“That is such an articulate way of putting it Caleb, because that is, I think, what draws us into any type of live medium – be that theatre, music, comedy, or sport. You’re engaging with something that is suggesting you need to suspend your disbelief, but it’s not. It’s actually asking you to augment your reality, and to accept slightly changed or bended rules and invest into that. That allows your heart to come out, it allows your soul to come out, and allows you to release the grip that the cerebral or the neurotic has on you which I think is amazing. And that’s what I’ve felt anytime that I’ve watched an incredible artist, a great rapper, or a perfectly pinged pass across the goal. Just like great plays, it’s inherently fictional. It picks up on something that’s so fundamentally truthful. So, that’s definitely something that we can always strive to do as artists.”

Actor Paapa Essiedu first entered the public imagination when his performance in the fearless, frank and provocative comedy-drama, I May Destroy You, propelled him to Primetime Emmy and British Academy Television Award nominations. Now, he’s becoming one of the most celebrated actors of our generation. In his latest project, he plays Tristan in the revival of Lucy Prebble’s, The Effect. And everyone, I mean everyone, has gone to see it. Probing thought-provoking questions, The Effect sees Essiedu lead alongside 29-year-old Hollywood starlet, Taylor Russell, who plays Connie, in a dopamine-based pharmaceutical trial that chews up the very foundations of what love, longing, being and belonging truly means – and spits them straight back out for you to decipher. It’s funny, cool, powerful and vulnerable. Essiedu undoubtedly stirs the audience, and unwillingly steals their hearts. Covering our Autumn/Fall 2023 issue, Essiedu meets award-winning author of Open Water, Caleb Nelson, in the BFI’s café, to let us into what makes his performances just so goddamn good. Pre-order the issue now at wonderlandshop.com.

Paapa Essiedu wears Fendi.