’s not even that. It’s like, the mechanism of getting acting work in this sort of format (like professional acting work, where someone pays you to be on a film set, or whatever), the mechanism isn't always interested in who's best at their craft. Who is most talented? Or who has the most ability?
It’s often driven by far more superficial things—like, do they have the right length hair? Or do they have the right accent? You know, that sort of thing. And so quite often, these people who I don't necessarily think are fantastic actors, are actors who people think of as massively successful. And I know absolutely incredible actors who will never get that sort of success. I don't know, I don’t think that's the answer you're looking for.
KS: I’m not looking for an answer.
FH: In terms of the craft of acting, yeah, it sort of goes one of two ways, right? There's the actors that you can't tell that they're acting, others where the actors are like really, really, acting. Why do people love Jared Leto so much? Because he does more than anyone else, right? Well, I don’t love him. Why do people go mad for Robert Pattinson at the moment? Because he just gives absolutely mad performances. And people are like, Oh, right. Okay, so you're choosing to push the boat out there. On the completely other end of the spectrum are people like Tom Hanks, he never does anything. Or Martin Freeman, he never does anything. They're just there, aren’t they?
Yeah, I don't know. I think as well, as you can probably tell, from the way I'm speaking. After two years of not really doing much, and not acting that much, I’m trying to sort of reestablish what kind of actor I am. What makes me tick, who I like, who inspires me, what my relationship is with the industry, what my relationship with my craft is, and it's all sort of been massively muddled.
Pre-COVID, I was really riding my luck. I was presented with a lot of great opportunities and didn't really have the time to think about what I wanted to do, or how I wanted to hone my craft, or whatever. I was thrown into high-pressure situations — I was a small part of the large machine and I had to do the thing, and then move on to the next thing. So I guess I'm trying to reestablish my sort of, I don't know, my, I don't know what it is. I'm so hesitant to say, my art or my craft. I think I had a few years where I just didn't really know what I was doing.
KS: Yeah, that's scary. This kind of segues into my next question, like, you are trying to reestablish, you know, a relationship with your, I’ll say work. Upon reflection, what work would you say that you're most proud of?
FH: I’m proud in different ways about everything that I've done. Really, I never done anything that I’m not proud of, maybe just a couple of things that I think like, Oh, God.
KS: I won't ask about that. Ha.
FH: If you'd asked me a few months ago, I'd say Oh, yes. I was proud of being in a big TV series. You know, that's quite exciting! And I was proud of that. But actually, in terms of acting, I was proud of some of the stuff that I did in that, I guess. But TV is such a collaborative thing. When I watch myself back, I don’t often recognize the stuff that I see. Because it's so like, it's all cut and pasted. They change the context. There’s a manufactured performance, a performance manufactured by a director and an editor and all these other people in a room months after I've actually done the acting on the day, you know? I mean, look, I'm proud of the series. I think Frayed turned out really well. But in terms of in terms of work, where I think Yes, I'm happy with that and I'm proud of what I've done, I think of theater work. Just because it's so immediate, and you can feel when it's good. You can feel, I think as an actor, you can feel when you're nailing it, but only really when you do theater. Or at least for me. Only when I'm doing theater, because you've got people responding to you.
KS: Yeah.
FH: So you said about, that thing that I did in St Andrews right?
KS: Yeah. So I included in my question that my grandma raves about the performance you and Emma put on during Grad Week. It was at Aikmans, right?
FH: Yeah, I mean, it’s before I went to drama school. I’m sure like, in terms of my technical craft, there were things that I was doing wrong, or, weren't quite as polished as what it would have been now. There's a few times that I remember being on stage and going, you know what? this is, this is great. This is why I do it. This is what I love doing. And that was one of them. Honestly.
I mean, yeah, it’s student theater, I guess, but it was great student theater. And I was acting alongside someone else who a brilliant actor. We were all multi-roles, playing different characters and stuff. I remember sitting—I was playing an old man who'd just lost his wife, who sits and drinks a pint in the pub every night because that's what they used to do. It's like, quite a lovely, emotional monologue. Because it was Grad Week, my grandma was there. I remember looking at her while I was doing it, and she was crying, and I was crying. I had the thought — Oh, yeah. I feel like I'm doing it properly.
KS: Yeah.
