Richard "Love Actually" Curtis tells a historical story in Pirate Radio. In the early '60s, rock n' roll music was banned in the U.K., so DJs just sailed boats off the coast to broadcast. The film has fun with the lives of DJs on the boat. Actor Nick Frost joked about the tight spaces, particularly in proportion to his own size.

"They got tighter when I got in them, put it that way," Frost said. "They're small. The sets were so intricate and perfect that that was a tiny bathroom and it was really small. It was tight."

Part of that is movie magic. Just to shove a camera into those cabins meant that some of the walls came out. "They had to do that kind of clever thing that they took pieces out and shot in and through. But the sets were amazing. The only time I got seasick on the whole project was when we were in the studio, because they built a giant set of the ship."

The set was built down to the last details too. "When I went through that set before we started shooting and I was opening every drawer and cupboard, and every drawer and cupboard was full of period food, of period cups, of everything. And I thought why? Why? I mean you're never ever going to see in here. And then sure enough, when they set the rocker to seven and the thing's doing this and everything's coming out the cupboards, you think oh right, OK, this is why they built it so precisely."

Pirate Radio opens Friday.

Story/Interview by Fred Topel

Starpulse contributing writer

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