Paul Mescal Lied About Driving Skills for ‘Normal People’ Role

Paul Mescal Lied About Driving Skills for ‘Normal People’ Role

Paul Mescal is looking back on when he fibbed about himself in order to land his role on Normal People.

While appearing on one of W magazine‘s Best Performances covers, the Gladiator II star was asked if he ever lied about having a certain skill to land a part to which he pointed to his role as Connell on the hit Hulu-BBC show.

“I said I could drive for Normal People, and I could not drive. We’d signed the paperwork, I’d gotten the part, and then I’d forgotten about doing my driver’s license. So I ended up doing Normal People on a provisional license. I could only drive the car if there was a fully licensed driver beside me,” he shared.

The actor quipped that despite being unable to drive in his day to day life for the show, “I did the best driving — and we have this on record — that anybody’s ever done onscreen in Normal People.“

Mescal’s breakout portrayal of Connell Waldron in Normal People catapulted the Irish actor to fame. The series, an adaptation of Sally Rooney’s 2018 bestselling novel, centered on social outcast Marianne (Daisy Edgar-Jones) and popular student Connell (Mescal). It followed them through their high school and college on-again, off-again romance.

When reflecting on Mescal’s audition, Normal People series director Lenny Abrahamson said, “You do know when somebody’s brilliant. Everybody in the office was just blown away by it. I wasn’t some Svengali who saw a little spark. It really didn’t take a genius.”

Since the series, Mescal has starred in films such as Aftersun — he received his first Oscar nom for best actor for the film — The Lost Daughter, Foe, Carmen, God’s Creatures, All of Us Strangers and now in Ridley Scott’s Gladiator II, the sequel to his Oscar-winning epic. He is also set to reprise his role as Stanley in A Streetcar Named Desire and star in Sony Pictures‘ Beatles movies for director Sam Mendes.

“It’s wonderful how meteoric that transformation is: from Normal People to Aftersun through to Gladiator. It’s amazing,” Abrahamson said of Mescal’s rise to fame. “You wouldn’t write it. It almost has a cartoon strip three-panel structure to it.” He also praised the actor for his ability to portray both a “very particular masculinity as well as this great vulnerability.”

He also recalled telling Mescal while working on Normal People that his life would probably change after the show: “I do remember saying to Paul that things will change. But I don’t think any of us quite realized just how things would change, how completely things would change.”

Last year, Mescal and Edgar-Jones reunited for a screening of Normal People alongside Abrahamson benefitting suicide prevention and mental health.