Smash hit

Ifans was raised in North Wales by two primary school teachers. He says that, over the course of a happy childhood, his parents taught him “a love of language, a love of stories and a love of play”. Acting, he says, was never an option. “It was never a childhood dream. I never did the shampoo thing that Kate Winslet did,” he says, before adding, with a piratical flourish, “I used to drink it instead! Ha ha ha!” Then the Clywd Youth Theatre came to town and Ifans was hooked, “for a whole flurry of reasons — it was exotic, it was romantic, it was a ticket out of town and a place you could smoke and get chicks”.

At 18 he moved to London on a three-year scholarship to the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, and then spent seven years treading the boards (from Chichester to Manchester to the Royal Court and beyond) before his double breakthrough, first in the vibrant Welsh Trainspotting-inspired Twin Town, then in Notting Hill.

After the blockbuster success of the latter movie (£250 million taken at the box office), Ifans became a regular face among a group of actors and friends who would subsequently become known as the Primrose Hill Set, named after the area of North London that most of them inhabited. Actors such as Law, Frost, Jonny Lee Miller and Ifans came together for low-budget movies such as Love, Honour and Obey and Rancid Aluminium. Law, Frost and Ewan McGregor even formed their own production company, Natural Nylon, which would subsequently make movies such as Nora and Existenz before folding.

The Primrose Set partied hard, too, recruiting outside members such as Kate Moss and Meg Matthews. “You were, famously, part of the Primrose Hill Set,” I say, gamely introducing the topic. The publicist nearly implodes. This is Defcon One. In seconds we will have an intercontinental Sienna Miller detonation. “Can we move away from this subject?” the publicist barks. I protest. Ifans says no, he’ll answer it. “I’ve never lived there,” he says. “And I’ve never been to an orgy. The truth is it’s all fabricated bollocks, but the fun is you’ll never know.”

Were you aware when the interest in the set, and you in particular, became more intense, more focused? “I wasn’t, because I was working. It’s like, there’s a war on, there’s kids being shot in the f***ing streets. That’s what I want to read in my newspapers. I don’t want to know about what I did or didn’t do the night before. I can’t be arsed. I’ll remember it.

“Don’t think I’m being aggressive or confrontational,” he continues. “I’m not. I just don’t care. I like doing my job, and hopefully people will remember the films longer than they’ll remember the Primrose Hill Gang, or whatever its called.”

Being paparazzi quarry is, he says, “a pain in the arse. But then so is having the flu, and Richard & Judy”. He says that it’s not important to him, but suddenly adds, on reflection, that actually the whole heady baptism of media fire (including, it is implied, his greedily reported break-up with Miller) transformed his life. “It has made me reassess what’s important about being a human being,” he says. “Be honest, be true, be kind, be generous and be loyal. I’m ticking all those Christian boxes now, and I’m a happy man. End of story.”

The rest of our conversation is generally a comical postscript. He answers most subsequent questions, whenever possible, with deadpan irreverence. Of plastic surgery he says: “I’d like to get one of my ears turned upside down and have two big knockers sewn into my back.” Of his oft-documented penchant for stripping off when out socialising, he sneers: “It’s how I get the jobs, man. Every time I get into a taxi I make sure they see my gusset.”

Ifans is more forthcoming about his rock band, the Peth (formed with his childhood friend Dafydd Ieuan from the Super Furry Animals), insisting that it’s not some actor vanity project, unlike Keanu Reeves’s Dogstar. “We piss on Dogstar,” he says. “We’re really good.” And the Kevin Bacon band, the Bacon Brothers? “I don’t even need to hear them to know that we would piss on them from an even greater height.”

He closes by name-checking the new movies he has coming up, including the Ben Stiller drama Greenberg, the Howard Marks biopic Mr Nice and the Belgian drama Mr Nobody. “Aaargh! I’ve done Mr Nice and Mr Nobody!” he says, aghast. “I’ll have to do Mr Benn next.”

For the moment, downtime is strictly reserved for the Peth. “They’re the people I’d be spending time with irrespective of whether the band existed or not. The band is an expression of a unit that already exists.”

Yes, but is he happy and content with his life right now? “I’d give it a big ole nine-and-a-half out of ten, I would,” Ifans says, catching the publicist’s eye, perhaps aware that this whole rebranding thing is going a treat. “I would’ve said ten, but I don’t want to sound too happy.”

The Boat that Rocked is released on April 1

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