People: Eddie Redmayne can talk about dogs in German

Oscar winner Eddie Redmayne (42) learned some German for his new role as a contract killer – and it wasn’t easy for him to do so. “To be honest, I found it really challenging,” said Redmayne (“The Discovery of Infinity”) to the German Press Agency in Berlin. “I can say some very specific arbitrary sentences in German.”

In the new Sky thriller series “The Day of the Jackal”, the Brit plays a contract killer with the code name “Jackal” who is hunted by the British secret agent Bianca (Lashana Lynch). In order to disguise himself in public, he often changes his identity and appearance and also speaks in German or French.

In one scene, the jackal poses as a grieving son who talks about his deceased mother and her dogs. He says: “My mother didn’t make any plans, she didn’t tell me what she wanted. Now I’m alone in the big house with the two dogs and don’t know where to start.” A language and dialect coach helped him, said Redmayne.

Lynch: Had to follow and film woman in London store

“It was so fascinating because I couldn’t just learn and speak German in the time we had. So it was really about trusting her to teach me phonetically – sound by sound – some of these things.” But the truth is that he doesn’t actually speak a word of German.

He and Lynch also received espionage lessons. An expert gave them the task of following and filming his wife in a shop in London. “He said, ‘Go into this store and follow this person, film them from another aisle, but make sure they don’t see you,” said Lynch (“James Bond 007: No Time to Die”).