He knows how to quickly dial up the intimacy of an encounter.
Hes all about the here and now, cracking jokes, and dancing.
But all of that is really a means of not going deeper.
The 33-year-old actor, though, is happy to go deeper.
Id had some really hard times, he says.
His advice to women who encounter those types?
Growing up, Essiedu says, his mother usedto plead with him:Get a real job.
People were getting snatched up by the police, he says.
You didnt know how your son was going to turn out in a very real way.
I have no idea where she is now, but God bless her soul, he says.
(He ended up marrying another actor, Rosa Robson.)
The art world couldnt have been more foreign to him.
But within a few short years of drama school, he was getting national attention.
(Past recipients include Ruth Negga, Cush Jumbo, and David Oyelowo.)
Eventually, however, the loss of his mother caught up to him.
Does it f*cking matter?
The way grief works is kind of quantum, he explains.
You both feel everything and nothing at the same time.
That knowledge found a natural home in his drama school classmate Coels auto-fictional, impressionisticI May Destroy You.
Essiedu considers Cillian Murphy a career role model.
He just lived in this village and took his kids to school.
Easier said than done.
Essiedu says he has to be brave, in terms of the projects he chooses.
Were in the streets out here, he jokes.
