Last update: 23.11.2018
Wife, four daughters, three dogs, five chickens... The 26-year-old actor carries with him the experience of a man who is at least twice his age.
As I waited for Aaron Taylor-Johnson to arrive at a diner on the Eastside in Los Angeles, I caught myself thinking that I felt like I was going on a blind date. You have no idea who's going through that door now.
At 26, Aaron has almost 20 years of acting experience behind him, he knows and can do much more than most of his peers. It's funny that we saw each other in last time in 2014, when he was the real life incarnation of his superhero named Quicksilver, whom he successfully embodied in the film Avengers: Age of Ultron. Before that, I ran into him in a metamorphosis before Anna Karenina, where he later played Count Vronsky (white-haired and mustachioed), even earlier, he perfectly got used to the image of a vindictive super-nerd in the Kick-Ass series ) (you could see him somewhere under an avalanche of white curls).
Well, the most significant for his breakthrough in cinema was the work on the role of young John Lennon with a cigarette behind his ear, in the film "Become John Lennon" (Eng. Nowhere Boy - "Boy from Nowhere"), which was shot in 2009 by a British film director Sam Taylor-Wood, who later became his wife and mother of his two daughters.
The experience gained on the set of the film "Nowhere Boy" changed the course of Taylor-Johnson's life diametrically and pushed him to become more responsible and courageous. He became a father at 18, and married at 22, having adopted two stepdaughters into the family and taking new surname(he and Taylor-Wood both changed their last names to Taylor-Johnson).
Since then, he has played a leading role in a kind of Hollywood home idyll, tending his own garden and chicken coop, stopping by an organic meat store, cooking fresh eggs from her chickens to her daughters Mses Wylda Rae, who is six, and Romy Hero, who is five, and loves his wife Sam very much. For the record, she's 23 years older than him.
First season awards
Last year, he had to resort to the services of a shaman who cleansed his body from the effects of a three-month binge. He had to drink so seriously in order to turn into the Texas psychopath Ray, whom he played in the film "Under cover of night" (eng. Nocturnal Animals, second title " Nocturnal Animals») Tom Ford. Like Ray he spent most 2015, reminiscent of the Lion King's homeless brother.
Then he metamorphosed into a smart man dressed in immaculately pressed Tom Ford suits and embarked on a six-month tour of the awards and nominations season for Animals of the Night. His next role as a military sniper in the soon-to-be-released film The Wall added large doses of Pabst Blue Ribbon to his diet.
When we met today, it seemed to me that he had somehow changed again. He chuckles when I share with him my impressions of my first impression of his appearance- dressed as a retired military man from the 50s - khaki trousers, a short-sleeved shirt with a motorcycle image over a white T-shirt, under which a pair of army dog tags was hidden on a chain. “The worst thing was when my daughter was just graduating kindergarten, and she had to make an album about the impressions of the past year with her photographs,” he says. “Each of her photos was: she, her mother and some new guy: With short hair, with a long, with a mustache and without a mustache, a bearded, skinny soldier ... The question arose: "Who the hell is this?"
If Nowhere Boy was the film that had the biggest impact on the former Johnson's personal life, then Under Cover of Night was a career-changing film. After the film was released at the end of 2016, Taylor-Johnson appeared before the eyes of the viewer in the form of a mature man. His hero, the rapist and murderer Ray, is the depraved heart of the film, as magnetic as it is sadistic, as powerful as it is comely, somewhat similar to Travis Bickle from Martin Scorsese's Taxi Driver.
It is a pity that he was not nominated for an Oscar, and the Bafft Award (eng. "BAFTA") that year was received by Dev Patel (eng. Dev Patel). But he is by no means disappointed. But rather, on the contrary, he is cheerful and energetic, like a person who can finally take a breath after his first season of awards. “In some ways, I even feel relieved,” he says. “And here the question is not that I do not know how to be grateful or gloat. It's just hard for me to handle that level of attention."
How a hero is born
Awards ceremonies "absolutely dumbfound" him. At the Golden Globes, he delivered a refreshingly informal speech in his prosaic Baginghamshire way, thanking his wife "for putting up with me - I wasn't very nice in that part." Taylor-Johnson hates talking about himself. He'd rather show me a video on his iPhone of his daughter doing an inimitable dance to Queen's "Another One Bites The Dust" or a picture of his wife doing an advanced back arched yogic pose against a wall.
He is noble and unpretentious, from that category of people who really reveal themselves only in the circle of close people or working for film set with complete dedication. And it's hard to believe that such crazy energy can come from such a reserved person, but then let's just remember Robert De Niro.
