 Welcome to Toffy TV, I'm joined by Andrew Gower. You'll have seen him in Outlander, Black Mirror, Midsummer Maiders, the White Queen, Being Human, Endeavour and loads of other stuff. Also, Paul Dark, Carnival Row, lots of stuff, lots of stuff. He's an actor, he's a screenwriter, more importantly he is an Evertonian. From his place in London, he's holed up like the rest of us. Are you getting on mate? You know what, Baz, I'm doing alright mate. I've, as I said before, just come back two weeks, I've been keeping myself busy in the place in Walthamstow, E17. We've been good, as I say, come back two weeks ago when the place has never looked so clean in my life. You've even made a bed in the background? I know mate, I know, the bed's made up, spare bedrooms made up. Already. E17, stay another day, it literally is, stay inside another day innit? Stay inside another day, exactly, yeah. But obviously people will have seen you then, I've wrote a few of them, there's loads, you're being in loads, you're being human, White Queen, Endeavour, Outlander, Black Mirror, Midsummer Maiders, about six weeks ago when we had a couple of them. On, you know, just stacked up when it was the one you were in, obviously, bringing the clans or whatever. Sending the clans, yeah. Did you spot the murderer from the off basil? No, I didn't from the off, no, I'll be honest, but it was good, it was good. So, you know, people will have seen a lot of your stuff. I mean, born in 93. Born in 93, yeah. Did you know it was going to be an actor or was it a footballer or, I know you've been in a band as well. So, which one was it from a young age? It was a delusion of footballer, so I was deluded. I did want to be a footballer up to a certain age, 17, which I mean, you should realise way before 17 that you're not good enough to be a footballer, but I didn't. And then, yeah, and then weirdly, when into A-levels was unsure what I was going to do after having the kind of realisation that I'm not a good enough player. And then an English teacher said to me, listen, you're quite funny in English literature, getting up reading crap to the class, reading out Shakespeare or whatever. And he was like, listen, we're doing a play. And it was fagin. They needed a fagin in all of a twist. And I don't know why they thought of me. Maybe it's the nose or something. I don't know. But yeah, he said, listen, come and try out for this. Did that got kind of weird? I always say to a lot of my mates who like football and acting. I always use football as a kind of comparison between, I don't know. There's a lot of comparisons you can make between the two or I make them anyway. And yeah, football kind of got the same buzz being on stage as I did when I used to play football. I had the adrenaline, the kind of people, not that many people used to watch us, but people watching or whatever. And that was it really. I was hooked from when I had that first performance and then put to a year later I got into drama school at 18. So it was kind of weird looking back how quickly all that happened. I lied to my dad for a while that I was auditioning for drama school. Told him I wanted to go to university and then ended up getting in at the Oxford School of Drama. And then the rest, it's a weird thing. I didn't really have massive intentions of getting into acting and I didn't realise how amazing the profession is and how much there is to it and how much to the craft there is. And so many people have different methods of training and all that. But after getting into drama school, I kind of went down the rabbit hole, so to speak. And yeah, here I am 12 years later. So yeah, weird. But your writer is a performer, isn't it? So your writer equates it to football. It's that performance, the adrenaline. I'm guessing a little bit of nerves like anything the minute you start doing it. But if you're comfortable in what you do, then your talent takes over, doesn't it? Very much like football. I always think like the best footballers in the world, the Messi's, you know, the Ronaldo's. In a way, they are like still playing football with the mates in the park. But they forget about the audience. They just play in football and it looks so simple. And that's, I think, you know, I don't have kids any advice to a kid if I was looking back. It meant so much to me playing every game. I was too conscious of making a mistake, too conscious of taking a risk in a game. And I think the best footballers you're watching nowadays, the kids who come through, they take risks. They take risks as footballers in position, you know, in front of 40,000 moody Evitonians. I couldn't imagine, you know, but yeah, the similarities in football and acting. That's one of them, I'd say, the risks sort of taking and being able to perform in front of that many people. Outstanding. I mean, you were in an episode of Black Mirror and I guess it kind of feels like we're living in an episode of Black Mirror at the moment, doesn't it? It's very strange times, isn't it, at the moment? But what was that like being part of something that's quite, it's got quite a cult following, hasn't it? The Black Mirror franchise, I suppose, if you want to call it that. But what was that like being involved in that? Fantastic, really. I mean, especially we got to film in Iceland that that was not the supermarket, I always say that. Yeah, we have beautiful, like, beautiful time in Iceland and Charlie Brooker. I mean, if anybody you'd want to hear speak about, you know, coronavirus right now and what's going on, I'm sure many people would like to kind of have his version, his take of events. But, yeah, amazing cast of Bukir in Son Ysawar and Andrew Reisbrough and just amazing writing and perfect location. It's