As the sequel to the Cornish fishing film is released, its star discusses his 30-year mission to avoid fame, being caught up in a racism row and dealing with bullies – himself included
James Purefoy strolls over to the breakfast buffet in a London hotel, pours himself an orange juice and saunters back to the table. “Nobody knows who I am here,” says the 58-year-old actor in a hushed, appreciative tone. To be fair, nobody knows who he is anywhere. Sure, there were times when he had phone cameras shoved in his face in New York during his three-season spell between 2013 and 2015 as a serial killer and cult leader opposite Kevin Bacon in The Following, which was watched by 11 million viewers in the US. And shoppers at the supermarket near his home in Somerset (“not the fashionable part”) once approached him to praise Fisherman’s Friends, the 2019 hit about real-life Cornish lobster fishers whose sea shanties won them a recording contract.
Mostly, though, he has spent the past 30 years in constant employment and near-anonymity. He has twice “pulled away” from offers to play James Bond. “I was worried about what would change. Could you still sit in a pub with your mates? Could you knock a ball around in Ravenscourt Park [in west London]? You really can’t.”