Taylor-Johnson has no problem making speeches in public, he just doesn't feel the need to, he has an incredible combination of youthful urgency with emotional maturity, a sensitive soul and a powerful body. In The Wall, he plays a US Army soldier who is literally pinned back against a wall by an invisible Iraqi sniper after his partner, played by John Cena, is killed. As a result, the thriller promises to be psychologically intense, and Taylor-Johnson maintains this state for most of the film alone. The Wall was directed by Doug Liman, best known for his work on the Jason Bourne series.
“When you get used to the role and are in a state of such psychological stress, in the end you carry it with you and you cannot get rid of it on your own”
Aaron was actively preparing for this role. After immersing himself in research on PTSD, the actor made friends with military connections, including Bradley Cooper, who played leading role in the movie "Sniper" (eng. American Sniper - "American Sniper"). He introduced Aaron to war veteran Jacob Schick, one of the founders of 22Kill, an organization that was created as a support group for ex-servicemen (named after approximately 22 suicides committed on US Veterans Day between 1999 and 2010).
He subsequently traveled to an event hosted by 22Kill in Boston. "These guys are very simple people' he says. “Some of them have been to hell and come back. It was the most exciting event for [eyewitnesses]: the men you consider to be very courageous military personnel openly talk about their struggle with PTSD (post-traumatic stress syndrome). Some went as far as putting a gun to their head, many had suicidal thoughts, they are kept afloat by camaraderie, friendships, jokes ... "
Nick Irving "The Reaper" (famous for his 33 confirmed kills in his first three months in Iraq) is "now one of my best comrades. He's a super cool dude, a real darling." In the course of his research, Taylor-Johnson also received support Nobel laureate- War photographer Lindsey Addario (born Lynsey Addario) and Jane Horton (eng. Jane Horton), a veteran and family lawyer, whom he met by chance during training at the shooting range. Her husband, Christopher Horton, was a sniper who was killed in combat in Iraq.
He also spent time with sniper trainees at Fort Chaffee in Arkansas. “Not many of them go through the six-week course,” says Taylor-Johnson. “10 graduates out of 30. One of the targets was at a distance of 1356 meters to hit the target. you must know all about the wind and the earth's axis. It's just amazing." All these acquaintances and meetings had a serious impact on the character of his character in the film.
Taylor-Johnson worked hard on increasing his weight before the film in order to get a military physique. He managed to add 13 kilograms to his 85 kilograms. “It was food and the gym, food and the gym,” he says. “But this weight gain was very different from the system I followed for The Avengers. There I consumed pure, high quality protein to look healthy. And here it was shit. I constantly ate at fast foods and felt like an SUV stuffed with canned goods.
In order to fully integrate with the image of his character, as in the case of Ray, Taylor-Johnson spent two months living and breathing his character, even smelling like him. “I used crates of cheap beer,” he says. “Tobacco-flavored chewing gum was the worst. In order to periodically spit picturesquely, he learned to accumulate saliva in his mouth. I got a terrible, rancid breath. My wife was horrified by all this.”
The Taylor-Johnson way of life seems to be based on some kind of cycle of abuse and purification. In order to embody the disgusting Ray, he smoked, got high on beer, watched documentaries O serial killers and didn't trim his nails for three months to "feel the toxicity inside and out". And after such a "transformation" he did not want to bring this negative energy to the house with his wife and children and after filming, he set about "expelling Ray."
“When you get into a role and you’re in that kind of psychological stress, you end up carrying it around with you and you can’t get rid of it on your own,” he says. “I realized that I needed a detox from all this and turned to a very gifted female shaman who practices reiki and acupuncture [acupuncture]. This was not my first experience of such a cleaning, I had already performed this procedure, after working with Oliver Stone on the film Savages, where he played a drug dealer.
The secret of balance
Eventually, after celebrating the end of The Wall, he got sober again in January. "I'm not in AA or NA, and I don't belong to any of those organizations," he says. "I can just stop." All of this metamorphosis of getting into character is one big reason why Aaron Taylor Johnson doesn't work on more than one project a year. He needs “two or three months to smoothly transform from one character to another. In addition, there are plenty of everyday things like gardening or cooking, or just spending time with your kids.” IN this moment he lives through the Japanese culinary period and gets very animated when he starts talking about his ancient clay pots.
