Bill Nighy Said It Was ‘Lonely’ On Set of ‘Pirates of the Caribbean’ While ‘Dressed as an Idiot’
From hit movies like Love Actually and Hot Fuzz to TV shows like Doctor Who, Bill Nighy has done it all. One of his most famous roles was Captain Davy Jones in the blockbuster Pirates of the Caribbean series. However, Nighy does not remember his time on set fondly.
How the ‘Pirates of the Caribbean’ crew turned Bill Nighy into Captain Davy Jones
Nighy first appeared as Captain Davy Jones in 2006’s Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest, reprising his role for the 2007 sequel Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End.
Davy Jones is a memorable character, and not just because of Nighy’s impressive performance. The paranormal sea captain sports a beard made of octopus tentacles and a large crab claw — all created through CGI.
Fans were blown away by how realistic the effects looked, but Nighy was not a fan of what it took to achieve the oceanic look.
Bill Nighy describes his onset ‘pajamas’ and ‘skull cap with a bubble on top’
“I wasn’t going to do it,” he told GQ of the role. “And [the director] said ‘Come on, how many times do you get to be in a pirate movie?’ And I was like, ‘Alright.’” Nighy accepted the role, but it’s clear the actor had no idea how much behind-the-scenes work would go into making him Davy Jones.
“You had to wear baggy computer pajamas with white dots all over them, fuzzy white dots,” the actor explained. “And you had to have 250 white dots put on your face every morning, and you had to wear a skull cap with a bubble on the top.”
The white dots on Nighy’s clothing and face picked up his body and facial movements, which helped create the lifelike performance of Captain Davy Jones in the movies.
“You had bubbles all over you,” Nighy continued. “And trainers [sneakers], which is like social death, as far as I’m concerned, and bubbles on your trainers. And then they introduce you to Johnny Depp. You know, when you meet Johnny, you just think ‘Why did I ever bother about my hair or what shirt I was going to wear or anything of that kind?’ and ‘It would be great if I wasn’t dressed as Andy Pandy [a 1950s TV show character].”
Nighy thought the ‘Pirates of the Caribbean’ set was ‘a very lonely place to be’
The actor explained, “It was kind of a very lonely place to be, on a big American film set, dressed as an idiot. I just used to think of the money. They gave me quite a lot of money, so I just used to think of the money all the time. I’d just go around thinking of the figure, which I’m not going to tell you, obviously, what it was — but, you know, in order to get me through.”
The actor also spoke about the cast and crew’s reaction to his CGI pajamas and how they eventually ran out of jokes to make about them.
“They just couldn’t look, it was just too sad,” the actor laughed. You know, I was…not young then, and it was kind of, um, tragic to see this old guy wandering about in pajamas.”
Nighy might not have loved being on set while making the Pirates of the Caribbean. But fans around the world love his performance as Captain Davy Jones in the movies.
