When Swinton was approached with the role, she knew she needed to make it special.
“We wanted to do something different.”
Elba wanted to approach the film in a unique way as well.
“As actors, we dread being stale.
We want it to be fresh a lot,” he said.
But no one knows exactly what a genie sounds like so Elba decided to make it up.
“It might sound similar to things you may have heard before,” he said.
“But the work that we did to make it create his voice was really exciting to me.”
In fact, his character was ultimately years in the making.
But her role in “Three Thousand Years of Longing” was a different undertaking altogether.
“That was definitely a fresh road for me.”
She suspects it’s a trap.
Even so, Swinton felt all sorts of magic whenever she stepped foot on set.
“We still felt free at the last minute to try fresh things,” she said.
“Three Thousand Years of Longing” hits theaters on Friday, August 26.