like, yeah, I didn't know much about the series before I signed up to it. I hadn't seen many of the episodes, but then as soon as the audition came through, I kind of, you know, I checked out the one with what's-a-name Haley Atwell and which is sort of a similar episode, Ray Spall, the Christmas episode, which is fantastic with John Hamm. So, like, yeah, since being in it, actually, I realized how it's kind of that funny thing when the audition comes through, you're like, OK, let's just get this job, let's land it. And then looking back now, it's one of those jobs. I'm like, oh, that was, you know, it's a nice tick off the list. And also the director, John Hillcott, who directed The Road and, yeah, many, many amazing film. He'd just, to work with him, it's another tick on the list. Another director who was, like, so excited to work with. Would you like another crack at one of those, one of the black mirrors or a star here? Is it a case of one and half with that one? It's weird, actually, because a few, I think a few, I can't think off the top on my head, but a few of my mates, a girl I worked with on her very first job, she did a black mirror episode and then she was called back in to do another one. So you're waiting for the call. I mean, if they call, if the phone rings, it'd be nice. The amazing thing about black mirrors, they're all so different, aren't they? They're all films of their own. Very times are the unexpected, aren't they? It's a quote. Do you have a favourite episode? No, you know what? Ped is the full on black mirror. I've watched a few of them. I mean, the first one I watched, he made me watch it the one with the bacon. What's his name? The, forget, Rupert. Absolutely. Dark episode. Yeah, yeah, but there's, I mean, obviously, the Netflix that's pure cult following on when you know people talk about it, they absolutely love it, don't they? But it's interesting to see what he got that call back. You were in Outlander waiting, you know, I spoke to Sam Paul last week who's in the English game, you know, broke the English game, rather at the moment, one of the episodes, and Big Evertonian. And you were in Outlander with him as well, weren't you, a few years ago? Yeah, different, me and Sam actually have crossed over a few times. So we're Outlander, I think he was in a different season, but everybody knows each other on that job I played, the Bonnie Prince of Scotland, which is a fun one. And then in Carnival Row as well, Sam came in into season one of that as well. Yeah, we've crossed paths a few times, unfortunately, haven't had any scenes together yet, but yeah. For a big everton off in a scene, yeah. I'd be like, Mikael, our tattoo. To Mikael, yeah, yeah, all over, yeah. Be lovely, be lovely. Well, growing up, obviously, you've said, you know, you would want them to be a footballer, like we all were, and we all had that dream. Who were your kind of heroes, your everton heroes, as you were growing up? I mean, big dunk, obviously big dunk, the Messiah. I mean, I just love Layton Baines, I think he oozes class. I'd always share that photo of him getting an ice cream after the game, just gets me every time. And I've seen him down, I was doing a project of my own in Liverpool actually. I've never filmed in Liverpool, which is one big thing, one big dream of mine. But I was doing this project of my own with another Liverpool actor, Stephen Walters. And we were filming, and I was waiting for him. And I was waiting four days on the bounce in Bald Street. And I just kept bumping into Baines with his kid. And it took me four days to sort of... Actually, we should be to him. ...to encourage you up to speak to him. But yeah, just, I mean, that Moise, the Moise, what was it, 11 years or 10 years of Moise, you know, a lot of those players. That was my sort of the best, the best I've seen of Everton is that I was too young to remember 95 ride out and the charity shield. I mean, so the biggest thing for me, yeah, was the Moise era really. Those players like Arteta, signing players like him and Pienaar on loan. Being on holiday and checking the internet in the summer and seeing Pienaar come on loan to begin with and Arteta. Those players, for me, are kind of... I don't like your hair at all, so to speak. Yeah, the heroes. Which is a really odd... It's an odd thing when you're talking to Coppites or you're talking to Arsenal fans or Tottenham fans down here and you turn around saying, somebody asked me the other day to say who's your top five players. And Tim Cale, Arteta, Baines, I mean, for me, they are the players for me to find the Everton era that I've become accustomed to. Yeah, three brilliant players, those would be fair. They are, they are. All played the part, Baines is still obviously very much playing his part at the moment. What a goal, again, what a goal against Leicester. Oh, it was an hell of a goal one. Listen, he's played five, six games maybe this season, he's been brilliant in every game that he's played and that shows the quality and the class of the man. Have you had a chance to watch the English game, yeah? I haven't, but I've heard. I see, I was watching that interview with Sam and I said, I auditioned for that a good three times as well. Did you? Yeah, it was going, it was doing the rounds that one, Baz, it was doing the rounds. Yeah, definitely a Baines doppelganger. Oh, without a shadow, with that moustache. It can't unsee it. Now, once you've seen it, you can unsee it. Every time I look at it, Fegg is suiter, you just think it's like Baines Acton, which is a bit of a mad one. But yeah, it's a really good series. It's a great series, yeah, it's fantastic. And if they have a second season, then you've got to audition, mate. Oh, mate, there we