Tom Ellis on Playing His Difficult To Like ‘Tell Me Lies’ Character

[Editor’s note: The following contains spoilers for Season 2 of Tell Me Lies.]

The Big Picture

• The Hulu series ‘Tell Me Lies’ explores complex characters with gray areas, reflecting life’s bad choices and relatable experiences.
• The character of Oliver, played by Tom Ellis is difficult, sociopathic, and hard to empathize with due to his actions.
• Intimacy coordinator presence was crucial while shooting sensitive scenes, helping the actors with ensuring a safe environment.

The Hulu series Tell Me Lies, which recently concluded its second season, is an addictive relationship drama that you just can’t stop watching. Whether it’s Lucy Albright (Grace Van Patten) and Stephen DeMarco (Jackson White) who can’t seem to stop being toxic with each other, or Bree (Catherine Missal) and the older married professor (Tom Ellis) she was secretly dating, or any number of secrets that always find the most inopportune time to boil over, you can’t help but wonder where it will all lead.

After watching the season, Collider spoke to Ellis about joining the second season of his wife, Meaghan Oppenheimer’s series, playing Oliver, and fighting against an actor’s usual desire to not judge their character. During the one-on-one chat, he talked about how we all have bad choices within us, not being able to forgive Oliver’s actions, trying to stay in the moment as they explored the student-professor power dynamic, why he was grateful for an intimacy coordinator, why the actor notes his wife gives on set are so helpful, and his role in her next series, Second Wife.

‘Tell Me Lies’ Is Less About Bad Characters and More About Bad Choices

Collider: When you saw the first season, what most spoke to you about it when it came to what the show was doing, the characters, and the type of show that it is? What most stood out to you about it?

TOM ELLIS: The fact that it doesn’t paint any one character as good or bad. It just suggests that we all have bad choices within us and we all can do things that you feel are the right thing at the right time, but when you look from the outside in, there are all these red flags going on and you’re screaming at the TV, saying, “Why are you doing that? Why did you make that choice?” But it’s not like you’ve got the good guys and the bad guys. It’s that everyone’s got that within them. I think that’s really reflective of life, actually. There are a lot of grey areas in life, and there are a lot of things that we tell ourselves and tell other people that maybe we’re not that proud of. I think it explores that unashamedly. One lie breeds another lie, and breed another lie, and breeds another lie. It’s difficult to watch, but at the same time, it’s very relatable as well.

When your wife, Meaghan Oppenheimer, asked you if you wanted to join the series for Season 2, did she tell you what the role would be like? Was it very clearly defined from the moment she brought it to you, or did he evolve?

ELLIS: When she was first thinking about Season 2 and what she wanted to do, she said, “I want to do a storyline with a professor in it and explore that dynamic,” because it’s a dynamic that Meghan finds very interesting. It’s something that happens. The thing that I find really interesting about Tell Me Lies is that the majority of it happens in 2008. This conversation about sexual dynamics and people abusing power and consent is a conversation that’s evolved a lot since 2008, so going back to it, in retrospect, it’s quite interesting to play out these things that that happen a lot. Even though I’m not a huge fan of Oliver and his choices, I’ve experienced, in my lifetime, when I was in tertiary education, stories of professors and students and that happening. The consequences are very different these days, to what they would have been back then, and how people can express themselves about it is very different these days. Looking at it back then, it’s quite a murky world. And Meaghan coming to me and asking me to do this, I was grateful. I thought Season 1 was amazing and it was a show that I really was thrilled to be joining. But I’m used to having some degree of empathy or sympathy about a character that I play. Even if they’re a dark, twisted character, there’s something I normally try to find, that I either like about them or that makes me at least understand their choices. But with this one, I found that quite difficult. There was not a lot about Oliver that I could forgive. I just needed to get over that hurdle and think about playing someone who doesn’t think about consequence.

Actors don’t want to judge their characters, but that seems particularly difficult to avoid in this situation.

ELLIS: Yeah. When [Catherine Missal] and I talked initially about playing out this relationship, we didn’t wanna get too far ahead of ourselves. It wasn’t like you were looking at the finale and looking at what happens and thinking about that. It was more about taking it step by step. We were performing the relationship as it was evolving on screen, and that helped not be too judgmental about the character. It wasn’t really until I finished shooting and I sat down to decompress, and I really thought about the actions of Oliver, that I was like, “Oh, my God, I’m gonna have to leave the country.” It was a really tough watch, for me to go back and watch it. But my job is to service storytelling, and I can’t always like the characters that I play. Even though, in the last few years, I’ve really enjoyed the characters that I’ve played, I enjoyed the work on this. The end product and the person that people perceive when they watch it, I’m along with the audience on this one. I do not like the guy.

