Is Mark Rylance the best actor in the business? He’s certainly in the Top One. From the bombast and bacchanalia of his Olivier and Tony Award-winning tour de force in Jerusalem to the quiet malevolence of his Thomas Cromwell in the BBC’s Wolf Hall, Rylance commands an audience’s attention. Like a quiet voice in a noisy argument, he draws us towards him. Nobody does it better. On stage, on screen, or on a Zoom call with The Big Issue, he is, it seems, permanently in the moment. Instinctive. Reacting. Responding.
It makes him a joy to talk to. He moves breezily between subjects, always fully engaged. “Oh, you’ve got a nice record collection there. Me too,” he says, at the start of our conversation. “It’s so nice to see records…
