Chris Noth
A Conversation With Chris Noth
(Pompey)

Q: This set is amazing. Did you realize the scope of this project when you decided to be a part of the film?
A: I knew it would be grandiose. I am incredibly impressed by the sets. I love this period of history, and when you walked onto the set, you really got a sense of it.

Q: What is it about this period of history that still makes for great movies?
A: Hollywood usually does different variations of Shakespeare's Julius Caesar, and this movie takes place quite a bit before the time in which that story was set. I haven't seen many movies that deal with Caesar when he was conquering Gaul and the politics involved in that. You don't hear that much about Sulla or Pompey. This movie includes those things, so I think it will be pretty fresh and interesting.

Q: What do you think is the most dramatic part of this story?
A: In this movie, there are several stories that are all intertwined: the personal stories, the love stories and the politics. I think the complicated politics of the Senate make for great drama.

Q: Do you think there's a key to making a historical film believable?
A: It all starts with the script. I think this is less hokey than a lot of historical scripts because the history is so interesting that there is no need to deviate from it. And the characters in this are big characters. They are gigantic forces -people who changed the history of the world. It's not always very pretty; in fact, it's very violent. The very thing that fascinates me is that there was all this violence in Rome, yet such intellectual scope at the same time. These men gave patriotism a new name. They weren't just violent in war. They were violent about their ideas and their ambitions.

Q: What do you hope viewers will take away from this film?
A: I hope people will be transfixed by this story and will get a glimpse into an ancient civilization that was filled with human emotion, love, violence and culture. You want them to see that there are certain things in humanity that haven't changed at all.