After getting to know a few actors, I’ve realised it’s not only important to stand out as an actor but also take control of your future. When I interviewed Petra Bryant, she was taking big steps to secure the future of her acting career. The same thing can be said about Mhairi Calvey, another actor who I worked with on Abduct. We talk about the said film, the role that has been following her all her life and the exciting new plans she has for the future.
“It was so different from the normal sci-fi film and there was loads of stuff I could research and get my teeth into, that was one of the things that drew me and with the great team involved, we would get on very well.”
But how much research did Mhairi look into?
“I did about a month of research on conspiracy theories, the occult, the illuminati, aliens and all sorts of those things, I watched a lot of documentaries on the subject. And then I did a month building on my character because it’s quite a complicated character. Ilyas (Kaduji, the director) sort of gave us the characters to allow us to work on them but we were able to contact him if we needed to and talk through things about our characters, but it was really up to us to bring what we wanted to the characters.”
With Mhairi playing Crystal, one of the main characters in Abduct, how did she feel taking on a lead role?
“I never really think of roles being lead or supporting roles, it’s all about coming prepared and doing your research but this is my third lead role now, so I felt a lot of more comfortable in that sort of role.”
Abduct also stars some recognisable faces including William B. Davis from The X Flies, Jack O’Halloran from Superman 2 and Sienna Guillory from the Resident Evil franchise. So what was it like for Mhairi working with these established actors?
“It was really great actually and when I got the chance I asked them as much as I could about how they do their work and loads of industry advice. It’s really nice to be on a set and learn things from really experienced actors.”
“I think the best moments for me were doing the green screen because I had never done it before. It was so different and a new challenge and a really weird experience especially when the crew was pushing the car up and down, I could see you and the other runners in the mirror. I also enjoyed when the fan broke and we had to use the leaf blower, it was so surreal.”
When you google Mhairi Calvey’s name in, there is one film that always comes up, Braveheart. So how often does Mhairi get asked about Braveheart nowadays?
“All the time, it’s getting ridiculous.”
Do you get people asking you all the time of what it was like on set?
“Yeah, a lot of the time, like is the thistle real?”
But looking back, Mhairi was around 5 or 6 when she filmed Braveheart so does she really remember much?
“I remember a lot more than you would think, I remember being on set with Mel Gibson and what I had to do each day.”
But unlike most child actors, Mhairi didn’t continue acting. So what was the decision behind this?
“I was offered the whole Hollywood child star route but my parents and no one in the family are from within the industry, so they didn’t know anything about it. Some of the industry professionals I was working with suggested that it was not a great idea to go into child stardom. So I pulled away from that, went to school, had a normal childhood and did some theatre so I’ve always kept my foot in acting. And now I’m coming back into acting and doing it off my own back rather than a lucky break or being famous.”
With Mhairi always being labeled by Braveheart, what difficulties has she encountered in the past few years of her acting career?
“The main difficulties I’ve had to deal with are not knowing anyone from the industry when I was younger and when I started going into it for myself. A lot of people didn’t like the idea of me becoming an actor; I didn’t have a great deal of support. I also had a lot of difficulties with a drama teacher I went to school with, she was just really jealous of the fact that I was in the film, so she made my life hell for about five years. She didn’t let me act in any of school plays. I think that was the hardest, trying to fight my way back into acting.”
“Part of it was to create my own work for other actors and crew members that I know, to create more opportunities for those people. I’ve constantly got loads of ideas and I’m writing scripts at the moment, so it was really another chance to do something of my own. The reason I set up the academy was to teach actors the business part of acting because you’re never taught that at drama school, people don’t really know how to write CVs and really basic stuff.”
I know what you mean, we were taught very little about the business side of the film industry and when we all finished uni, no one was prepared.
“That’s how I felt coming out of drama school, you all get out of drama school and everyone’s like ‘Oh my God, how do you even get work?’ We were never taught that so now that I’ve learned through my own mistakes, I can now pass on my experience onto other people.”
Passing on her experience within the industry is one of the goals going forward with the academy, but what other goals does Mhairi have?
“I enjoy anything where I have the opportunity to collaborate, I’m working with another production company called Eye Films on their first movie and we’re about to do their second film, so anything where I can work with people and collaborate with them is perfect for me.”
Having built her career up from the most horrible drama teacher ever to setting up her own production company, what’s the best advice Mhairi had for any actors looking to break their way into the industry?
“The best advice I can give is to stay grounded, I think it’s very easy to if you become very successful for it to go to your head and to lose who you really are and at the same time it’s very hard to deal with rejection. So if you stay grounded, keep yourself as busy as possible when you’re not working, so learn new skills, play the guitar, do dancing, exercise and all sorts of things, so you need to keep yourself really, really busy during all that work.”
Mhairi is living up to her advice and staying as busy as possible working on so many projects and really taking control of not just her acting career and her film career by setting up her own production company, but she’s taking control of her life and not letting her life be defined by one role nearly twenty years ago. But before I wrapped up my interview, I had one more question for Mhairi, are you with geek?
“Yes, I am with geek.”