“Indeed… Love”
Even after 20 years, Hugh Grant still scolds
Hugh Grant isn’t a fan of the “Love Actually” dance scene.
© Xavier Collin/Image Press Agency/ImageCollect
He couldn’t avoid it: Hugh Grant hated filming his famous dance scene in Love Actually, as he now recounts.
Apparently that goes deep: Once again Hugh Grant (62) talks about how much he hated shooting his famous dance scene in the film “Love Actually” (2003). The actor says in a TV special to the classic that he immediately disliked the scene in which the Prime Minister he played, David, danced exuberantly through his official residence to the song “Jump (For My Love)”.
“I saw it in the script and I thought, ‘I’m going to hate doing this,'” he says in an excerpt from the upcoming ABC News special, The Laughter & Secrets of Love Actually: 20 Years Later. “The Laughter and Mysteries of ‘Love Actually’: 20 Years Later”). Grant goes on to explain, “I had no desire at all to do the dance, let alone rehearse it.”
“He was just perfect”
“He kept saying no,” recalls “Actually… Love” director and screenwriter Richard Curtis (66). “I think he was hoping I was going to get sick or something…” Curtis also says that Grant was “grumpy” on the day of filming, but he “knew it was a contractual obligation”.
Even 20 years later, Hugh Grant is apparently not completely satisfied with his performance: “By the way, I’m out of sync, especially at the beginning when I shake my ass,” says the actor about the scene. Curtis explains of filming the dance, “I was like, oh, well, he’s going to do it. And two, it’s excruciatingly embarrassing.” The filmmaker jokes, “He was just perfect.”
Grant himself apparently came up with the conclusion to the scene in which David’s employee appears. “It was my idea to let this secretary catch me.” The actor also says, “To this day there are a lot of people – and I agree with them – who think it’s the most horrific scene ever caught on celluloid. But some people like it.”