No, he wasn’t a different character, there was just some specifics about it: how he was introduced and what his history was. And, most important to me was: what’s he after? How’s he intending to get there? What’s his plan? And how does his plan change? What does he want from Michael Burnham? And how does he see it all playing out? And then, circumstances can change along the way. Like any of us, nothing stays fixed. I just needed to know where I started from and what had happened to him beforehand. We needed to agree on a common narrative, so I, you know…

The camera loves secrets. And cameras love pointing at someone who’s saying one thing and meaning another, but is actually driven by some third thing that we understand about them as an audience, but they don’t get themself. Self-knowledge is never complete. And I wanted to be able to play all those three elements. So I needed to know from them either what their plans were, or to work out the plans with them, which is what we ended up doing.

It was interesting in the new episode today, the fifth episode, where he talks about how he blew up his previous crew.

How he killed them all, right. That weighs very, very heavily on him. There’s a reason why he didn’t have an eye transplant, which he could have had. He wants those eyes. He wants those eyes that saw that, as a legacy.

Is the eye thing challenging to play?

Oh, nothing’s challenging. I mean, for God’s sake, it’s all acting. It’s fun having physical things to do. It’s fun having an accent. It’s fun to remember that bright lights set me off. There was some other point… because you know your character better than anyone else… there are a couple of points much later in the series when I went, “But he wouldn’t be able to look at that.” And they went, “What?” And I said, “Remember?” And they went, “Oh shit, that’s right, yeah.” Because you kind of own all those idiosyncrasies. But they’re great.

I must say, I think Lorca is the most interesting character in the show. Or the most intriguing, definitely.

Well thanks. He’s certainly got… there’s something hidden about him, and private about him. All the other Captains have wanted to be known and shared and avuncular, and he doesn’t mind distancing himself from the crew and having a different agenda, because they’re not the best crew to do the job that he’s doing. And that’s not something that I’ve seen before in Star Trek.

Another thing that’s unique about Discovery is that it’s the first Trek series to go straight onto the internet instead of TV. And obviously you’ve done Netflix as well, with The OA. Were you at all hesitant to start doing these online-centric things? I feel like some actors might be.

Do you know, there’s not any difference to me. I’m doing exactly the same job. How it’s delivered, whether it’s on subscription TV, or free TV, or a movie, or being shown on the side of a building near you, or in parks, I’m going off to tell a story. So, er, CBS are launching their streaming platform with it in America. It’s Netflix everywhere else. That’s no… there’s essentially no difference.

It’s odd when people contact me online or try and engage with social media and go, you know, “Why are you making us pay behind a paywall?” I’m not doing anything. Why do you pay for HBO? I don’t… I’d like everything I do to be delivered free to everybody. In fact, I’d like all of us to earn an equal wage, I’d be perfectly fine with it. We should all get free medicine and free food.

But it’s none of my business. I tell the story, and if no one ever sees anything I do, as long as I can keep working, I’ll be fine.

There’s an interesting parallel between Zhukov and Lorca. They’re both these revered wartime figures. Is it interesting for you to play these people who, in some way have similarities, but you’ve got to find the differences?

Well, Zhukov’s having a very good time. Lorca’s having a terrible time. Lorca is fighting, as far as he’s concerned, a one-man battle to save everybody in the Federation. Not just the 133 members of the crew or whatever it is, but everyone who lives on any planet that might be invaded or slaughtered by the Klingons. And he doesn’t have the best tools, or people, to do it with.

Zhukov’s got the entire Red Army behind him, and wherever he throws his weight, he’s gonna be at the centre of the Soviet empire for some time to come. So, they’re having a very different experience.

What are you going onto next?

I’m doing, I hope, the second season of The OA. They’re just finishing on it. I have no idea how much I’m in it, if I’m in it, what happens to me. I thought the first season was extraordinary, and I don’t know what they’re going to come up with in the second season. Equally mind-blowing, I’m sure, but it certainly won’t be more of the same.

You’ve got loads of films this year, as well.

Well, one of them is called Hotel Mumbai, and I don’t know when it’s coming out. It’s owned by the Weinsteins, or it was until last week, so I don’t know where that’s going. It’s a brilliant film, from a brilliant filmmaker, so I do hope it gets seen. And the other one is a thing called Look Away, which was directed by the guy that directed Fauda [Assaf Bernstein]. Have you seen Fauda, on Netflix?

No, I haven’t.

If you haven’t seen it, you’ve got to watch it. It’s an unbelievably tense series. My wife, who doesn’t like watching things that are violent or tense… I was in Toronto, I said, “You should take a look at it.” And she phoned me at one point at nine o’clock in the morning, which means it four o’clock in the morning in England. And I went, “What are you doing up?” And she said, “Why did you make me watch this fucking TV show? I’ve got to watch it all the way to the end now! It’s four o’clock in the morning and I’ve got another hour to go!” So you should watch that. And he’s made a film, that I haven’t managed to see yet, called Look Away.

And there’s an animated film coming out. But, it looks like you’re working a lot, but they’re made over a long length of time, and then suddenly they all come out together like buses.

You had The Cure For Wellness this year, as well. Just before I’m ushered out, what was that experience like and what was Gore Verbinski like as a director?

He was more like Ridley Scott than I had imagined, given the kind of romps he’s made. And he came with very complete storyboards. And a very evolved vision, an aesthetic vision of what he wanted to see. It was a real gift, the pictures. I hadn’t expected it to look so sumptuous. Every frame, I thought, was like a poster.

So yeah, he was a different kind of filmmaker than I expected. But, you know, we had a real laugh making it. It’s not a laugh to watch, but we had a lovely time. We filmed in the most haunted building in Europe, so if you asked me to cast my mind back to the experience, it was mostly in between takes at night time, looking firmly down at the ground, and going to the trailer not looking up, because I didn’t want to look in the windows of any of the empty buildings for fear of seeing silhouettes or headless people moving by.

Jason Isaacs, thank you very much!