Prometheus Star Michael Fassbender on His Robotic Role and Why He Believes in Aliens- Q & A

Michael Fassbender has had a busy couple of years. In 2011 alone, he played everything from a sex addict in Shame and Carl Jung in A Dangerous Method to X-Men’s Magneto and Jane Eyre’s Rochester. And now he’s adding a new kind of character to the already-full stable, as an android spaceship attendant named David in Ridley Scott’s Prometheus, out in the U.S. on Friday. Fassbender caught up with TIME from London, where the film has already been released, to discuss how the character of David came to be—and whether he thinks a real-life David could ever exist.

How do you go about acting that feelinglessness?

There’s always an objective. There’s always an internal dialogue going on. It doesn’t always have to be emotionally based. If I’m approaching a character I don’t necessarily think of it emotionally. I think about what the character is trying to get and what the character’s trying to achieve and how they go about doing it, and emotion is a side-effect as opposed to being a driving force.

Did you study any other famous on-screen robots?

No, the inspiration we used was David Bowie and The Man Who Fell to Earth, and for films there were the replicants in Blade Runner. Greg Louganis, in terms of physicality. Lawrence of Arabia of course, and Peter O’Toole as Lawrence, and Dirk Bogarde. They were the ingredients.

Read the Whole Interview HERE