Eddie Redmayne in The Day Of The Jackal. PHOTO: MAX

Fans of Eddie Redmayne are used to seeing him as the good guy, whether it is compassionate wizard Newt Scamander in the Fantastic Beasts fantasy films (2016 to 2022) or scientific genius Stephen Hawking in the biographical drama The Theory Of Everything (2014).

But the 43-year-old English actor plays against type as a killer-for-hire in The Day Of The Jackal, a spy thriller debuting on the streaming service Max on Jan 21.

Based on Frederick Forsyth’s acclaimed 1971 novel of the same name, it follows a lone assassin known as The Jackal (Redmayne) – a master of disguise who takes on different personas as he carries out hits.

But he meets his match in Bianca Pullman (Lashana Lynch), a British intelligence agent determined to track him down even if it means chasing him across Europe.

Redmayne, who won a Best Actor Oscar for The Theory Of Everything, had not done a major television role since 2010, when he starred in the historical drama The Pillars Of The Earth.

“But I was sent scripts for the first three episodes of this and it was page-turning – I wanted to know what was going to happen next and that is the kind of television I love.”

The action drama – which picked up nominations at the recent Golden Globes for Best Television Series – Drama and Best Actor (Redmayne) – crosses genres.

“On the one hand, it’s this action piece, but I also found it romantic and dark, and the morality, grey and complex,” says the star, who won praise for his portrayal of the late transgender artist Lili Elbe in romantic drama The Danish Girl (2015).

And the story has a special place in his heart.

The first film adaptation of the book – The Day Of The Jackal (1973) starring English actor Edward Fox – is his father’s favourite movie, and the VHS tape of it played repeatedly in the family home in the 1980s.

“I used to watch it at a really inappropriately young age,” jokes Redmayne, who has two children aged six and eight with English wife Hannah Bagshawe, 42.

“And there was something about Edward Fox – he was just so enigmatic, stylish and effortless. I was really compelled by it as a kid.”

English actor Eddie Redmayne and his wife, Hannah Bagshawe, at the Golden Globe Awards in Beverly Hills, California, on Jan 5. PHOTO: AFP

The series, which was shot in England, Hungary and Croatia, also channels the 1970s thrillers and early Bond movies adored by Redmayne’s father, 86-year-old banker Richard Redmayne.

Still, given the actor’s admiration of the 1973 film, attempting to make another adaptation seemed almost like “sacrilege”.

“But when I started reading the scripts, because it is set now, it felt like something other (than that).

“And it retained those elements that I love – that kind of analogue thing and this peacocking quality of the Jackal.

“So, other than my dad telling me not to f*** it up, it felt very liberating,” quips Redmayne.

Being able to unpeel this character over 10 episodes opened up new possibilities, including in his cat-and-mouse relationship with Pullman.

“In the film, the character is so enigmatic but so opaque – you really don’t get a sense of him.

“What this series has done is open him up and try to align these two almost completely different humans, and find where they meld.”

He and co-star Lynch – the 37-year-old English actress who played 007 agent Nomi in the Bond film No Time To Die (2021), as well as former US Air Force pilot Maria Rambeau in the Marvel Cinematic Universe in superhero film Captain Marvel (2019) – were both executive producers as well.

(From left) English actor Eddie Redmayne and actress Lashana Lynch on the red carpet for the London premiere of The Day Of The Jackal on Oct 22, 2024. PHOTO: AFP

And in some ways, they were as obsessive as their characters when it came to getting things right.

“Our casting director cast us well in the sense that both of these characters have a meticulous, obsessive quality.

“Lashana is wonderful as a human being and as an actor, but also as a producer, because there is a forensic quality to the way that we work.

“And when your face is on screen, you care a lot,” Redmayne adds.

So, even though one can grow exhausted looking at “thousands of edits and iterations of the same thing, if you’re really welded to it and you’ve worked on it from those embryonic stages, you want to keep coming back”, he says.