“I stock up on fresh seaweed, which I cook on toasted rice. sesame oil and sake,” he says. “I add a couple of eggs to this dish while it cooks, then daikon sprouts. And of course, the final chord in the form of an unsurpassed presentation of the whole dish. He also tidied up a plot of land on the slope of his garden. “I like it when peace reigns in my world,” he says. “Constantly being in an acting environment is extremely difficult, jumping from project to project, you can just go crazy. Half of my friends go crazy and start burning bridges with alcohol and drugs." For an actor whose career began at the age of six, he looks surprisingly level-headed.
"I like being a father more than being an actor."
Taylor-Johnson grew up in Holmer Green in Buckinghamshire. At the age of six he entered theater school in order to study drama, participate in auditions, learn jazz dance, acrobatics and singing. Three years later, in the West End, he was already playing the murdered son of Macduff on the same stage with Rufus Sewall in the role of Macbeth. At the age of 15, he left school and went to Los Angeles to meet Hollywood agents. In 2006, the casting was successfully passed for the role of Young Eisenheim in The Illusionist (eng. The Illusionist), then there was the role of Dave Lizewski in the film about super-heroes "Kick-Ass" by Matthew Vaughn, for which two years later he was nominated for BAFTA and several more awards.
He went through his "self-destructive period" two years before he turned 18. "I just went a little crazy," he told me in 2014 during our Godzilla interview. “I spent a lot of money and lived for two years that I can't even remember. It's about about how there comes a time when you have to strip everything off of yourself before you can move on, right? Because if I hadn't done it then, I'd be broken now. I wouldn't be able to take care of a family, or control myself, or feel responsible enough to do what I do."
Mr. Taylor-Johnson's friends call him Benjamin Button, the man who aged backwards. “I like being a father more than being an actor,” he says. "I'm still thinking about changing careers."
He and his wife take turns working on projects, one stays at home while the other is on set. But when Sam Taylor-Wood directed the filming of Fifty Shades of Grey, the whole family went to Canada with her. Most recently, she has produced and directed two episodes of a Netflix series, psychological thriller"Gypsy" (Eng. Gypsy).
At the end of our conversation, it turned out that the Taylor-Johnsons were working together again on several mysterious projects, a dance piece on the list, they also bought the rights to a book, and are working on a film that could appear at Cannes this year.
How to keep a woman happy
He admits that in addition to "a wife, four daughters, two female dogs and three female chickens," he also has his own feminine energies. "I'm happy to say I'm a feminist," he says. “Being a feminist is just believing in equal rights. Man, woman, gay, straight, white, black, we're all equal." Just now Taylor Johnson handed over miniatures of all the posters that were on the global women's march in January to decorate the family bathroom. “When they become young women, they will be ready,” he says of his daughters. "They have a great role model - their mom is one of the strongest, most independent women I know."
Note to the reader: despite the statement of support for feminism, he has not ceased to be a real man in this family. He also continues to give flowers to his young ladies. I suppose he could probably write an instruction booklet called How to Keep a Woman Happy. He looks a little confused. “I don’t really analyze our relationship,” he says. “I just know it works. I just feel loved and taken care of. We have a very deep connection. We're just in sync."
Text: Alina Simonova
Photo: Splash/AllOverPress; Getty/Fotobank.ru
44-year-old Sam Taylor-Wood and her 21-year-old fiancé Aaron Johnson have become parents again. A great reason to break off an engagement that has dragged on for several years and finally tie the knot.
Director, actress, artist Sam Taylor Wood became a mother for the fourth time. She had a daughter. 21-year-old fiance Sam Aaron Johnson is happy. Sam's three older children are also girls. The couple already has common daughter 18 month old Wilde. Two other girls, 14-year-old Angelica and 5-year-old Jessica, were born from a previous marriage between Sam and art dealer Jay Jopling.
The relationship between Sam and Aaron began on the set of the film "Becoming John Lennon" in 2009, just a few months later the couple announced their engagement. This connection shocked the public not only because huge difference at the age of 23, but more due to the fact that at the time of the beginning of the novel, Aaron was only 19. According to British law, he has not yet reached the age of majority! Taylor Wood was going to marry an actor when not even a year had passed since the divorce from her first husband (they separated after 11 years of marriage). As you might guess, a flurry of accusations fell upon the director, among which the “predator” was the most decent. By the way, it was Johnson who convinced his older girlfriend to start a family with him. “Almost before anything started between us, Aaron told me that he wanted children. He made it clear to me that he dreams of a family. He is very mature. He only accepts job offers where you can take breaks - he wants to be part of the first months of Wilde's life, ”Taylor-Woods shared. The couple is happy and does not pay attention to idle gossips: “Previously, marriages between people of different races or different sexes caused disputes, now everyone attacks women who are older than their chosen ones. That's why, when a man marries a girl, which suits him in a daughter, no one says anything bad about him? Johnson echoes his fiancee: “I have an old and wise soul, and Sam has a young one. We don't see the age difference, we just see each other."