FH: I was so proud of that. I was so proud of that show, in a way that I don't feel like I have been about anything that I've done professionally. Because it becomes something different. When it becomes your profession, there’s all these added extra layers. There's something so pure about student theater. Everyone’s there, investing all that time, like, so much time, into plays and into their craft. Everyone is only entirely focused on the craft. No one makes any money. No one's worried about money really, in that context. And so that gives you space to really focus on that. And, that's something that I think very, very rarely get again, because it's always layered with something else now. You know?
KS: Yeah. Wow.
FH: God I love that show. I was such a good show.
KS: It’s such a good show. I mean, you keep saying it's student theater, but my grandma said it was the best show she's ever seen. She was 88 at that time, you know, like she'd seen a lot.
FH: I don't think that they’re mutually exclusive. I think student theater can be amazing.
KS: Yeah, exactly. If anything, it's almost elevated, because people are so focused on the craft and you’re stripped away of all of the other pressures, in a way.
FH: That's all I did at St Andrews. Really. All I did was play, after play, after play. I'm very lucky in that sense. I got to play all these amazing roles that I didn’t get to play again, with people with people who massively cared about it. I mean, that’s the thing with student theater, it's a mixed bag terms of intrinsic ability.
KS: Laughs
FH: But the one thing is that everyone cares. Everyone cares so much about making it good.
KS: What is your relationship with music? Like because I think—
FH: Not good.
KS: Bad? Okay.
FH: Well, people always ask me this. It’s another thing that's been sort of bastardized by my career, if you like. I went to music school when I was little, so music has always felt like a job to me. It's never felt like a creative outlet, or very rarely felt like a creative outlet. Always felt like a job. We had a demanding schedule of choral services at the cathedral, oh my god I am getting attacked by a wasp - go!
I've surely told you the story about the way the music school operated. There was like an underground corridor of rooms, windowless rooms, that we would get put in for an hour in the morning and an hour in the afternoon. Teachers patrolled the corridors to make sure we were staying in our rooms, to make sure we were practicing. It was like solitary confinement practice. We had to knock on the doors if we wanted to go to the toilet. It was just like, I don't know. It was horrible. It wasn't necessarily the right environment to nurture my love of music, you know. It definitely made me a competent musician.
KS: “Competent.” Laughs.
FH: But that's the thing, I really felt competent. I felt useless when I was there, actually. I played piano and trumpet. The whole school worked so that there were like absolute geniuses, like complete geniuses, like violinists, pianists. And then the rest of the students were there to pay for them, you know? So, yeah, it really kind of instilled the feeling of being mediocre.
But you know what, I'm very grateful for it, because music has helped me pay my way. When I left there, I sort of began to enjoy playing music. You know, when I was at St Andrews, I used to play at the Fairmont.
KS: Yeah!
FH: Which was such a cushy gig. But also, like, incredibly depressing.
I used to get quite into it, because I was given free rein to do whatever I want. So I used to have a really good time, just like bashing away and trying different things out in this ghostly hotel, where there's no one ever there, and getting paid good money to do it. I distinctly remember one time really getting into it. I was doing some quite complex jazz improvisation, and thinking, this is great. Then I stopped at the end, and no one looked. No one even looked up from their dinner. I felt so invisible and so disposable and forgettable. It was like wallpaper. I became like wallpaper. It just becomes so boring.
In terms of acting, actually, there's a few times that I've done things thinking, like oh, God, this is getting boring. And when acting becomes boring, then it's slightly worrying. I’d think, oh god, I need to get out of it. It’s easy to tailor that stuff, I think.
Music now, yeah. Because music has become a tool by which to market me as an actor, it’s like an extra string for my bow. That means you get this part as well! Quite often, that part is standing at the back of a stage dressed in a funny costume. So I really try and separate it out. And I think I've done that quite successfully recently. As soon as I separate my music, as soon as I think of think of it as a job, rather than an artistic outlet. If I think of music, playing piano or whatever it is, as a job, as like a money job, then I actually start to enjoy it a lot more.
One of the things that I feel is when you're when you're afforded these creative opportunities professionally, there's so much pressure to be creatively sated by it all the time.
KS: Mmmm.
One of the things that I feel is when you're when you're afforded these creative opportunities professionally, there's so much pressure to be creatively sated by it all the time.
