"Taron Egerton"
Episode
55 min
Read time
2 min
Topics
Career Growth, Relationships, Investing
AI-Generated Summary
Key Takeaways
- ✓Drama school persistence: Egerton faced rejection from all drama schools his first audition year due to being underprepared and overconfident. He took the feedback, adjusted his approach, and successfully gained admission the following year, demonstrating the value of accepting critical notes early in a career.
- ✓Family investment in training: Each drama school audition cost forty to sixty pounds. Egerton's mother, father, stepfather, and aunt each funded one audition while he paid for another himself, showing how working-class families pool resources to support artistic education when financial barriers exist.
- ✓Managing public attention: Egerton notes his ability to engage with fans varies based on self-perception rather than external circumstances. Days with strong self-confidence make public interaction easier, while days of self-doubt make the same interactions feel draining, regardless of actual events occurring in his life.
- ✓Character-driven project selection: After Rocketman's success, Egerton deliberately chose the stage show Blackbird to avoid being typecast as vanilla or average Joe characters. He prioritizes roles that stretch his range and allow him to function as a character actor despite leading man looks.
What It Covers
Actor Taron Egerton discusses his journey from Welsh youth theater to Hollywood stardom, covering his Royal Academy training, breakthrough in Kingsman, portraying Elton John in Rocketman, and navigating fame while maintaining connections to his working-class Welsh roots.
Key Questions Answered
- •Drama school persistence: Egerton faced rejection from all drama schools his first audition year due to being underprepared and overconfident. He took the feedback, adjusted his approach, and successfully gained admission the following year, demonstrating the value of accepting critical notes early in a career.
- •Family investment in training: Each drama school audition cost forty to sixty pounds. Egerton's mother, father, stepfather, and aunt each funded one audition while he paid for another himself, showing how working-class families pool resources to support artistic education when financial barriers exist.
- •Managing public attention: Egerton notes his ability to engage with fans varies based on self-perception rather than external circumstances. Days with strong self-confidence make public interaction easier, while days of self-doubt make the same interactions feel draining, regardless of actual events occurring in his life.
- •Character-driven project selection: After Rocketman's success, Egerton deliberately chose the stage show Blackbird to avoid being typecast as vanilla or average Joe characters. He prioritizes roles that stretch his range and allow him to function as a character actor despite leading man looks.
Notable Moment
Egerton describes reading the Kingsman script on a London street corner at age twenty-three, becoming so excited he started performing the dialogue aloud in public. He experienced an immediate certainty that the role was meant for him, a feeling he has never replicated with any subsequent project.
Episode Transcript
Listen, I think you two are gonna be great at this. Is this your first podcast, the both of you? Sean? Well This Yeah. Just the first time out. Yeah. First time out. What what what what do we need to know? Well, you just go ahead and talk into that big foamy black thing in front of your lips. And what do I do with my microphone? Bam, bam, bam, bam, wow. Welcome to Smartlist. Smart. Less. Smart. Less. Good morning, good day, good evening, listener. We're We had we had a real robust, in house smart list text chain going this morning. Yeah. We it's really fascinating. Uh-huh. I love talking about that stuff. Talking about all the scary stuff. Going out in the world. Yeah. Like AI. I don't listener, I don't know if you've heard about this this is the acronym is AI. It stands for artificial intelligence. Waco back. And it's coming, and it's going to be freaky. I wish the listeners could see how dead your eyes were when you were Shut up, Will. This is serious. Okay. No. It's coming. And, So what now? I'm running for the hills, buy a pistol. What are we doing? Or or I guess double down on, just chatting with folks like we're doing. You know? Yes. I guess you you can kinda robot us, can't you? I mean, I'm pretty much always you're always called me a robot, Will. Sean, there is no way, Jason. It's me, Will. I'm here. Sean, you look so good today. It is a pleasure to be on Smarlas. I'm excited for our next guest. Wait. Do I have any do I have any good dad jokes? Oh, you're gonna try to lighten things? Yeah. I got one. Call you. Ready for this? Guy will. Yeah. Open up the file. Yeah. What do you got? What do you call a what do you call a teacher who never farts in public? What's that? Private tutor. Oh my goodness. Sean, that's fun. Sean, that's really fun. That is fun. I've taken that one. I'm gonna ride that for a week. I know how that feels. I was gonna say speaking of which. Mhmm. Now, Sean, do you have a callback today or a photo shoot or something? Because you look you do look great. You usually do look good. Yeah. What's, what's the occasion? I didn't I took a shower and, this is what it looks like. Yeah. There we have it. Wow. Yeah. I took a shower. Do you now when you shower, do you shampoo your hair and condition it? I don't condition. I've never conditioned my hair. I just shampoo. Okay. Or I get the shampoo. Every time you shower, you shampoo your hair? Yeah. Who doesn't? People who look good. I don't. What do you mean? Every time. Yeah. Every time shampoo your hair every time you shower. You get that fluffy, shitty hairdo like shampoo face. Of …
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