words by Bailey Slater.
photographer Diego Bendezu fashion Raúl Guerrero
hair Ayumi Yamamoto at bridge
make up Yuui using chanel beauty,
cinematographer Ian Robertson
photography assistants Brandon Abreu and Natalia Ormeño
fashion assistants Sean Rodriguez and Grace Providencia Wagner
photographed at Ojeras Studio in new york
Eliot Sumner has a knack for making an entrance. As an actor, it’s a quality as fundamental to finding success as the ability to retain lines or even hit your mark. And having reintroduced himself to the world several times over through years of enthralling musical experimentation, bounding from electro-pop and techno to the world of alt-indie, the budding star makes commanding a room look more natural than breathing.
In his latest project, a slow-burning take on Patricia Highsmith’s enduring thriller The Talented Mr. Ripley, director Steven Zaillian poses him the challenge of commanding the room, only this time as a corpse. Dragged into shot in the arms of a noticeably perturbed Andrew Scott, not even the stiffness of rigour mortis can’t stop Sumner from turning heads in the style of a classic Yves Saint Laurent muse. Svelte-fitted in a dashing overcoat with long, luscious hair slicked to the scalp, the illusion shatters somewhat upon the discovery that this setting agent is Sumner’s congealed blood, but that’s by the by, this is a kind of star quality you just can’t buy.
Thankfully, when Sumner flashes on to our Zoom call in a flurry of blinding natural light, he is much more animated, baring none of the bruised, sinister, or frankly jarring qualities of his ill-fated on-screen counterpart. Sumner joins me from sunny Connecticut, having escaped the thrum of New York City’s Chinatown for a much-needed weekend getaway, politely pitying my vantage point from rainy England. The multi-hyphenate performer is well-acquainted with this climate, having re-settled back in the States two years ago following prolonged stints in both the UK and Germany. “I’m even starting to do Fahrenheit now,” he boasts.
eliot all in Saint Laurent PARIS
eliot wears jacket and trousers by Savas and belt by Saint Laurent PARIS
Despite being the child of powerhouse musician and actor-director duo Sting and Trudie Styler, which admittedly has its perks when it comes to navigating the choppy waters of life in the entertainment industry, a life of performance wasn’t always a given for Sumner. As a child, he talks of a shy disposition that eschewed group activities for the observant life of a wallflower. Ironically, it was touring as late aughts electro-pop prodigy I Blame Coco (the sonic lovechild of Robyn and Lily Allen), where Sumner first nurtured a now longstanding streak of extroversion.
“In a strange way, it felt like a place that I could break out of myself,” he tells me of his performance past life, offering a grin in his reminiscence. “It makes no sense at all.” It was back in 2017 when Sumner first began to entertain the prospect of a career outside of music, which had taken up his near entire adult life after signing to Island Records at 17. After bouncing around the globe as Vaal, a faceless DJ and producer of brooding techno, for months of gigging, Sumner suddenly found himself without a place to live. The actor eventually wound up in a friend’s spare room, who, after spotting Sumner’s potential from a mile off, extended their hospitality by adding him to the books of a talent agency. “It was a complete accident, “Sumner explains of this pivot into acting, evidently still bewildered at the process. “He got me an audition for something, and then they just kept coming.”
It wouldn’t be long after these initial callouts that Sumner landed his first booking, joining the cast of Guy Ritchie’s 2019 spy-flick The Gentlemen alongside industry heavyweights like Matthew McConaughey, Hugh Grant & Colin Farrell. Aside from minor roles as a child, much of his education in the performance world up until this point happened off-camera, on odd jobs as a runner or a stunt double. Yet he took to playing Laura Pressfield, the troubled spawn of a Lord involved in an illegal drug trade, with the convincing stoicism of a true professional, tapping into a pool of brooding charisma that had previously allowed him to entertain crowds of ravers and gig-goers alike.
“It’s a very similar creative process,” Sumner explains of navigating these differing modes of expression. “[Performing] is kind of playground for your emotions, one that we don’t really get to play out in daily life. I’ve always believed in artistic license, but you know how complex human beings are, in polite society, we don’t really get to explore the entire spectrum of that.”
eliot wears jacket, shirt and hat by Willy Chavarria and trousers by Louis Vuitton
eliot wears suit by Loewe and shoes by Saint Laurent PARIS
Having spent years as a touring musician, both as a live act and DJ, this break into the industry not only offered Sumner the chance to put his fascination with studying human behaviour into practice, but allow an escape from the loneliness of life spent constantly on the road. “Being in airports and hotel rooms, you play the show over in a loop. It takes a minute to come down from that,” says Sumner. ‘Whereas making movies is very collaborative, so it was really exciting for me to be around people in such a professional setting.”
It’s here where Sumner’s affinity for performance began to blossom, pondering the many possibilities that could be found in teamwork, and learning from the directorial forces that be, whether that requires him to imbibe the spirit of a cold-hearted killer or a pompous flaneur. It’s the latter that we meet in Netflix’s Ripley, a noir-ish retelling of cat-and-mouse conmanship under the glare of the Roman sun based on Patricia Highsmith’s classic novel, The Talented Mr Ripley.
