Emmys 2026: Jamie Bell On The Difficulties, Challenges Playing Niall in ‘Half Man’ [VIDEO]

Jamie Bell has been taking on risky roles since he debuted onscreen, in 2000, in the titular role of Billy Elliot, when he was a teen. He went on to win a host of accolades including the BAFTA for Best Actor in a Leading Role. There was even a justified outcry when he was overlooked for an Academy Award nomination.

Now, a quarter century later, he is poised to receive his first Emmy nomination—among other citations I’m certain–for his searing, extraordinary work on Richard Gadd’s astounding limited series, Half Man, currently streaming on HBO MAX.

The follow up to Gadd’s smash success, Baby Reindeer, the show chronicles the often-toxic relationship between two non-blood brothers, Niall and Ruben, played as teens by Mitchell Robertson & Stuart Campbell and as adults by Gadd & Bell.

The first three episodes mostly features the teen versions of the characters and establishes their loving/combustible relationship.

Episode one opens at the wedding of older Niall, with an uninvited Ruben crashing and instantly becoming violent. But it isn’t until episode four that the more mature versions of Niall and Ruben take center stage, and their strange relationship sees a bunch of dramatic twists and turns.

Niall is a nervous, paranoid mess, having betrayed Ruben (at least that’s the way Ruben sees it), after Ruben nearly beat a young man to death. Now, over a decade later, unbeknownst to Niall, Ruben is out of prison and making a more than decent life for himself while Niall is suffering from writer’s block, struggling with mental illness and barely making ends meet –all while having tons of indiscriminate sex with men. And he is still in denial about his sexual orientation. When he discovers Ruben has been free for years, he stalks him and the two have quite the dramatic confrontation.

Episode five finds Niall still in denial, but about to become a father. And the insanity continues.

The dark and bold series deals with male rage, sexual repression, shame and trauma. And both young and older Niall struggle with shame and sexual repression, which go hand in hand.  Does Niall hero worships Ruben, want to be him or want to fuck him? Or is it all three?

Robertson sets the groundwork for just how complicated Niall is and how confusing his feelings are towards Ruben. Bell takes all of it and Niall’s internalized homophobia as well as his deep and damaging desire to be liked, to shattering, envelope pushing levels.

“He cannot accept who he is,” Bell offers about Niall, “It’s the easiest thing to say to people: be who you are. Be uniquely you. And while that’s so easy to say, it’s sometimes the hardest fucking thing to do. It just is, for a lot of people. And that can get you into serious trouble…”

This is Bell’s best performance to date, and that is saying a lot. “There’s no question, this is certainly one of the hardest things I’ve ever done,” Bell admits.

After Billy Elliot, Bell proceeded to establish himself as one of the screens most versatile and immersive actors doing impressive work in Douglas McGrath’s Nicholas Nickleby (2002), David Gordon Green’s Undertow (2004), Thomas Vinterberg’s Dear Wendy (2005), Clint Eastwood’s Flags of Our Fathers (2006), Edward Zwick’s Defiance (2008), Cary Joji Fukunaga’s Jane Eyre (2011), Asger Leth’s Man on a Ledge (2012), Bong Joon Ho’s Snowpiercer (2013) and Lars von Trier’s Nymphomaniac (2013).

In 2017 and 2018, he delivered indelible performances in two underrated gems, Paul McGuigan’s Film Stars Don’t Die in Liverpool and Guy Nattiv’s Skin .And in Andrew Haigh’s All of Us Strangers, in 2023, Bell, etched a haunting portrait of a loving, if ghostly, father to Andrew Scott’s hopeful son. For Strangers, he received a British Independent Film Award nomination.

His TV credits include TURN: Washington’s Spies and Shining Girls.

Later this year the thesp will be seen in Karim Alhouz’s biting satire, Rosebush Pruning, about an eccentric, privileged NYC family that move to Spain, and don’t really fit into normal society. Led by a blind and abusive patriarch (Tracy Letts), the outrageous dark comedy has Bell delivering another fascinating performance as the eldest of four children, who is the most admired, to the point where even some of his sibs (Callum Turner, Riley Keough, Lukas Gage) seem to want him…yes, in that way. Certain to be divisive, it’s also curiously queer. Bell’s scenes with Elle Fanning are terrific. The film, written by Efthimis Filippou, is loosely based on Marco Bellocchio’s Italian classic Fists in the Pocket. MUBI is releasing the film.

Bell just completed Paul Greengrass’s The Uprising, opposite Andrew Garfield and Thomasin McKenzie. He is currently filming the Peaky Blinders sequel, playing Cillian Murphy’s character, Tommy Shelby’s, eldest son.

The Contending had the pleasure of a VIDEO chat with Bell.