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After plenty of behind-the-scenes drama on Paramount+ hit “MobLand,” which saw Tom Hardy almost booted off the series, the cast and creatives reunited for the premiere of Season 2 in London, Thursday night.
Leading trio
Pierce Brosnan and Helen Mirren — who play crime couple Conrad and Maeve Harrigan opposite Hardy’s fixer Harry Da Souza — posed together with Hardy on the black carpet outside the Odeon Luxe theater in Leicester Square before heading inside to take the stage alongside co-creator Guy Ritchie and exec producer David Glasser.
Introducing the director and cast to the audience, Glasser – who was believed to have lost patience with Hardy after the actor requested script changes and was late to set – heaped plenty of praise on the star, calling him “the captain of our ship.”
“Without further ado, the captain of our ship, and the man who really, really pushed the envelope for us to get this to where we want to do Season 1 and Season 2, and was with it from the beginning and stayed with it to the bitter end of us getting through this incredible season, ladies and gentlemen — Tom Hardy,” Glasser announced as Hardy joined Ritchie, Brosnan and Mirren on stage.
After the cast and audience sang “Happy Birthday” to Ritchie, who turns 58 today, the director spoke movingly about the cast, saying they’ve been “magnificent, it’s been nothing other than a pleasure to work with these monsters of creativity.”
“Lady Helen — Dame Helen, fantastic Helen, Queen Helen — has been nothing other than an inspiration and a force of creativity,” Ritchie said. Super positive all day long, super creative all day long. Pierce Brosnan, your lordship, I can say exactly the same about Pierce and my old brother Tom Hardy.”
“I’m going to come and give a quick cuddle,” Ritchie added before darting across the stage and hugging Hardy.
“They’ve all been a magnificent cast,” Ritchie continued. “It’s been nothing other than a pleasure to work with these monsters of creativity. It’s been nothing but a pleasure. And David, thank you very much. David actually is a visionary. There you go. That’s a surprise. I don’t know. It’s a surprise. He actually is. David is a force of creativity. Good for you, David. Well done.”
When asked what she was most excited for the audience to see in Season 2, Mirren replied “Madder, badder, better,” before turning to Hardy and repeating: “Madder…badder…better. Chaotic, cool, funny. Frightening, funny.”
Brosnan added: “Yeah, very mangled, very strange. And there’s frailties within these characters as well, which makes them very human. But we get on like a great company of actors.”
Mirren also praised the show’s writer, Jez Butterworth, saying he provided them with “incredible material.”
“And the beautiful poetry of Jazz Butterworth, the poetic element in the script is so incredible. It just heightens it out of the sort of the normal. It’s incredible material for us to work on.”
Before introducing the cast, Glasser gave some insight into how the show first got off the ground, saying he and the Paramount+ team flew to Ritchie’s country house in the U.K. to pitch him on the show. “He said yes on the spot…” Glasser recalled. “Over a great bottle of wine while he was cooking some amazing lamb.”
Glasser also revealed that when they were just eight weeks away from shooting Season 1, he, Ritchie and Hardy were still trying to “figure out what the show is” which is when they brought in Butterworth. “We call upon a dear friend, Jez Butterworth, and we say to Jez, ‘We’re eight weeks out of production. Here’s the idea. Here’s the early concept. Let’s go make something of it.’ And you can only imagine being eight weeks out what that was like. It was insane.”
By Season 2, however, the relationship between Hardy, Butterworth and Glasser deteriorated to the point that reports emerged claiming Hardy had been kicked off the show. Those reports turned out to be premature, and Variety confirmed the trio’s “creative differences” were being worked out in order to bring the actor back for Season 2 re-shoots as well as Season 3, which is set to start shooting later this year.
Last week Paramount+ officially confirmed Hardy would indeed return as fixer Harry Da Souza in the popular gangland series.