But such an idyll was far from always in the director's life. In 1997, when Sam was 30 years old and had just given birth to her first daughter, Angelica, doctors diagnosed her with colorectal cancer. Taylor-Wood managed to win terrible disease. But fate was preparing another blow for her. In 2000, another killer diagnosis was made - cancer again, this time of the breast. The result - several operations and the loss of one breast. However, this did not break Samantha. She did not whine why this happened to me - she was happy and immensely grateful to God for having survived. In an interview with Harper's Bazaar, she said: "At first I was overwhelmed with gratitude for the fact that I survived. The scars on the chest and abdomen seem like nothing in this state. The scar on my stomach is shaped like a question mark, and I find it delightful. And then I began to respect my body even more: in the end, it overcame cancer twice and gave birth to two beautiful children. "Yes, three years after recovery, the director decided on a very bold move She gave birth to her second daughter, Jessica. In 2009, life again decided to test Taylor-Wood for strength: marriage to her husband Jay Jopling ordered a long life ... Divorce was painful. Taylor did not hang her nose, continued to love life and be inspired by people. And it was at that moment that she met Aaron. Maybe this man was sent to her as a gift, for the fact that all the tests sent to her were passed with honor? And really, what does the age difference matter if two people love each other. With Johnson, two more daughters appeared in her life. And not only that: a few months ago, Prince Charles awarded Taylor-Woods the highest order of the British Empire and now she bears the well-deserved title of Dame along with the legendary Helen Mirren and Judi Dench. She deserved it!
Celebrity biographies
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16.05.14 10:13
He was remembered by the audience as a curly, desperate boy, a mini-superhero, a fighter against evil. But years have passed since Kick-Ass, during which actor Aaron Taylor-Johnson has grown and matured.
Biography of Aaron Taylor-Johnson
Young, yes early
Moreover, he managed to get married, have two daughters and star in wonderful films - and this is in his 20s!
We know him as Aaron Johnson, who doubled his last name, adding another one to it - the wife of Samantha. Aaron has Russian-Jewish roots: his great-grandfather once left his homeland and settled in the UK. This is probably why the first name (he is Aaron Perry) of the actor is quite Jewish.
Born in the family of an engineer and a housewife, the little boy, however, began to demonstrate acting skills very early. The first appearance on the stage took place at the age of 6. And then there were school performances and filming in commercials.
Very different looks
Having flashed on the "big" screen in an episode of the comedy with Jackie Chan "Shanghai Knights", in "The Illusionist" Aaron has already received a larger role. Almost mystical and very beautiful story about the famous magician Eisenheim ( great job Edward Norton) would be incomplete if the director did not include the childhood scene in the picture central character. young hero Norton was played by Johnson.
Then, in the biography of the young artist, a funny film happened with unusual name"Angus, thongs and kissing passionately." A teen melodrama. And then - a more serious drama, "Becoming John Lennon." The rock idol of millions performed by a young compatriot Johnson was good.
In Kick-Ass, the guy starred at the age of 20, although he played a schoolboy. But in "Anna Karenina" he became such a young Vronsky that admirers of the novel were discouraged.
Lots of work
Thriller "Chat" did not appeal to all fans of action-packed tangled stories but it definitely has its own charm. And Johnson is great as the evil puppeteer.
Films of recent years
Undeservedly, in the shadow of other high-profile premieres of 2011, the incredible drama "The Mysterious Albert Nobbs" remained, in which actor Aaron Taylor-Johnson has a rather big role. But this is the unconditional benefit of Glenn Close. Just think, she portrays a woman who has lived for many years under the guise of a man!
Of the other notable recent years we note the sequel to "Kick-Ass" and the action drama of the venerable Oliver Stone. In the movie "Particularly Dangerous", the artist appears in the form of Ben's criminal talent. Aaron also appeared in the second "Avenger" (Quicksilver / Pietro Maximoff) and in a new interpretation of history and Godzilla. Roles are literally pouring in on Aaron Taylor-Johnson. His biography is already such that one can only envy.
Aaron Taylor-Johnson Personal Life
Love at first sight
A film about Lennon's youth brought Aaron the Best Debut award and a meeting with Sam Taylor-Wood (it was she who shot this tape). They will immediately announce their engagement, and after 3 years they will marry. So the personal life of Aaron Taylor-Johnson is transparent and has no "pitfalls".