go. You and Sam came in up to audition. He's few and he didn't get in the last one. He wrote it episode four, didn't he? But you didn't get in it. He wasn't too happy with that one. Talking about ever now, obviously, at the moment, there's more important things than football going on. But you do have to have that kind of distraction, don't you, to think about it? Yeah, most definitely. Were you surprised that we were able to get Carlo Ancelotti? Honestly, yeah. I mean, my dad's a cop. My eldest brother is Everton. My middle brother is Liverpool and I'm Everton. So we have many of you. Oh, my mum hates football. Well, my husband actually is a big blue-nose. But amongst friends, a lot of Tottenham Arsenal united, the whole kind of spectrum of football. I think when I was saying, listen, this link with Ancelotti is, it looks quite real. It was being fobbed off. And in a way, you kind of allow yourself as an Evertonian to think sometimes it's too good to be true. So when it happened, it feels that for me right now, it feels a great fit. And it's so nice to see how invested in the club he is. He brought his son. He's really buying into the history of the club. And it's a great affiliation with the fans. And it feels like a great fit. But had you asked me, you know, towards the final few games of Marco Silva, that we were going to end up with Ancelotti, I had told you to do. Fantastic appointment. Really great appointment. And just one of those things, I think, you know, we forget. And I think a lot of other football teams forget how, like, bad are, you know, how bad the finances were at Everton for most of my growing up. It was like, you know, getting a loan deal, signing McGuy Gay or, you know, Edan Tal or, you know, these players that we signed and had to get excited about. So that season when we did sign Rooney in class and, you know, we signed this massive plethora of players, all these players coming in. You know, you can't excuse Evertonians for getting excited that year. You can't excuse me and my family were in France when we signed Rooney. And yeah, me and my brother, eldest brother, we got carried away. Of course we did. But we've spent years in the dark, really, of, like, you know, Gareth Smith and Strachwell AC and a lot of players, doesn't it? I mean, you can make a film about, you know, Everton's transfer and shockers. But as far as, like, now we have Angelotti and now we have, you know, a bit of firepower in the transfer market. I don't blame us for making mistakes. I think it's sort of, it was not everybody can do what city did and get it straight, get it right straight away. I mean, and also there's a lot more money in football than there ever has been. So I think the fact we have Angelotti and how I feel like with the money, with, you know, with the mistakes we've made, I feel like it's the perfect timing for him to come in and kind of say, well, listen, you know, I'm only going to sign players who fit my ethos, who fit the club he seems to, he has dunk next to him. So I feel like I'm glad we've made those mistakes. I mean, it was awful, that season was awful in the end of Cooman and, you know, most of Marco Silva was kind of, I just didn't feel it was the right fit at all. So now I feel, I don't know, that dunk game against Chelsea for me was, I watched it in the other room, literally, the missus had something else on the TV and she came in and she was like, you're all right, I just got so, because I didn't feel like I was going to have another Everton game like that. That Everton game really just, and I think for the first time in a while the media sort of took note of it and was like, hey, that's, you know, that's Everton, that's what they want, because we were kind of in this weird grey area trying to work ourselves trying to work ourselves out and what was the identity of the club. And I think dunk hit the nail on the head and it was, yeah. So since then, apart from the Chelsea game, but you know, there's going to be, there's going to be games like that. There's going to be, the squad isn't the squad I think that he wants. So there's going to be, that's going to happen. But yeah, I'm positive, really positive to have Angelo at the helm. I mean, kind of, it rings a little bit of Howard Kendall for me. I don't know, it's kind of exciting to have somebody come in who just is a tactician and knows his stuff. It's not Howard Kendall, obviously, ex-player, but just that experience, a bit of experience and excitement. Carmen and the person who can carry the club on the shoulders he's being there, done it. And like you say, you know, having, obviously having dunking there as well and having a son, you know, very settled and things looking a lot brighter and a lot more trust in the fans. I think that to me is the biggest thing is that a lot of the fans are. Kind of like, we can't really question this fella because he knows what he's doing. We'll have bumps in the road, like you've said. We'll have a couple of defeats where we're scratching our head. We'll have defeats where we've been battered because at the moment he hasn't got the plays he wants. But if it's on the right path, then we'll accept that as fans, won't we? Exactly, mate. Exactly. Very exciting. Fingers crossed. It carries on, I fingers crossed. What about you? What's next for you? A bit of writing, I've seen it. Yeah, a bit of writing. I produced something last year. I'm still doing Carnival Row season two right now. So we had four weeks left of that. We were just about to get to Croatia, Dubrovnik, and then Trump's filming band. Well, not filming band, but travel band came in. So finishing that off. Hopefully when, I mean, what can we say? When will this end? When will travel happen again? So