FH: Like, if I've got an acting job, and it's like, oh, I guess this is the chance for me to practice my craft! this is the chance for me to enjoy my craft! If I got a music job, then I can enjoy playing amazing music, you know? But actually, the reality of professional acting, or professional musicianship, is that quite often, the jobs don't give you the space to do that at all. I mean, say you get an acting job where you're playing Cafe Server Number One. You say, Hello, good morning, would you like a coffee? And that's it. There's all this pressure, like—Oh, I've got I've got an acting job in a TV series. I need to make it count!
I’ve started to realize that actually, you don’t. It can just be a job for the sake of being a job. Acting and music, that's my job. I'm making a living from it. When I've stopped punishing myself for not feeling creatively sated, by music jobs in particular, I’ve suddenly started to enjoy it. Does that make sense?
KS: Totally. 100%. It makes sense. I feel the same way about writing, like talking to other writers. People are like I work in corporate communications, I get to write every day! Like, okay, but you're not doing writing that makes you feel sated. Exactly what you're saying. You're using a skill that you have, that’s technically a creative skill, but it's not coming from a place of creativity when other people are paying you to do it a certain way.
FH: Exactly. Last week, last couple weeks, I told you I was playing piano for this comedian, Cat Cohen. And you know what? I actually had a blast doing it. She was playing at the Soho Theatre and Clapham Grand, big sold-out venues. She's got these absolutely adoring fans, and she's lovely. I thought she was great.
There's something so liberating about sitting at a piano, enjoying playing, knowing that I was earning money for doing it, also like, being in the shadows. I really enjoyed not being on the show, not feeling like I had to make my voice heard, not feeling like I needed to be creatively interesting. I was just doing the job. I was facilitating her art, you know?
KS: Yeah.
FH: And that was so enjoyable. Because the pressure comes off, right? And it was so freeing in a way that I've not felt with music for a while. Don’t get me wrong— I was playing technically good music.
KS: That's so cool. I can’t help but also think about when you played at the Fairmont. And it seems, it's like, they're so close, so similar in the sense of like, you're not necessarily the main attraction, like you're playing the piano, right? But for whatever reason—
FH: I think the difference is that with Cat Cohen, and the jobs I'm taking now in music, I’m professionally respected.
KS: Right.
FH: I’m like a hired gun. Right? They go, here's a guy who can come in and do the job that we need him to do. We don't have to worry about him.
KS: Yeah.
FH: I’m paid properly to do it. There's a certain level that's expected of me. But it's not about me. Like you do in any job, you can find the lightness and find the find the enjoyment, you know? Whereas at the Fairmont, what I was trying to do, or what I was initially was trying to do, was be amazing. Be an amazing piano player. And got absolutely nothing back from anyone. No one cared.
I could have I turned up and played “twinkle twinkle little star” on repeat for three hours every night, and I'm sure no one would notice. I’d have gotten the same amount of money.
Equally, I talked to actor friend of mine, who came out of drama school, very talented, and didn't work for two years. And then got that first job on a big film, which is very exciting. She was getting a nice wage for a few days work on a big film with a great credit. It was just very exciting. But because she’s not worked for two years, she suddenly felt this pressure. As well as being a great professional credit, and professionally helpful, it was like, this is the opportunity that I've been given for my creative fulfillment. She had one line. Almost like a featured extra. There's not enough there for that to creatively fulfill you for however long, you know, before the next job. What I'm learning to do, it's quite difficult to articulate. Being an actor or being a musician, it's hard to just separate all those different parts out. When you're being an actor, an actor who earns money and is given a job, you expect yourself to also be an actor who is an artist. You can't be everything all the time. But because it's all acting, it’s hard to separate out.
KS: Mmmmm. Yeah, it's really twisty. Interesting.
FH: So twisty.
KS: I can understand why you I felt this way.
When you're being an actor, an actor who earns money and is given a job, you expect yourself to also be an actor who is an artist. You can't be everything all the time. But because it's all acting, it’s hard to separate out.
FH: I so don't enjoy the business side of acting. Learning to accept that that's all right, actually, is quite difficult, but it was helpful. I've definitely done that a lot easier with music than with acting. I think I care about acting a lot more than I do music.
KS: Yeah. That's hard. You kind of answered my question earlier. So I'll give you the floor, if you think you have anything more to say about the idea of yourself, Frazer, versus the industry's ideal Frazer, you know? Maybe that's like the twisty problem that you're experiencing and feeling lost. You necessarily haven't reserved any of that space for yourself, because there’s not time for it?