Samantha - outstanding personality! Not only is she an independent director, photographer and artist, who has a very honorary British title of “lady,” she managed to overcome a terrible illness twice more. In 1997, she was overtaken by cancer, but the disease was defeated. Three years later, a new attack of cancer awaited the woman, this time a breast tumor. But even with this trouble, Sam coped.
The difference in the age of husband and wife is 23 years, but this did not become an obstacle for lovers. Years are not a hindrance if the feelings are real. So says Aaron Taylor-Johnson, whose biography, because of such an “adult” wife, is the subject of idle gossip. But Sam and Aaron are serenely happy, and their daughters Wylda and Romi are adorable.
Last update: 11/23/2018
Wife, four daughters, three dogs, five chickens... The 26-year-old actor carries with him the experience of a man who is at least twice his age.
As I waited for Aaron Taylor-Johnson to arrive at a diner on the Eastside in Los Angeles, I caught myself thinking that I felt like I was going on a blind date. You have no idea who's going through that door now.
At 26, Aaron has almost 20 years of acting experience behind him, he knows and can do much more than most of his peers. It's funny that we last saw him in 2014, when he was the real-life embodiment of his superhero named Quicksilver, which he successfully embodied in the movie Avengers: Age of Ultron ). Before that, I ran into him in a metamorphosis before Anna Karenina, where he later played Count Vronsky (white-haired and mustachioed), even earlier, he perfectly got used to the image of a vindictive super-nerd in the Kick-Ass series ) (you could see him somewhere under an avalanche of white curls).
Well, the most significant for his breakthrough in cinema was the work on the role of young John Lennon with a cigarette behind his ear, in the film "Become John Lennon" (Eng. Nowhere Boy - "Boy from Nowhere"), which was shot in 2009 by a British film director Sam Taylor-Wood, who later became his wife and mother of his two daughters.
The experience gained on the set of the film "Nowhere Boy" changed the course of Taylor-Johnson's life diametrically and pushed him to become more responsible and courageous. He became a father at 18 and married at 22, adopting two stepdaughters and adopting a new surname (he and Taylor-Wood both changed their surnames to Taylor-Johnson).
Since then, he has played a leading role in a kind of Hollywood home idyll, tending his own vegetable garden and chicken coop, looking into the store that sells organic meat, preparing fresh eggs from his chickens for the daughters of Mses Wylda Rae (eng. Mses Wylda Rae), which six and Romy Hero, who is five and loves his wife Sam very much. For the record, she's 23 years older than him.
First season awards
Last year, he had to resort to the services of a shaman who cleansed his body from the effects of a three-month binge. He had to drink so seriously in order to turn into the Texas psychopath Ray, whom he played in the film "Under cover of night" (eng. Nocturnal Animals, second title " Nocturnal Animals») Tom Ford. As Ray, he spent most of 2015 looking like the Lion King's homeless brother.
Then he metamorphosed into a smart man dressed in immaculately pressed Tom Ford suits and embarked on a six-month tour of the awards and nominations season for Animals of the Night. His next role as a military sniper in the soon-to-be-released film The Wall added large doses of Pabst Blue Ribbon to his diet.
When we met today, it seemed to me that he had somehow changed again. He chuckles as I share with him my impressions of my first impression of his appearance - dressed as a retired military man from the 50s - khaki trousers, a short-sleeved shirt with a motorcycle graphic over a white T-shirt, under which a pair of army dog tags on a chain was hidden. . “The worst thing was when my daughter was just finishing kindergarten, and she had to make an album about the impressions of the past year with her photos,” he says. “Every photo of her was: her, her mother and some new guy: with short hair, with long hair, with a mustache and without a mustache, a bearded, skinny soldier ... The question arose: “Who the hell is this?”
If Nowhere Boy was the film that had the biggest impact on the former Johnson's personal life, then Under Cover of Night was a career-changing film. After the film was released at the end of 2016, Taylor-Johnson appeared before the eyes of the viewer in the form of a mature man. His hero, the rapist and murderer Ray, is the depraved heart of the film, as magnetic as it is sadistic, as powerful as it is comely, somewhat similar to Travis Bickle from Martin Scorsese's Taxi Driver.
