00:00You must never leave this hotel.
00:05Let's dive in.
00:07So I totally fell in love with the novel. I just couldn't stop.
00:10It was really the most amazing reading experience. I didn't want the book to end.
00:15I kind of shored myself up, prepared myself for this really dense, heavy read about the Russian Revolution.
00:20And then I just kind of went down this rabbit hole into this really charming world.
00:25When I started reading it, I was quite surprised and taken by it.
00:29It's been quite an interesting process of playing this character who's already existed on the page
00:34and readers might have some familiarity with.
00:37After smoothing her skirt and straightening her hat,
00:40the willowy one gracefully crossed the lobby to the count,
00:43where, thanks to a pair of French heels, she met him eye to eye.
00:47You know, I think Amor Tolles, who's an incredible human being,
00:50I was lucky enough, you know, we met on set.
00:52He came here with his family, who were just lovely.
00:54And that was a thrill. You could really feel something on the day that he was here.
00:58I've been writing fiction since I was a kid.
01:00The nature of writing novels is that it's a very solitary process.
01:04And it is something quite extraordinary to come here to the set of The Gentleman Moscow
01:09because the series is an extremely collaborative effort.
01:13It was a very happy pre-production period of just bouncing ideas and hearing their ideas
01:18and falling more and more in love with the Count as a character.
01:21And he's been absolutely fantastic to play.
01:24What struck me about the novel when I first read it
01:26was the humanity of this incredible character in Count Alexander Rostov
01:30and the relationships he forms and how those relationships save him.
01:35You can never compete with an already existing character,
01:40especially, like, when each individual person has designed what that person looks like,
01:45speaks like, is, like, to them, they've already, they've got a friend.
01:50But when the Count opened his eyes, he nearly dropped his spoon.
01:53Where did they go?
01:54I beg your pardon?
01:56Your moustaches.
01:57For standing at the edge of his table was the young girl with the penchant for yellow.
02:01I would put off the last pages for, you know, I would read a page a day just so it didn't end.
02:07I really loved it so much.
02:09Readers will find that the tone of the story and the thematic focus of the story is there.
02:14In the end, I kind of couldn't wait to pick the book up.
02:16You know, you'd have all the day's interactions going on
02:18and then I'd go and jump into that book
02:20and it'd be like jumping into a cool pool on a sunny afternoon, you know.
02:24It was just a beautiful well to enter.
02:26The Count studied his host more indiscreetly and then shrugged.
02:30Well, you were a soldier once, an infantryman.
02:32You rose to the rank of Colonel by the war's end.
02:35How would you know?
02:37Well, it is the business of gentlemen to distinguish between men of rank.
02:40Gentlemen in Moscow allows us to empathise, to feel hopeless in a safe space
02:48and to move into hope.
02:50It has such a sense of whimsy and magic and fun.
02:53Just such a page turner.
02:55I just feel like it's, it's like perfect.