that's happening, which is really exciting. The series has gotten bigger and better since season one. So with Mr Bloom and Miss Delavine. And then this season of Miss Skull and the Duke, which is out on Alibi at the moment, it's about to go on to PBS Masterpiece, where Paul Dawk and Downton Abbey went on. So that's another. So yeah, lots of Victorian pieces to me at the moment, Baz witches, which I never imagined when I was, you know, when I was a drama school or whatever. But it's nice. It's been really lucky recently with roles and stuff. So yeah, just finish Carnival Row and then see what's next. Is that what it is? Is it just the case that you finished that job and then is it literally, you got an agent who says, this is coming up or do people send you scripts or are you sitting round going, you know, is there a WhatsApp group with A? Listen to me. If there was a WhatsApp group, mate, I tell you what, I need to get on. It's, it's, it's kind of a mixture. You can hear it through, you know, hear through the grapevine of like, oh, this is, you know, for instance, the English game, a lot of, a lot of football actors, actor footballers were talking about that project or Carnival Row when that came up, you know, the script was going around and everybody's like, oh, have you read that so you can nudge your agent? But a lot of the stuff is, you know, your agent will receive a call and they'd have seen it. And a role that's similar or somebody, a casting director or whatever would be intrigued to see you play a certain role that you haven't done or, or a director or a producer has worked with you before and they want you for that part. So it's a mixture. It's often a, yeah, it's often a mixture of, I mean, there's, there's no one way to land a job. There's, there's several ways. And I'm sure people will continuously invent ways of finding and landing jobs. I still haven't written a letter yet to anybody begging for a job. So I'm saving that one, mate. I'm saving that one, yeah, that could be. If Dixie Dean comes up and there you go, you and Sam will be fighting over it. I mean, the deafening needs to be a Dixie Dean film without a shadow, without us. Because, you know, incredible. I mean, the opening scene and starting at the Derby game at the end of his life. Yeah, yeah. Llywch, you've already got it, haven't you? You've got it. I can see it there. It's ready. Have you had the chance to watch the Howard's Way documentary? I haven't. I was just, I was just putting that. We've, me and the Mrs have come up with a list of, of films and stuff we need to watch. And that's Howard's Way film is definitely on that. Would you, you'd recommend it? Absolutely. It's absolutely fun. I mean, my son's acting in it, so there you go. There you go. Now, it's absolutely brilliant, honestly. It's the togetherness of the squad comes across and how important they all are to each other. And it just takes, obviously, listen, you weren't born. So it's difficult. But when you actually see whatever, not that long ago. I mean, it's absolutely fun. I mean, my son's acting in it, so there you go. Long ago. It's incredible. 35 years this year since we've won the league and it's charged up, but it's unbelievable on us. It's a really, it's a really good watch. So my mum's husband, literally Bullens Road season ticket holder was, and every game we used to go to and my uncle Frank, he used a massive blue nose. Never, never married off. There you go. Love it. Love it. That's all they spoke to me about at every game was that's the standard they still. That's my standard, yeah. And that's what a lot of other clubs don't realise with Everton. It's all of the, that era is kind of, we feel like it's not spoken about enough. But it's great to have the Howard's Way film to, I think that might be on the Christmas list for my mum's husband. Oh God, yeah. He'd be delighted. Make sure you watch it cos honestly. I'll get your lad to sign it for him. Yeah. I don't think you'd be that bothered. We'd have that mate. You'd have that. Yeah, yeah. But definitely check it out cos it's a brilliant watch it really is and it keeps that fire burning. We're still the fourth most successful English club even though we forgot it. So yeah, you'd have to keep that. Keep telling everybody and ourselves that to try to keep our standards up there. Exactly, the standards there. Well, listen, it's lovely, being lovely to teatr and made up your trucks on time out your day for us. And good luck with everything you've got coming up. You're going to be, when fingers crossed, you know, we can get over this at the moment and things can slowly start moving back to normal. You can get on with your very success for acting career and continue to smash it. I'm proud for that. Dixie being film 60 on whatever it's going to be called. Yeah, there we are. Love to you and Ped mate. It's been an absolute pleasure and always, I mean all my family in Australia and all the blues in the family always check you and Ped out. So, real big love to Toffy TV. So, thanks a lot mate. Siwferd, listen when you're off and live a pearl. Cos you'll be cast up here soon. Listen loads of films you've done here now. As soon as I shake off the Victorian moustache, I'll be up there too. Get in and see us. Get in and see us. Listen Anziw, thanks so much for joining us mate and look after yourself mate, take care. You too. Stay safe. And you mate, see you later. Thanks mate, bye. There you go. Big thanks to Anziw for taking time out of his day to chatter us here at Toffy TV. Make sure you check Carnival Row out which is the latest thing he is in. Subscribe to this channel. Give the video a thumbs up. And if you want more videos, get over and join us on Patreon. See you later.