It is a pity that he was not nominated for an Oscar, and the Bafft Award (eng. "BAFTA") that year was received by Dev Patel (eng. Dev Patel). But he is by no means disappointed. But rather, on the contrary, he is cheerful and energetic, like a person who can finally take a breath after his first season of awards. “In some ways, I even feel relieved,” he says. “And here the question is not that I do not know how to be grateful or gloat. It's just hard for me to handle that level of attention."
How a hero is born
Awards ceremonies "absolutely dumbfound" him. At the Golden Globes, he delivered a refreshingly informal speech in his prosaic Baginghamshire way, thanking his wife "for putting up with me - I wasn't very nice in that part." Taylor-Johnson hates talking about himself. He'd rather show me a video on his iPhone of his daughter doing an inimitable dance to Queen's "Another One Bites The Dust" or a picture of his wife doing an advanced back arched yogic pose against a wall.
He is noble and unpretentious, from that category of people who really reveal themselves only in the circle of close people or working on the set with full dedication. And it's hard to believe that such crazy energy can come from such a reserved person, but then let's just remember Robert De Niro.
Taylor-Johnson has no problem making speeches in public, he just doesn't feel the need to, he has an incredible combination of youthful urgency with emotional maturity, a sensitive soul and a powerful body. In The Wall, he plays a US Army soldier who is literally pinned back against a wall by an invisible Iraqi sniper after his partner, played by John Cena, is killed. As a result, the thriller promises to be psychologically intense, and Taylor-Johnson maintains this state for most of the film alone. The Wall was directed by Doug Liman, best known for his work on the Jason Bourne series.
“When you get used to the role and are in a state of such psychological stress, in the end you carry it with you and you cannot get rid of it on your own”
Aaron was actively preparing for this role. Immersed in research on post-traumatic stress disorder, the actor found friends with army connections, including Bradley Cooper, who starred in the movie American Sniper. He introduced Aaron to war veteran Jacob Schick, one of the founders of 22Kill, an organization that was created as a support group for ex-servicemen (named after approximately 22 suicides committed on US Veterans Day between 1999 and 2010).
He subsequently traveled to an event hosted by 22Kill in Boston. “These guys are very simple people,” he says. “Some of them have been to hell and come back. It was the most exciting event for [eyewitnesses]: the men you consider to be very courageous military personnel openly talk about their struggle with PTSD (post-traumatic stress syndrome). Some went as far as putting a gun to their head, many had suicidal thoughts, they are kept afloat by camaraderie, friendships, jokes ... "
Nick Irving "The Reaper" (famous for his 33 confirmed kills in his first three months in Iraq) is "one of my best comrades now. He's a super cool dude, a real darling." In the course of his research, Taylor-Johnson also received the support of Nobel-winning war photographer Lynsey Addario and Jane Horton, a veteran and family lawyer whom he met by chance during training at the shooting range. Her husband, Christopher Horton, was a sniper who was killed in combat in Iraq.
He also spent time with sniper trainees at Fort Chaffee in Arkansas. “Not many of them go through the six-week course,” says Taylor-Johnson. “10 graduates out of 30. One of the targets was at a distance of 1356 meters to hit the target. you must know all about the wind and the earth's axis. It's just amazing." All these acquaintances and meetings had a serious impact on the character of his character in the film.
Taylor-Johnson worked hard on increasing his weight before the film in order to get a military physique. He managed to add 13 kilograms to his 85 kilograms. “It was food and the gym, food and the gym,” he says. “But this weight gain was very different from the system I followed for The Avengers. There I consumed pure, high quality protein to look healthy. And here it was shit. I constantly ate at fast foods and felt like an SUV stuffed with canned goods.
In order to fully integrate with the image of his character, as in the case of Ray, Taylor-Johnson spent two months living and breathing his character, even smelling like him. “I used crates of cheap beer,” he says. “Tobacco-flavored chewing gum was the worst. In order to periodically spit picturesquely, he learned to accumulate saliva in his mouth. I got a terrible, rancid breath. My wife was horrified by all this.”
The Taylor-Johnson way of life seems to be based on some kind of cycle of abuse and purification. To embody the hideous Ray, he smoked, got high on beer, watched documentaries about serial killers, and didn't cut his nails for three months to "feel the toxicity inside and out." And after such a “transformation”, he did not want to bring this negative energy into the house to his wife and children, and after filming, he set about “expelling Ray”.
“When you get into a role and you’re in that kind of psychological stress, you end up carrying it around with you and you can’t get rid of it on your own,” he says. “I realized that I needed a detox from all this and turned to a very gifted female shaman who practices reiki and acupuncture [acupuncture]. This was not my first experience of such a cleaning, I had already performed this procedure, after working with Oliver Stone on the film Savages, where he played a drug dealer.