FH: There's also a twisted kind of misconception that to be an amazing actor or to be amazing at the craft of acting, to give an amazing performance, you need to like, like bare your soul. Dedicate all of yourself to a role.
KS: Yeah, like Heath Ledger or something.
FH: Sure, but it's actually quite dangerous. Not just like, in the sense that people always talk about. Not just the sense of, dangerous, like, if you're playing a bad character, or doing a really sad situation, it might actually make you sad in your real life. I don't just mean that.
I mean, in terms of the industry side of it, as well. Because I am marketing a product. The product is myself. The reality of being a professional actor is so much about rejection. I've always said like being an actor is mostly being sad about not acting, and then occasionally being reminded why you put yourself through it.
KS: Oh my god!!
FH: But if you put your whole self into it, which is the thing that all the drama schools tell you to do. You need to be fully committed to this; you need to commit all of your energy into this. Then, when you get knocked back, and believe me, that is 99% of my life as an actor, is being knocked back, then it's so personal.
KS: Yeah. Wow.
FH: Because it's like, we don't like the product that you're selling. We don't think it's good enough. We don't like it, for whatever reason. And that product is me, you know.
So there's a really, good podcast —have you listened to Dead Eyes?
KS: No.
FH: So I was really struggling last year with lots of horrible work stuff. It just felt like every time I was putting myself up for more roles, it was like self flagellation. Every time. It was just horrible. I got so many knock-backs, last year, so many more than I’ve ever had. So there's this podcast by this guy, it’s called Dead Eyes.
It's a guy called Connor Ratliff, an American guy who auditioned for a small part in Band of Brothers, and was cast in the part. And then the day before he was due to film that part, he was fired by Tom Hanks, who was directing it. Tom Hanks saw his audition tape, didn't like the look of it for whatever reason. He called in to re-audition for the role, and then he was let go. He was fired after he'd been cast. He said to his agent, what went wrong? what happened? And the agent said, Oh, Tom Hanks thought you had dead eyes.
KS: Gasps
FH: This is a brilliant podcast about like, how the sausage gets made, the world of acting, all these big people that have all these knockbacks and it's a fantastic, fantastic podcast. But I mean, what a dreadful thing to hear about yourself, you know? There's nothing that he can do about it. There's no part of improving his craft that can change the way that he that he looks.
KS: Yeah.
FH: Quite often, the rejections that you get are for reasons like that. Not that they’re always made explicit. I know from seeing the other side of it, with Catherine, how things are cast.
Now, the way that I first audition for roles is to self tape. So I get sent a script, I put a bit down on tape and send it back to the casting director. And I will spend hours and hours of preparation on these things. Along the lines, I'll do character work, I'll film it out, spend hours filming it, making sure it's as good as I can possibly get it. That's actually where I think I do some of my best work: completely unpaid, in my living room, behind an iPhone. I really do think that some of my best acting. But then I know I send it off to the casting director, and I know that the casting director, or the producers or whatever, have like fifty people for that small role that they've asked to tape. They'll have like thousands of people that were submitted, they've asked fifty to tape for that role in the big film. And they might not watch all of them! Or they might watch them with the sound off, or small in the corner of a screen, or they'll look down the list of tapes and they'll think oh, he doesn't actually look right. When you put all that effort into taping, you're putting yourself on the line. You're doing it knowing that the overwhelming likelihood is that it's not for anything, you know, you're not going to get the part. It's just me, you know? I'm not wearing a costume. I'm not in fancy makeup. It's me sat in my living room. That's what I'm giving people—that’s what I'm selling. So when you get knocked back, over and over and over again; when you don’t get a role to play Passerby Number Four. I don't do many of those auditions anymore. I've done a hell of a lot of them. I mean, I know it's because I didn't look right for the makeup of scene or whatever. But there's something intrinsically hurtful—it feels like what they're saying is that you're not good enough to play Passerby Number Four. It grinds you down.
KS: Like, yeah, I mean. I think in writing, there's so much rejection. But even if you're writing about yourself, and your writing is personal, it's still your writing and not you.
FH: Exactly. I'm doing a lot of writing at the moment, like TV writing stuff. It’s great and I really enjoy it. I get so much rejection, but I just don't take it as hard. I think it's because it sort of acts as a shield, right?
