Hero Fiennes Tiffin Reveals Differences Between First Love Character & Hardin

Hi, Hiro.

Hi, ya.

How are you? How are you doing? We spoke before, haven't we?

We talked eight months ago to this day. I looked it up.

Eight months ago to this day, wow, nice. I was gonna ask, so you had the answers. It's been a while, how are you?

Good.

You've been up to a lot too.

I have. Yeah, I have. Um, it's weird, people keep saying you're so busy and I've been chilling for the past like two months. So I like to pretend and keep that facade and, and, and idea that I'm busy but I've actually just been doing very little. It's been lovely.

You were just at a soccer match, no?

Yeah, I played in a charity football match, charity soccer game. Yeah, that was fun. It was my friends uh, have a goat, they've a goat, a Wow, I'm tired. They don't have a goat. They have a brand called Young Goat and there's a great guy called Chris who does charity work for Great Ormond Street Hospital and they organized a charity match that I played in on the weekend. So yeah, big up them, we've uh, I don't know how much money they raised just yet, but no, great work from them everyone, so I'm excited to hear.

Do you like playing soccer?

I love playing soccer. Yeah, it's uh, it's kinda all I do when I'm back home, it's like go away and act and then to decompress and be Hiro again, it's just like play football and chill out, yeah.

So just chillin and soccer, that's what you've been up to.

Exactly.

So, we have First Love, it's coming out. Did you film at UCLA? Like were you in LA that whole time?

Yeah, actually, we did film at UCLA. We, we shot all around LA. Um, and it felt so natural and nice because every set wasn't like covered, you know, I feel like a lot of the time you walk into a movie set and it doesn't look like the movie set, it looks like a, it just trailers everywhere and make-up trucks and you know, people in high vis jackets and covid departments and

Right.

Obviously we had all the good health and safety regulations in place, but it was so nice to go to UCLA and feel like, oh I'm just in UCLA. I don't feel like there's lights up there and things to, and it's the same for all the shots even inside and there was so little light used and marks used and it was just all natural light and it just felt so real. So to be able to shoot all around LA and go to the campus but not have it feel like a film set was actually really, really cool and, and you know, helped with the acting to really be there in it. Yeah.

Were the students around? Do you feel like you could have gone to college at UCLA, like in America?

Uh, yeah, maybe. You know what was hilarious actually, when we finished, I'm sorry I do this like every year, but when we rap, when we literally wrapped the film, we shot the final scene um, at UCLA. There's like some long, obviously like brick, concrete like staircase and everyone was like lined up along it and people were going down on like skis and snowboards and people were taking some hard, hard falls, but I don't know if Jim would have participated in that, but he could have definitely been a student at at UCLA, yeah. No, they have fun down there. I wish I could've stayed longer.

Yeah, UCLA has some fun traditions, so I was like, didn't know if you were caught up on the American college experience.

Yeah. Well did you, did you go? How do you know how do you know all of this about UCLA?

I have, I'm like 10 minutes from campus. I live, so my friends go to UCLA. Um, but they have like the Undie Run so like literally like it's a whole thing 'cause they just graduated too so all the traditions and everything. They have right now.

No, that's fun. That is fun. Um, yeah, no I do, I do enjoy those traditions. I'm jealous of of you guys in that sense.

And you have an English accent now, so how was mastering that? Did you have to practice?

Oh, the American. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So I've done, I've done an American accent once before in The Silencing, but it's like southern and it's a smaller role. So yeah, I was, I was, I was very worried about my American accent when going into this. And I kinda thought I'd have more sessions with my dialect coach and they got cut short and then she, her name was Joey. She was lovely and she was very helpful, but I did feel like on the last day before we started filming I called her up and I was like, can I just go through it once with you? And I read the lines, she was like, Hiro, that's not, like, that's it's not terrible, but you've done better. Like, you're just nervous, get over yourself, you'll be fine. And yeah, quickly you just get into it and you're like, well I'm here now, aren't I? So what's done is done. But I've only heard positive feedback anyway, so I'm, I'm glad I think um, credit to Joey, she helped me get there in the end. But I'd be, I'd be lying if I said I was confident going into it.

Cuz people on the trailer like, oh my god, like he's like, this is so different than all his other roles. Like people are really excited to see this one.

Oh, I'm so glad. I'm really excited for them to see it too. I've already showed it to like four friends and um, I'm, I'm proud of this and really excited for everyone to see it. Yeah.

Are you a track star in real life? I know last Zoom you said boxing I think that you would do, but are you, do you like running?

I've started I've started doing a fair bit of boxing just for like fitness and I love doing that as well. Soccer's always been my sport, but yeah, when you go to school obviously they put you in, you do athletics and stuff. And I was pretty good. I was quick when I was young. And then in like secondary school, so like through my teens I did like 400 meter race. And I think Jim runs long distance. So it's a bit different. But I was all right. I was quite good. I think I came second in cross country. James Bates beat me by a hair. I'll never forgive him for that. Yeah.

I love it. So what, besides this film so you're kinda, you're the sweet, like sweeter boy than your previous roles, which a lot of people are also commenting on too. So when you first read the script were you excited to dive into this kinda role?

Definitely. I think part of the attraction, I didn't want to do another romance specifically. And then the script came in and it was so good, I was like, okay cool, maybe we should do this. You, you know, you're not doing coming-of-age romances when you're 40, so just take them now while, now while you can. And if it's a great script with a great team, you should do it. And I just felt like the only thing I was apprehensive of about doing another romance was putting myself in a box and doing the same thing over and over again and not kinda diversifying my my portfolio and showing my ability to do other roles. And then when I kinda delved into it, I was realizing this is, this film could not be more different from After in terms of it being a romance. Jim could not be more different from Hardin. So I was no longer scared of, of, of doing the same thing again 'cause it's so far from that. And um, and yeah, I think that was part of the a lot to to playing him and part of what enticed me to to playing him was because of how different he was from After, from Hardin and After, so.

What is one thing that you and Jim are like in real life? Um,

Would you like write a note to like write a note to the teacher like a fake note, would you do that? That's pretty that's pretty cool, isn't it? I've, that's To be fair, I feel like, I feel like that's quite unlike Jim as well. I feel like he was like, okay cool, I'm gonna do this. Like I don't think that's something that he would do all the time. I think he just felt like he had to pull it out the bag for for Ann. Um, but no, I feel like what are we similar in in real life? Maybe with the, you know, we both like like like to do a bit of track running, but I feel like um, I feel like I, he cares about the people who are close to him and I feel like I do too. Um, I would like to be a bit more concise with my words like he is. Sometimes I just go on a roll and I'm just especially on these interviews, I just talk for days and I think he's really good at just like listening and being concise with his words and only speaking when he really needs to so I could, I could learn from him in that sense. Yeah.

Well congratulations on this next, you know, chapter to come out in your life.

Thank you so much. I really appreciate that. It was so nice to talk to you.