The secret of balance
Eventually, after celebrating the end of The Wall, he got sober again in January. "I'm not in AA or NA, and I don't belong to any of those organizations," he says. "I can just stop." All of this metamorphosis of getting into character is one big reason why Aaron Taylor Johnson doesn't work on more than one project a year. He needs “two or three months to smoothly transform from one character to another. In addition, there are plenty of everyday things like gardening or cooking, or just spending time with your kids.” He is currently living in the Japanese culinary period and gets very excited when he starts talking about his ancient clay pots.
“I stock up on fresh seaweed, which I cook on rice with toasted sesame oil and sake,” he says. “I add a couple of eggs to this dish while it cooks, then daikon sprouts. And of course, the final chord in the form of an unsurpassed presentation of the whole dish. He also tidied up a plot of land on the slope of his garden. “I like it when peace reigns in my world,” he says. “Constantly being in an acting environment is extremely difficult, jumping from project to project, you can just go crazy. Half of my friends go crazy and start burning bridges with alcohol and drugs." For an actor whose career began at the age of six, he looks surprisingly level-headed.
"I like being a father more than being an actor."
Taylor-Johnson grew up in Holmer Green in Buckinghamshire. At the age of six, he entered drama school in order to study drama, participate in auditions, study jazz dance, acrobatics and singing. Three years later, in the West End, he was already playing the murdered son of Macduff on the same stage with Rufus Sewall in the role of Macbeth. At the age of 15, he left school and went to Los Angeles to meet Hollywood agents. In 2006, the casting was successfully passed for the role of Young Eisenheim in The Illusionist (eng. The Illusionist), then there was the role of Dave Lizewski in the film about super-heroes "Kick-Ass" by Matthew Vaughn, for which two years later he was nominated for BAFTA and several more awards.
He went through his "self-destructive period" two years before he turned 18. "I just went a little crazy," he told me in 2014 during our Godzilla interview. “I spent a lot of money and lived for two years that I can't even remember. It's about the fact that there comes a time when you have to get everything off of yourself before you can move on, right? Because if I hadn't done it then, I'd be broken now. I wouldn't be able to take care of a family, or control myself, or feel responsible enough to do what I do."
Mr. Taylor-Johnson's friends call him Benjamin Button, the man who aged backwards. “I like being a father more than being an actor,” he says. "I'm still thinking about changing careers."
He and his wife take turns working on projects, one stays at home while the other is on set. But when Sam Taylor-Wood directed the filming of Fifty Shades of Grey, the whole family went to Canada with her. Most recently, she produced and directed two episodes of the Netflix series, the psychological thriller Gypsy.
At the end of our conversation, it turned out that the Taylor-Johnsons were working together again on several mysterious projects, a dance piece on the list, they also bought the rights to a book, and are working on a film that could appear at Cannes this year.
How to keep a woman happy
He admits that in addition to "a wife, four daughters, two female dogs and three female chickens," he also has his own feminine energies. "I'm happy to say I'm a feminist," he says. “Being a feminist is just believing in equal rights. Man, woman, gay, straight, white, black, we're all equal." Just now, Taylor-Johnson has handed over miniatures of all the posters that were on the global women's march in January to decorate the family bathroom. “When they become young women, they will be ready,” he says of his daughters. "They have a great role model - their mom is one of the strongest, most independent women I know."
Note to the reader: despite the statement of support for feminism, he has not ceased to be a real man in this family. He also continues to give flowers to his young ladies. I suppose he could probably write an instruction booklet called How to Keep a Woman Happy. He looks a little confused. “I don’t really analyze our relationship,” he says. “I just know it works. I just feel loved and taken care of. We have a very deep connection. We're just in sync."
The love story of Sam Taylor-Wood and Aaron Jones seems just amazing. He is a young handsome man who plays either Vronsky or John Lennon in the movie, she is an artist, director, a woman who defeated cancer, survived a difficult divorce and met new love, despite condemnation and prejudice - after all, Sam is older than her husband by as much as 23 years! This circumstance, however, does not at all prevent Aaron from looking at his wife with loving eyes, raising her two daughters from a previous marriage and two common girls, being a real father of the family and supporting his wife in everything.
woman with a past
Director Sam Taylor-Wood met actor Aaron Johnson when she was 42 and he was only 19. Sam was filming a biopic about John Lennon and chose a handsome young man for the main role, who really looked very much like young musician. Aaron Johnson, agreeing to this role, did not yet know that he had met his love.
