Phil Dunster Reflects on Bizarre Ladle Fight with Steve Carell in New Comedy Rooster
Phil Dunster, the 33-year-old actor who gained global fame playing footballer Jamie Tartt in the hit series Ted Lasso, is taking on a very different role in the new dark comedy Rooster. In the HBO Max series, Dunster portrays Archie, a character whose redemption arc is far less straightforward than Jamie's, and whose most memorable scene involves a ladle, a bed, and Steve Carell.
From Football Pitch to University Campus
Created by Bill Lawrence and Matt Tarses, Rooster follows Greg Russo (Steve Carell), a successful author who takes a job at a prestigious university to support his daughter Katie (Charly Clive) after she divorces her husband Archie. The reason for the split? Archie had an affair with a student, making him instantly unlikable in Greg's eyes.
The tension between Greg and Archie escalates throughout the series, culminating in a particularly unusual physical confrontation in episode two. "It was such a fever dream," Dunster laughed when describing the scene where Carell's character hits him on the bottom with a ladle while Dunster wears only boxer shorts.
The Making of a Bizarre Moment
"When I first read it, I was like, 'Is this right?'" Dunster recalled. "I'm in pants, and Steve's going to be hitting me on the bottom with a ladle?" Despite initial reservations, the actor found the experience surprisingly joyful once they began filming.
After mapping out the choreography for the ladle spanking scene, Dunster and Carell watched playback and improvised together. "We watched it back a couple of times, which I think most people wouldn't normally do," Dunster explained. "But it was so joyful to be working with this person who's such an icon, and he's the person who's so giddily going, 'Can we watch it again?'"
Mastering the Dastardly Character
Dunster's casting as Archie was no accident. Series co-creator Matt Tarses specifically wanted him for the role because he's "someone who the audience could still love when he was doing really dastardly things."
"I love the word dastardly," Dunster joked when asked about his approach to playing unlikeable characters. "Honestly, the boring but true answer is it's all there in the writing. Archie is affable in that sort of public school boy way, and he doesn't see himself as the bad guy ever."
In fact, the character was originally written with Dunster in mind. "The writers and creators Bill Lawrence and Matt Tarses wrote a part, and originally, he was not called Archie," Dunster revealed. "He was called Phil, and they said, 'He's a real a***hole. He's a British guy. We thought of you. Would you like to play him?'"
Contrasting Archie with Jamie Tartt
While fans might draw parallels between Archie and Dunster's previous character Jamie Tartt, the actor emphasizes significant differences between them. "I think that Jamie probably knows that whilst he's incredibly talented, he's had to work his entire life to get to where he is," Dunster explained. "Whilst Archie's incredibly talented, he probably also feels entitled to be where he is."
Dunster added that Archie "is not yet willing to do the work to try to become psychologically healthy" in the early episodes. "He is purely relying on the adoration that he's enjoyed for most of his life. So yeah, he's reprehensible. But I think that it's more fun for us as audience members to go, 'My god, this person's got a long way to go. Can he really become a decent person?'"
Rooster: A Dark Comedy with Heart
The ten-episode series features an impressive cast including Steve Carell, Danielle Deadwyler, Charly Clive, Lauren Tsai, and John C. McGinley. For Dunster, the appeal of playing Archie was the character's complexity. "Like a lot of Bill's characters, he seems extreme, but is really just a normal person in extreme circumstances," the actor noted.
Rooster is now available for streaming on HBO Max, offering viewers the chance to witness Dunster's latest transformation from beloved footballer to complicated academic, complete with one of television's most unusual fight scenes.
