{"id":355610,"date":"2025-12-19T14:08:11","date_gmt":"2025-12-19T14:08:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/355610\/"},"modified":"2025-12-19T14:08:11","modified_gmt":"2025-12-19T14:08:11","slug":"alfie-williams-will-surprise-you-in-28-years-later-the-bone-temple","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/355610\/","title":{"rendered":"Alfie Williams will surprise you in ’28 Years Later: The Bone Temple’"},"content":{"rendered":"

When Danny Boyle<\/a>\u2019s 28 Years Later<\/a> came out earlier this year, a star was well and truly born: Alfie Williams. Making his feature debut, this 14-year-old lad from Newcastle Upon Tyne was just the right blend of innocence and experience as Spike, the young boy raised off the coast of Britain, with the mainland now overrun by those \u201cinfected\u201d with the Rage Virus \u2013 first chronicled in Boyle\u2019s original 2002 movie 28 Days Later<\/a>.<\/p>\n

It was a role that saw him nominated by the London Critics\u2019 Circle<\/a> for Young British\/Irish Performer of the Year, and now Williams is back as Spike in the fast-follow sequel 28 Years Later: The Bone Temple, directed by Nia DaCosta. \u201cJust be ready,\u201d he says, \u201cbecause it\u2019s gonna be brutal.\u201d<\/p>\n

Hello Alfie! We last left Spike on the mainland at the end of 28 Years Later. How would you describe his journey in The Bone Temple?<\/p>\n

Williams: \u201cHe dealt with the infected in the first one, and you see him grow up into this strong figure. And in the second one, he hasn\u2019t really dealt with humans, so he goes back to being the scared little kid again, you know? So he\u2019s regressed back to how he was in the first film.\u201d<\/p>\n

What was it like working with Jack O\u2019Connell, who plays gang leader Sir Jimmy?<\/p>\n

\u201cJack\u2019s amazing, you know? I mean, he\u2019s great to work with and he gives a lot of advice on how to get ready for scenes\u2026 the first scene in the film, it\u2019s a very tense scene, and he came over and he was like, \u2018Just forget about all of them. Focus on your performance. Focus on what Spike\u2019s feeling. And just give it everything.\u2019 And, I mean, that\u2019s stuck with us.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"JackJack O\u2019Connell in \u201928 Years Later: The Bone Temple\u2019. CREDIT: Sony Pictures<\/p>\n

Did you have to get physically fit for the films?<\/p>\n

\u201cYeah, there\u2019s a lot of running. I\u2019m not the fittest guy, but obviously while you were on set, you were doing lots of running and exercising. Danny made us do a lot of squats to get ready for a scene so I could get out of breath! Not that I needed to because we were running for ages!\u201d<\/p>\n

How was it to be on the set with actors playing The Infected?<\/p>\n

\u201cYou get used to it after a while, but [at first], I saw it and I was like, \u2018That\u2019s awesome!\u2019 The prosthetics are great, and the actors are nice. They played good Infected! You\u2019d see them getting coffee and stuff, and that would make for some weird photos!\u201d<\/p>\n

Do you have any idea why zombie shows and movies are so popular? And what\u2019s your favourite?<\/p>\n

\u201cI think it\u2019s just a \u2018what if?\u2019 What if that did happen, how would society react? And I think all of these films and TV shows do a good job of showing what would happen. I do enjoy The Walking Dead. I watch The Walking Dead a lot.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Alfie\u201928 Years Later\u2019 star Alfie Williams. CREDIT: David Reiss<\/p>\n

How would you cope in a zombie apocalypse? Could you survive?<\/p>\n

\u201cProbably, if you stay up high on roofs and stuff\u2026 I mean, you could survive pretty long doing that. It\u2019s just when supplies are low and you\u2019ve got to get resources and stuff\u2026 as long as you don\u2019t get cornered. You might survive. Depends on if you\u2019re facing Infected or zombies.\u201d<\/p>\n

Since 28 Years Later came out, have people been coming up to you? Do you get recognised a lot?<\/p>\n

\u201cNot much on the streets. I don\u2019t have any encounters like that. I mean, there was this one time where I went into a CEX to sell some video games, and then the guy at the counter recognised us, and I got a picture with him and stuff. That was the one time, but it felt great!\u201d<\/p>\n

What have your friends made of your success?<\/p>\n

\u201cThey\u2019re very, very happy for us. When the film first came out they were seeing us on buses and kept taking pictures. It was very funny.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"RalphRalph Fiennes and Alfie Williams in \u201928 Years Later\u2019. CREDIT: Sony Pictures<\/p>\n

That must be weird for you to see your own face on a bus, right?<\/p>\n

\u201cA hundred percent. It\u2019s weird. If you had told a five-year-old me that I would be on a bus and in a movie, then he wouldn\u2019t believe it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Is it true that your 28 Years Later co-star Aaron Taylor-Johnson<\/a> gave you a guitar as a present?<\/p>\n

\u201cYeah. He gave me a guitar on, I think, Holy Island where we filmed. And ever since then, I\u2019ve been playing guitar religiously.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u00a0Had you played guitar at all before you got that present?<\/p>\n

\u201cNo, and I\u2019ve got no idea\u2026 because while I was on set, I was thinking about getting one and then, I don\u2019t know how he knew. Must be psychic or something.\u201d<\/p>\n

What songs are you learning?<\/p>\n

\u201cRecently, I\u2019ve been writing my own stuff. But I play a lot of Nirvana<\/a>\u2026 just old stuff.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

You also struck up a relationship with Stephen Graham<\/a>, right? You co-starred in the short film Phallacy and he gave your career a push\u2026<\/p>\n

\u201cYeah, yeah, that\u2019s what he did. He liked the performance that I did in the film, and he called his agent and gave a referral. So I\u2019m very thankful to Stephen for that.\u201d<\/p>\n

Have you kept in touch with him at all since that happened?<\/p>\n

\u201cYeah. I mean, when he heard about me in 28 Years Later, he gave us a call and he was very happy for us. We\u2019ve spoken a couple of times.\u201d<\/p>\n

Who are the actors that you love to watch?<\/p>\n

\u201cI really love Bryan Cranston<\/a>. He would probably be my favourite actor. And I like J.K. Simmons\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n

You like all the old guys?<\/p>\n

\u201cOld is gold!\u201d<\/p>\n

You\u2019re filming Banquet with Meghann Fahy. What can you say about that project?<\/p>\n

\u201cIt mixes drama and horror. It\u2019s a horror film. I play a troubled young guy and that\u2019s probably as much as I can say about it, to be honest.\u201d<\/p>\n

Do you want to carry on doing film or TV or stage work?<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m ready for anything. Movies, TV shows, I\u2019ll do it all if it\u2019s right, if the character is right, and if it\u2019s something I want to do.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u201828 Years Later: The Bone Temple\u2019 is in UK cinemas from January 16<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"When Danny Boyle\u2019s 28 Years Later came out earlier this year, a star was well and truly born:…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":355611,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[49,48,75,367,337],"class_list":{"0":"post-355610","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-movies","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-entertainment","11":"tag-horror","12":"tag-movies"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/355610","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=355610"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/355610\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/355611"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=355610"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=355610"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=355610"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}