Sam had a hard and interesting fate. Director and artist Taylor-Wood was married for 11 years to art dealer Jay Jopling, who helped Sam arrange her photo and art exhibitions. Family life the couple seemed happy, their first daughter Angelina was born, and everything seemed fine, but ... 30-year-old Sam was diagnosed with colorectal. Despite the fact that the diagnosis sounded scary, Taylor-Wood was in no hurry to give up, began a course of chemotherapy, agreed to the operation and believed that she would definitely get better.
Director Sam Taylor-Wood went through many trials
Only two years had passed after Sam finally managed to defeat the disease, as a new test awaited her - and cancer again! This time - the mammary gland ... To say that the woman was amazed is to say nothing. Has begun new round grueling procedures - again the hospital, again chemotherapy ...
“At first I was overwhelmed with gratitude for the fact that I survived,” said Sam Taylor-Wood in an interview with Harper’s Bazaar magazine. “The scars on the chest and abdomen seem to be mere trifles in this state. The scar on the abdomen resembles a question mark in shape, and I I find it amazing. And then I began to respect my body even more: in the end, it overcame cancer twice and produced two beautiful children. ”
Sam really not only defeated cancer for the second time, but also decided to give birth again - this is how her daughter Jessica was born. However, the relationship with her husband Jay Jopling did not withstand numerous tests - he decided to divorce his wife, which Taylor-Wood was very painfully worried about. Her favorite work helped her cope with the next blow of fate. Sam arranged a touching photo project "Weeping Men", in 2006 she made her debut film "Forbidden to Show", and then she swung at the biography of John Lennon ...
Meeting with Aaron was a real gift of fate for her.
Man with a future
For 19-year-old Aaron Johnson, the role in Becoming John Lennon was lucky ticket to Hollywood. The young actor had already starred in several minor films, so working with Sam Taylor-Wood was a real breakthrough for him. Aaron was recognized as the best young actor in Britain, received several prestigious awards, but that was not the main thing ... On the set, he began a stormy romance with the director of the film.
It is worth noting that the press did not take these relations seriously. Aaron Johnson especially got it, who was suspected of commercialism, the desire to become famous through these relationships ... However, the actor did not care much public opinion. “I consider myself quite a brave man,” he once said. - First of all, because I don’t care at all who and what they think of me. I always do only what my instinct tells me."
Their romance began on the set
And while a scandalous separation was expected from the couple, in reality everything turned out differently - Johnson's fleeting affair did not suit him, in 2009 he persuaded Sam to become his wife, and then to have common children. As proof of the seriousness of his feelings, Aaron took double surname Now he's Taylor-Johnson.
“Almost before anything started between us, Aaron told me that he wanted children,” Sam frankly told in an interview. - He clearly let me know that he dreams of a family. He is very mature. He only accepts job offers where he can take breaks - he wants to be part of the first months of Wilde's life.
A year after the wedding, Sam and Aaron had a daughter, Wilde, and two years later, a lovely girl, Romi. Moreover, Johnson is trying to replace the father and two daughters Taylor-Wood from his first marriage. It's hard to believe, but now Aaron is only 23 years old, and he is already raising four children!
Now 23-year-old Aaron Johnson is the father of a large family
It is worth noting that the actor’s career does not stand still - he played Vronsky in the film adaptation of Anna Karenina, showed that he could be a bad guy in the film Kick-Ass, and now he is participating in several large-scale projects at once - in the film about superheroes The Avengers : Age of Ultron" and in the next "Godzilla".
Age difference
Of course, the 23-year age gap in favor of a woman has become an inexhaustible topic of discussion, but Aaron and Sam are calm about such issues.
In an interview, the actor said: “I have an old and wise soul, and Sam has a young one. We don't see the age difference, we just see each other." Unlike most young people today, Johnson does not pursue entertainment and pleasure. “My children and my wife are what I live for,” the actor declares.
Sam Taylor-Wood herself is also not shy about this topic. The director aptly remarks that before people And interracial marriages seemed wild, but now it does not surprise anyone, so you need to get rid of prejudices about age. Taylor-Wood says: “Why is it not embarrassing when men meet women who are suitable for their daughter? But if a woman is much older, this is already a reason to pour mud on her!
However, the lovers knew what they were doing at the very beginning of the novel, so Sam and Aaron very quickly learned to ignore gossip addressed to them. And the changeable public opinion has changed anger to mercy - now Sam Taylor-Wood and Aaron Johnson are considered a happy and harmonious couple, which Lady Mail.Ru cannot but agree with.
