With director Dexter Fletcher’s Rocketman opening in theaters this weekend, I recently sat down with Richard Madden to talk about making the fantasy musical based on the life of Elton John. As most of you know from the trailers, Rocketman isn’t your convention biopic. Yes, you’ll see how John (Taron Egerton) and his writing partner Bernie Taupin (Jamie Bell) came up with some of their iconic songs, and the film does include a few of the tropes you see in all movies based on someone’s life. But Rocketman also stages these elaborate musical sequences set to John’s most beloved songs that exist in their own reality. Rocketman also stars Richard Madden as Elton’s first manager, John Reid, and Bryce Dallas Howard as Elton’s mother Sheila Farebrother.
During my interview with Richard Madden he talked about how he got ready to play the role, how he formed such great chemistry with Taron Egerton, a day he’ll always remember from filming, deleted scenes, and more. In addition, for fans of the great series Bodyguard (which is now streaming on Netflix), Madden talked about when he’s like to return and play the character of Richard Budd again.
Check out what he had to say in the player above and below is exactly what we talked about.
Richard Madden: