In Netflix’s new political thriller series “Zero Day,” Dan Stevens plays Evan Green, a brash, outspoken internet star who becomes enmeshed in a White House investigation into a global cyber attack.
Robert De Niro stars as George Mullen, a former U.S. president who comes out of retirement to lead the investigation. In one scene, De Niro and Stevens are practically nose-to-nose as Mullen interrogates Green. “It was the perfect dynamic really because there’s this character who is suddenly face-to-face with Robert De Niro, face-to-face with Mullen, face-to-face with this giant figure that’s sort of been looming over the story, it was kind of thrilling,” Stevens tells me on the new episode of the “Just for Variety” podcast. “But it is sort of the perfect encounter that you could imagine within it. Rather than having to be all sort of cozy and chummy with him, it was like, “Oh, OK, I’m a little bit intimidated here.”
I spoke to Stevens on Zoom from his Los Angeles-area home. The conversation below has been edited for length and clarity. You can listen to it in its entirety at “Just for Variety” or wherever you download your favorite podcasts.
Are you the type of person when you finish a scene or wrap for the day, you send a text home to family or friends saying, “I just acted opposite with Robert De Niro?”
I don’t exactly put out a big group message. But I think for most actors, getting to do scenes with De Niro is a real bucket-list kind of thing where you’re just like, “Wow, I can’t believe that really happened.” Without giving too much away about the show, that interrogation scene was really, really intense. And just to be going through what I was going through and then just to look up and see De Niro at the other end of the table, it was a very, very strange, strange experience, but it was great. I think it really served the show well.
You have Robert De Niro as the former president, Joan Allen as the former first lady who’s now going to become a Supreme Court justice. Angela Bassett as the president. Are Robert De Niro and Joan Allen the Clintons, and is Angela Bassett Kamala Harris?
I think that’s a bit of a fool’s errand to go, “Who is who?” And I think inevitably, people are going to do that and look for comparisons. Same with Evan Green. Oh, is that Tucker Carlson? Is it Ben Shapiro? It’s none of those people. It’s all of them. We’re in a parallel universe with this story, and sure, there are reflections on certain administrations that you can look for, and comparisons are going to be plenty.
Is Evan Green based on Tucker Carlson?
He is not Tucker Carlson. No.
Am I the first one to tell that you sounded like Tucker Carlson?
No, not at all.
If Donald Trump calls you up and says, “We’d like to do a screening of ‘Zero Day’ at the White House,” what do you say?
Listen, I’m a busy guy. It’s probably not going to fit in the calendar, unfortunately.
You got to go onto another project you have coming over “Swiped” about the creation of the Bumble dating app. Lily James plays Bumble founder Whitney Wolfe Herd and you play her investor Andrey Andreev.
I think they’re in the process of changing the title. I don’t know what to, but that was the last I heard was that that name is maybe not going to stick.
Did you meet with Taylor or Andrey?
No. I think legally, there’s all sorts of NDAs and things that meant that we couldn’t. But fortunately, there’s quite a bit of tape out there and a lot of references and stuff of Whitney. Not so much of Andrey. There’s very few, but there are a few interviews and various conferences that he spoke at. So I was able to study those and get the accent and that kind of thing, which was fun.
So back in the day, were you swiping? Were you on Bumble or Tinder?
No, that sort of came along after my time, I think. It’s a brave new world out there. I know some people who are very actively into it, shall we say. That in itself is a very interesting sort of phenomenon. A friend of mine calls it Candy Crush for Humans.
Did you sign on to Bumble under an alias for research to be like, “OK, how did this all work?”
I should have done that. That could have been really fun. But then it might have caused all sorts of problems. I’ve had friends who’ve shown me apps. I remember a friend who showed me the early days of Grindr. We were on Broadway and just to show me what sort of the radar was – we were in the basement of a Broadway theater — he showed me, and he was like, “Well, this guy is 750 feet away.” I was like, “What are you talking about?” And it was just like all these little dots of all these horny gay men sort of circling us. So I was like, “Oh my God, this is terrifying.”
They’re not horny gay men. We’re just looking for love, Dan. It’s just love.
They might be horny. We don’t know.
“Zero Day” is now available to stream on Netflix.
