The monster within: Richard Armitage on playing serial killer Francis Dolarhyde on ‘Hannibal'
by Annie S. Alejo
July 30, 2015 (updated)


We all have our demons inside, but nothing like what ravages the soul of Francis Dolarhyde, the primary antagonist Thomas Harris in his 1981 novel “Red Dragon,” and its subsequent reincarnation on screen and, recently, on TV.

Richard Armitage, who famously played Thorin Oakenshield in Peter Jackson’s three-part film adaptation of J.R.R. Tolkien’s “The Hobbit,” has been tasked to bring the character to life on TV, in the third season of Bryan Fuller’s “Hannibal.” It’s a project he has taken on knowing it would be a personal challenge as well.

“I remember there was one day when they were showing some of the film footage of what he’d done and I remember being horrified as him, actually,” Armitage tells Bulletin Entertainment. “It was very, very difficult to watch.”

Admittedly “squeamish” about things that even the 1991 film “The Silence of the Lambs” had such an effect on him, Armitage jumped at the chance to portray Dolahyde – known also as the Tooth Fairy who bites his victims’ bodies; and who refers to his “other self” as The Great Red Dragon. “He is somebody that experienced such trauma in his childhood” from being abandoned by his mother to being abused by his step-siblings, he explains. “There’s a deformity in him that’s causing him to act in this way. So for that reason he has my empathy, and to an extent my sympathy,” Armitage adds.

Far from condoning what the wretched character does, however, Armitage feels the person that’s become a monster is fascinating to explore. “The most difficult thing for me is making it a piece of fictional entertainment,” he says, adding, “If an audience can empathize with him, then it’s kind of a strange achievement.”

Once sharing his views on portraying violence in an interview, Armitage still seems to be of the same opinion as before. “In a way that’s exactly why taking on the role was important to me,” he points out. “The conversation is what happens as you film something. So, when you’re asked to portray violence, it has to be faithful to what it really is depicting. If it’s trivialized, then we undersell it; if it’s glamorized, we’re in dangerous territory.”

Despite his being shirtless on the show causing a buzz among his fans, he insists, “I never saw Francis Dolarhyde as a sexualized being. In fact, I find him asexual. He’s never had a sexual encounter with a living woman before. That, to me, was fascinating because he’s falling in love for the first time. There was a real innocence to him yet at the same time he’s committing terrible, terrible crimes against families, in particular to the female of the family.”

What he remains thankful for is that Dolarhyde’s crimes are not really depicted on screen. “It was something that I was very frightened would be the case. And if it had been… I wouldn’t have been able to do it. I don’t think I would have been very comfortable taking on the role knowing that we were gonna see that.”

To him, it is enough that, without showing the gruesome murders, “you understand the character, what the character had done through his own vision of it, which is slightly distorted… all seen through the veil of a man who is very, very disturbed.”

Armitage, who does a lot of research even in psychopathy, relies on the script and keeps coming back to Harris’ novel “just to remind myself about who (Dolarhyde) was and his history and past,” he sees the character’s penchant for working shirtless as “something to do with him detaching from the human experience. That he didn’t want to feel like a man. He wanted to become an animal, or he wanted to become The Dragon. And a dragon has a kind of physical armor which isn’t human clothing.”

The nuances of this antagonist, as Fuller and Armitage have collaborated on, the actor hopes would come across to audiences. It’s well thought out for a character who is largely a stand-alone and has very little to do with the titular character in the novels. Armitage describes it as “the new element… a new construct” designed to “suspend Dolarhyde appropriately in the existing ‘Hannibal’ TV series universe.”

Indeed, you can’t have this antagonist in a series called “Hannibal” and not have him play against the main characters. “And it becomes a very dangerous triangle whereby Will Graham (Hugh Dancy) is trying to prevent the next murder, in a way, (to) save Francis Dolarhyde. And Hannibal (Lecter, played by Mads Mikkelsen) is pushing him towards the edge. He wants him to become The Dragon; he wants to see this kind of extraordinary experiment, this extraordinary becoming that Dolarhyde is attempting.

Hannibal cares less about his violent crimes than about what he’s gonna become. And unfortunately the next target is Will’s family, which is something taken directly from the book.”

However else this character plays out and how Armitage succeeds with this role, the latest season of “Hannibal” – a series that may not exactly be for everyone – is gunning for a strong finish.

“Hannibal” Season 3 airs every Tuesday at 9:45 p.m. first and exclusive on AXN.