Ben Hardy and Jason Patel knew there was a spark even before filming their new queer romance Unicornswhich recently had its world premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival.
To test their chemistry before casting Hardy as a hard-working single father and Patel as a South Asian drag queen with whom he forms a surprisingly deep bond, directors Sally El Hosaini and James Krishna Floyd had the actors perform some scenes from the script.
Hardy recalls how their relationship was “instant”.
“Personally, in my experience, I don’t think you can fake it,” Hardy, 32, tells PEOPLE. “I think it either exists or it doesn’t. I’ve done things before, I won’t name them, where I tried to produce chemistry and I spent a lot of time with people.”
“But I think it’s like when you fall in love, sometimes you meet someone, you hit it off and things go from there. I think if you don’t have it on screen, it shows,” Hardy says, adding, “But I’m not saying we’re in love!”
Patel, 27, adds: “We have such a great friendship now. We even worked out together this morning.”
Ben Hardy/Instagram
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Hardy, British actor best known for his role as the mutant angel in X-Men: Apocalypse and Queen drummer Roger Taylor Czech rhapsodyhe was excited by the prospect of telling a story unlike any before.
“I meant [Unicorns] it would be something I’ve never done before, so I thought it was something that would be a good test for me,” he says. “Ultimately, I just thought it was an incredibly beautiful story that I wanted to be a part of. ”
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For Patel, who previously played Mowgli in the touring production The Jungle Book, making his film debut Unicorns was his chance to “turn everything I can have into something.”
“This is the part of the national team that I want to highlight,” he says. “I didn’t have that when I was younger. I did my best.”
Unicorns next time he plays at the BFI London Film Festival. Currently seeking distribution in North America.
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Source: HIS Education