Tom Ellis Thinks His ‘Tell Me Lies’ Character Might Be a Bit Sociopathic

Do you think that he justifies all of his behavior to himself? Do you think he’s someone that thinks everything he’s doing is okay?

ELLIS: I think there’s a quiet sociopathic nature to him, for sure. There’s maybe one tiny nugget in there that might give the audience some degree of understanding, as to why this character is the way that he is. That is when he alludes to the fact that his first wife died. If I was gonna console myself over any of Oliver’s actions, I would suggest that maybe he was broken. He’s a broken person, and he’s never been fixed. He is able to console himself, but I don’t think he thinks too much about the consequences of his actions because he’s broken.

What was it like to figure out that relationship with your co-star, Catherine Missal? Did you have a lot of conversations about it?

ELLIS: There are two things at play. One is just the nature of working together, full stop, within a dynamic like this. We shot two episodes in a block with each director, and we would meet before each block started and run through the scenes and talk a little bit about it. That was basically us trying to be as comfortable as possible with what we were doing. And then, with the nature of the sexual relationship, we had an intimacy coordinator, and it was actually my first time working with an intimacy coordinator. I didn’t know how that was gonna be because I’ve spent 25 years not working with one of those people, but I was actually really grateful, in the end, that we had that. It really took away a lot of the uncomfortable feelings that you can have sometimes when you’ve got to do stuff like that. Back in the day, there was no way to diffuse it that discomfort. You just had to get on with it. Now, in the way that the world has changed since #MeToo, there’s a lot more understanding, from a performance side of things, that this is not comfortable territory for people. So, to bring in an intimacy coordinator to be able to talk about the things that are uncomfortable and to talk about everything to make sure that this is as safe an environment as possible that you’re going to perform these things in, I found that to be really helpful, especially with something like this.

Which scene was the most challenging for you to shoot and why?

ELLIS: That’s a good question. To be quite honest with you, I found it all pretty challenging. I think my biggest challenge of playing Oliver was that I feel like, as a person, I’m quite a generous person and I’m quite warm, and I want other people to feel comfortable. Oliver isn’t like that, at all. He’s cold and withdrawn, and he has his cards very close to his chest. For me, switching off that warmth was something that I found difficult. My way of approaching it was that I just had to desensitize myself to the situation and say, “Okay, this is normal.” It wasn’t until I finished the work completely that I really took stock of the story and really thought about how despicable it all was.

There are so many layers to the power dynamics, with this guy cheating on his wife with a student at the school that he teaches at, but she’s also in his wife’s class.

ELLIS: Oh, for sure. When you work in education, you have a huge responsibility towards the welfare of young people because you know better than they do, and you know much more than they do. When I think about people that abuse that sort of power, I really don’t like it. Even though this is so wrong and you’re watching it and thinking that it’s wrong, right, and you’re watching it thinking that it’s wrong, you still want the audience to understand why Bree is making the choices that she’s making and why there is some form of connection between these two characters. Meaghan is really good at being able to make you understand why characters are making choices that they’re making, even though there were all these red flags everywhere. That’s part of why Tell Me Lies is so compelling. Not everyone makes the right choices in life, and that’s a very relatable thing.

Stay Tuned for Tom Ellis’ Upcoming TV Series ‘Second Wife’

You’ve also done Second Wife with your wife. What type of guy is that character? What do you like about him? How different is he?

ELLIS: Very different. One of the things that I really relate to with that character is that he loves being a dad, and that’s something that I really love. That’s something that makes me feel the most normal. It’s out of Meaghan’s head, so it’s not just straightforward and lighthearted. There is, of course, some darkness there. But that’s more about not judging what these characters do. Their choices are much more understandable choices and it’s a much funnier show than Tell Me Lies. There’s more levity to it. I can relate much more with Jacob in Second Wife, for sure.

You’ve previously mentioned that Meaghan gives great acting notes because she used to be an actor. When it comes to that sort of communication, what feedback tends to work best for you? What do you usually need to hear when you’re in the moment?

ELLIS: I just need to hear something that’s very simple and concise. Sometimes you can work with directors and they’re trying to give you a note, and they talk around the houses. A lot of the time, it’s about protecting your feelings as a performer and not crushing your confidence. I’m not saying that Meaghan is harsh in any way, but she’s straight to the point, and that’s something I really appreciate, as a performer. At this stage, you’re not going, “Am I good enough to do this?,” or self-doubting your ability. It’s more about wanting to service the story and wanting to do it right, so very simple, but very effective notes are really helpful. There are a lot of kid gloves that go on, on set sometimes. You’re always up against it with time, so I need something that’s just simple and effective where I can go, “Yes, that’s it. Okay, let’s go.”

Tell Me Lies is available to stream at Hulu. Check out the trailer:

Watch on Hulu