My relationship with Sam inspired me as the dashing count of Anna Karenina

 
7 September 2012

He’s a young man who falls desperately in love with a woman and scandalises society. Aaron Taylor-Johnson, 22, told today how he felt an affinity with Count Vronsky, the character he plays in a new film adaptation of epic Russian tragedy Anna Karenina.

The actor sparked headlines in the gossip columns when he dated and then married artist Sam Taylor-Wood, 23 years his senior. Now he stars as the count who has a passionate affair with Anna, played by Keira Knightley, locked in a marriage with her staid and stuffy husband Alexei (Jude Law).

Speaking before the film’s premiere tonight, Taylor-Johnson said he could relate to the romantic count who stays true to his feelings whatever the cost: “He’s loyal and there’s a sense of you’ve got to be brave in society and not be affected by that. They’re all kinds of challenges that I’ve come across.”

The actor met his future wife on the set of her debut movie Nowhere Boy, in which he played John Lennon. Both took the surname Taylor-Johnson. He said he suspected it was their romance that attracted the attention of Anna Karenina director Joe Wright, whose films include Pride and Prejudice and Atonement.

“I think the reason Joe asked me in for a meeting was probably my relationship in a sense — and then he saw an REM video [directed by Sam Taylor-Johnson] where I was doing this crazy mad dancing. There’s dancing in the film.

I think he put two and two together.”

The role of dashing hero appears to come naturally to the actor. He said he was “not afraid to be romantic”, and responded as a gentleman when asked about his love scenes with Knightley: “I’m not going to talk about that, that’s disrespectful. It’s just work, She’s a professional girl. She’s engaged, I’m married.”

He said he arranged for the studios to use the name Taylor-Johnson on a trailer released on his wedding day in June. “I just don’t see why women need to take the man’s name,” he added. “I wanted to be a part of her just as much as she wanted to be part of me.”

The actor is now returning to his natural brown hair after going blond for the role — even though Leo Tolstoy has the count as “dark” in his novel, first serialised from 1873 to 1877. Taylor-Johnson admitted he did not quite finish the book through pressure of work, relying instead on Sir Tom Stoppard’s “outstanding” script. The film goes on general release on Friday.

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