KS: I mean, yeah.
FH: If they say, we didn't think your piece of writing was for us. When it's acting, it’s, you're not for us. “We didn’t like your piece of writing” versus “We didn’t like you.”
That's probably why I diversify as well because it's, I find it easier to hide behind things sometimes.
KS: Mmmm.
FH: But also like, but I keep getting dragged back to acting because I love it more than anything else.
KS: Tell me more about that?
FH: It's so much rejection, it's so much hurt, and it does, it really hurts me. It badly affects my mental health, the sort of like inner-workings the industry and the way that it operates. It really does. It really gets me down. I was so low all of last year, and it was because of that. It was situational—entirely because of that. But then, at the center of it all like, when I'm on stage or— there was a moment when I was filming Frayed last year. I had a fantastic scene that I was given, and there was a moment when the cameras were rolling, I was playing across that another great actor, and everything falls away. It's like, holy shit. This is why I do it. It's so amazing. It’s the most intense kind of hit. It's so addictive. The highs, the highs are so high. But no matter how low the lows are, and how sustained the lows are, the promise of feeling that high again is enough to motivate me to keep doing it.
KS: Oof yeah. Yeah. I don't know how you do it. Something stuck with me—I’m kind of rewinding here. You talk about last year, like just having so much rejection, and just really not what you thought this would be; or like what you knew it would be, but not what you looked forward to kind of thing? You often will text me and you're like, can you read this in your voice? What are the other things that you do, that people like me, people who don't know, or don’t spend time with actors or even close to the industry, might not know about? Like, what do you do? Why are those casting videos that like get watched in the corner of a screen by a producer who's doing five other things— why is that, to you, what you think is sometimes your best work?
FH: Because that's 95% of my work as an actor. The hardest I ever work is when I'm not working, when I'm auditioning. It's all about being thrown opportunities, right? I'm so dependent on other people giving me the chance to audition.
KS: But so when you're doing character work, like what does that mean? Like, what are you doing?
FH: I also think it’s a bit wanky to talk about process. It does sound very yawny and so ridiculous out of context. But you do whatever like, I mean, I dunno. I pour so much effort into making every single tape as good as it could possibly be. So yeah, I'll ask you for accent help. I'll make sure my accent is on point, if it's an American thing. I'll dig into the text and make sure I completely understand what's going on, and give it context and a backstory to see if I'm totally delivering in the right way.
There's so much prep that goes into it. Why I think it's my best work is because I get to play a wide variety of different roles in my home. It's only me that sees it (unless Catherine is reading opposite me).
KS: Laughs
FH: It’s just so much of it. I do so so many of those things. So the likelihood is, it's going to be great. And also, you know I talked about turning up on a film set and being a small part of a massive machine. When I'm doing it at home, I’ve not got that. There's a pressure that comes with trying to secure the role, to do as good a job as you can, but there's no one there saying okay, the lights not quite right, or we're running out of time, so we've only got one more take. I’ve got as much time as I want to make it as good as I possibly can.
KS: Yeah, it's like you're in the zone. And it's just you.
FH: Ultimately, most of the time, I won't be right for it. Ultimately, most of the time, I was never in the running. I was never, never going to get that part. But I think, yeah, it's just me. And so when I say that I do some of my best work at home, behind the camera, I mean, because I'm afforded the time and space to give as good performance as I can.
KS: Yeah, that's really cool. It's just something I never even thought about. Like, I can't stress how far removed from his I am. The fact that you have to send in tapes, I'm like, literally duh. But also, what?
FH: One of your questions was like - What do you do? What is your day like as an actor? What is your day like on set?
Catherine read that question was like, well, they're two completely different questions. And they are. My day life as an actor is doing tapes, reading scripts, emailing directors, emailing casting directors. Trying to doing all the professional stuff that no one ever sees. I mean, I work the hardest when I'm not working.
And then what’s a day life on set? On set: someone picks me up in the morning, someone shows me where to stand, someone delivers me lunch, someone pushes me over here, dresses me, makes me up. I don’t do anything on set. I’m told where to stand, I'm told what to do. And I turn up and do it. And then yes, like, if I'm very, very lucky, there might be a brief moment where I'm like, Okay, all these people have facilitated space for me to now kind of dig into my acting. Quite often, it’s too quick. I might turn up—I’m there for eight hours waiting around and doing little bits and pieces, but the scene is me like, walking out of the room. And that's it. One second scene.