The story follows the titular grifter, Tom Ripley (Andrew Scott), on his quest overseas to swindle the heir of a shipping magnate, Dickie Greenleaf, into returning home at the request of his father. Glaring over his lack of sophistication, much to the chagrin of his girlfriend Marge, Greenleaf becomes briefly infatuated with his new friend, and the mission soon complicates itself with muddling sexual tension and the chance to strike a big payday.
Sumner plays Freddie Miles, an acquaintance of Greenleaf (who is otherwise referred to as Dickie) who pierces through Ripley’s meek, doe-eyed act from the moment they meet. In all variations of the story, his arrival presents a real threat to everything about the protagonist’s security, both in his newfound friendships and the desperate upholding of the facade. “I was very conscious of the fact that he was the best character in the Anthony Minghella film,” says Sumner. “So I made this decision to make my audition as Freddie as unique as possible, and not just do a Philip Seymour Hoffman impression because, you know, he is God.”
Under the masterful steerage of Hoffman in the story’s beloved and aforementioned late 90s adaptation, Freddie is a total scene-stealer, antagonistic in every sense of the word. Evidently skipping out on lessons of composure and decency that would evidence the mannered breeding of the elite, he cuts through otherwise serene surroundings with the grace of a flashing siren atop an ambulance. He embodies the worst stereotypes of a cocksure tourist, but it’s his confidence that cements his place in the pack, an innate state of being that our protagonist studies intently.
eliot wears jacket by r13, shirt eliot’s own and trousers by Dsquared2
Sumner had nurtured a burning affinity for Patricia Highsmith’s extended cinematic universe since childhood, citing the likes of The American Friend and Purple Noon as classics of the genre. And after nabbing the script of Zaillian’s remake, he had his own iteration of Freddie pegged almost immediately, quickly filling in personality quirks and affecting his smug & composed delivery. When a voice emerges in his head this swiftly, it tends to be a fairly good baseline to know that rising to the occasion will be possible, “that I will be able to do this,” says Sumner.
“I just wanted to play him as a really arrogant, entitled English posh guy,” he continues. “He’s so hateful and is someone who doesn’t show any vulnerability whatsoever. I think those roles in general are much more fun.” And yet, despite him being the reason Freddie meets his maker, Sumner still finds Ripley a far more endearing presence in this tale. “He’s very human, I think we can all relate to him,” says Sumner. “The world around him is quite cruel and unaccepting, and he’s actually a really sweet character. I mean, you know, compared to someone like Freddie.”
With Ripley marking his biggest role to date, nailed with a slow-burning coyness that ceases to falter for even a second, I’m curious to know what obstacles Sumner faced on set, if any. “I was dead for a lot of it,” he reminds me, “but getting dragged around every day, that started to get quite challenging – I had to have lot of physio after.” What about a healthy dose of imposter syndrome? “Every day we were filming I was like, ‘Yeah, there’s been a mistake’,” says Sumner. “I’ve done a fair amount since, but that was really… I couldn’t believe it when I got the part.”
To get through take after take of bodyslamming and head banging, the team devised a heavy dummy replica of Summer, which he assures me was frighteningly realistic. The similarities were so rife that, on numerous occasions, various crew members found themselves spooked beyond belief to find the real actor hobnobbing around the set. “I lifted my head once and they turned as white as a ghost,” Sumner laughs. “Another grabbed me as if I was the dummy.”
But amongst his fondest reminisces of the time he spent on set, Sumner treasures most all he learnt from veteran thespian Andrew Scott. “I just loved spending time with him, he’s incredible at what he does. He’s a really kind person,” says Sumner, “and we really need those people around.”
The experience is certainly one Sumner isn’t rushing to forget any time soon, allowing him to build on his performance repertoire before taking on his heaviest role yet, an assuredly darker and villainous stint in the Swedish-Western Cry Wolf, which began filming last Summer. Based on Hans Rosenfeldt’s crime-thriller of the same name, Cry Wolf takes place small Nordic town gripped by drug crime and the unfolding events of a grizzly murder.
While he might’ve at least found some familiarity in taking to Ripley’s Freddie – no doubt lending some of his character study from the boorish aristocratic types he had the misfortune of encountering during his London years – for Cry Wolf, Sumner tells me “there was no real anchor” to latch to. “I wasn’t speaking in my own language, I was doing things I definitely wouldn’t do – like drowning teenagers – it was almost like I had to be completely vacant of myself throughout the whole thing. That felt wrong to me”
eliot all in Saint Laurent PARIS
Nonetheless, the opportunity has given Sumner an entirely new perspective on his craft, owing mostly to the slow process of giving into Jesper Ganslandt’s expert direction. “That was a real trust exercise for me, because you’re putting everything into someone else’s hands,” he says. It’s clear the results have made a huge impression on the actor – “It’s like nothing I’ve ever seen before!” – and will no doubt dictate the kinds of work he’s set to embrace in the future.
Sumner’s ultimate dream is to grapple with the intensely traumatic story of literal human punching-bag Jude St. James in Hanya Yanagihara’s A Little Life, which wrapped at the Savoy Theatre last Summer, setting him on a new path of trouble, vulnerability and seriously powerful storytelling. But regardless of what calls do or don’t materialise in the next few months, Sumner assures me he’s equal parts certain and hungry for more performance in his future. I just pity whoever has the misfortune of being his next victim…
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