KS: Laughs. So completely different lives.
FH: Yeah, and also like, if you split out my average year, three months of the year, I’m on set, and then the rest of the other nine months, I’m sat at home, doing the frantic emailing, the frantic taping. You know? So it's, I don't know. Being an actor is mainly not acting; or being an actor is mainly not being on set.
KS: Yeah.
FH: There's a lot of acting that I do, but it's mainly not working.
KS: It’s crazy.
FH: And the most fun thing about being on set, most of the time, is that you’re spoiled. It's so fun to be looked after, and feel part of a team. It feels exciting and special. But it doesn't feel like acting a lot of the time. That sort of gets forgotten and lost in it.
KS: What does it feel like to watch yourself? Because you don’t have that opportunity in the theater.
FH: You know, lots of people find it hard to watch themselves. I don’t.
KS: For whatever reason, that doesn’t surprise me.
FH: I think it's helpful. Also, I’m excited by it. I’m excited by the idea of being on TV. So I want to see. I also want to see if I'm any good. I'm very self-critical, so I want to see how I can be better. What you see on screen doesn't necessarily bear any resemblance to what I did on the day, because it's been re-contextualized and cut, mashed together. It's a composite performance of all the different things that I did. So there might be a reaction to a character saying something, and that reaction might be used for something completely different. Usually I don't see the performance that I think that I've given. So it's quite it feels like a lottery sometimes, to see like how have they cut this together? I've been watching Frayed, the second season of Frayed. I re-watched it recently because I was trying to cut it some scenes together for my show reel.
Catherine is joining me. We’re just ordering lunch. (Yeah that looks good.) What was I saying?
KS: You were talking about watching yourself, and about making a show reel.
FH: Oh, yeah. Some of the scenes that I've used for my show reel, I think some of my best scenes. I remember doing them on the day and thinking that wasn't anything special, or that I don’t think I gave a particularly good performance. But my performance was made to look great by the editor. And then some of the some of the ones were like, I remember thinking on the day, I have absolutely nailed it. I remember people saying to me on set, the producer is in tears and is telling me how I’ve given such a beautiful, beautiful performance. Now I’ve watched back it in the finished show, and I thought it was completely unremarkable. It was quite windy that day, so they probably couldn't use the best bits, or there's so many different things at play. It's such a lottery. I don’t necessarily see the performance that I thought I’d given.
KS: Yeah, like you have an idea in your head and then like the actual reality. Wow.
FH: It’s usually completely different. Whereas I've seen videos of myself performing on stage. And when you know you're nailing it, like I've watched it back and thought, oh yeah, I did. I did nail it. You can tell, because the audience is with you. That’s why stage is so much fun.
You’re doing an “artist series”, and it’s interesting because I think that you probably can tell that I don’t, I can't, see myself as an artist. Maybe it’s a self-preservation thing.
KS: That’s so interesting. I would be interested to hear what Catherine would have to say about that, too. Obviously she knows you very well, but because she also does this as work. She’s in the industry. Someone like me, like, I believe you’re artistic even if you don’t personally identify as an artist. It’s why I asked you to do this interview. And so I'm curious just to hear what her reaction would be in terms of like, what the word “artist” means. Is she more accepting in terms of separating it? Or is she more just kind of like, encouraging?
FH: I’m just gonna ask her. (Catherine, can I ask a question?) Wait, I'm just gonna put this in. I’ve given her an ear bud is she can hear you now. We’re in Le Marais about to get falafel in the longest queue I’ve ever seen.
KS: Ugh! That sounds soooo good. So Catherine, I just I wanted to ask you, if you think that Frazer is an artist?
Catherine Slater: Yes.
KS: Laughs.
A week later, Frazer traveled to Melbourne, Australia to begin filming a new project. He sent me a sleepy selfie from the plane, and a cloudy sunrise behind the city lights. Later, he sent me this message:
Was thinking about our conversation - my whole take on my craft/industry is massively skewed by the exact situation I currently find myself in. If you’d spoke to me this week, I’d have told you something completely different. Craft/industry are so inextricably linked for me that I can’t acknowledge my craft unless the industry bit is going well, otherwise too painful as they are parts of the same larger thing. That make sense? This week I am busy working, and think I’d say I am an artist. What an addendum.
Awesome!!