Michael Fassbender Wants You To Question Everything

IN 2001, MICHAEL Fassbender made his debut on one of the best television shows of all time. In Band of Brothers, he played Technical Sergeant Burton Christenson, a small, recurring role (he appeared in seven episodes of the Emmy-winning series), but one that got him the chance to work with co-creators Steven Spielberg and Tom Hanks—and kickstart what would eventually become one of the standout acting careers of his generation.

23 years later, Fassbender is back on TV in Paramount+ With Showtime's The Agency. The show finds the now-47-year-old star as a spy who goes by the name "Martian," one who needs to adjust after being unexpectedly yanked out of a deep undercover operation after six years. It's a demanding role that not only requires Fassbender to run around with the physicality of an action star, but also to put the weight of some super intense situations—high stakes, possibly dangerous, possibly life-ruining situations—on his shoulders dramatically as well.

With a resume that includes two Oscar nominations (for 12 Years a Slave and Steve Jobs), leading a superhero franchise (as Magneto in four X-Men films), and working with several of the greatest filmmakers of the modern era (including, but not limited to, Quentin Tarantino, Steven Soderbergh, and Steve McQueen) bookending his most significant performances on television, it's fair to wonder how Fassbender's career has changed since the Band of Brothers days. What does he know now that he may not have known back then?

"My homework remains the same. I spend a lot of time with the text. I’ll read a script 200 times, and there were 10 of them to read this time," he says. He's wearing a black jacket with a white shirt underneath, and for how intense this role (and just about all of his others) is, he's surprisingly affable; not long after we got onto Zoom together, he flashed a big thumbs up with a huge grin on his face. He seems excited to talk about just about anything (at one point, he even gestured bending metal with his hands like Magneto). "Through spending hours and hours of that a day, while I’m doing it I’m asking questions about the character," he continues. "In this sense, how much of a sociopath is this guy? Just working repetitively with the script, that’s the same."

As he continues, though, he remembers another answer—he has a family now.

"When I started off, the work was everything," he says. "I still love going to work; it’s my passion. I’m very grateful that I get to do a job that I love doing, and I still give it everything. But definitely, for me, once I had family, they come first, and then the work comes second."

That makes for an interesting contrast for an actor playing a character defined by three key pieces of his life: his work, a certain relationship he's hiding from his time deep undercover, and his relationship with his daughter, whom he scarcely saw during his time away. Fassbender, who's married to Oscar-winning actress Alicia Vikander and has two sons, appears to be doing a better job than his character with that balance—and has even found ways to make time for new passions.

Before returning last fall with roles in David Fincher's The Killer and Taika Waititi's Next Goal Wins, Fassbender took a few years away from acting to pursue a career in auto racing; he made his debut in the 2020 of the European Le Mans Series. He's working a lot, on a lot of different things, and seems to have figured out a way to balance it all. Up next—but actually filmed prior to The Agency—Fassbender will take on another espionage role as he reteams with Soderbergh for 2025's Black Bag, which should be one of the year's most exciting releases.

In an interview with Men's Health, Fassbender discussed the way he connects to and detoxes from his intense roles, his physical preparation, and everything The Agency and Martian.

Watch The Agency Here

MEN'S HEALTH: You’ve done a lot of intense, thriller, spy roles in the last couple years, with The Killer, now The Agency, and coming up with Black Bag. What is it about these kinds of characters and roles that you enjoy so much?

MF: You know, it just sort of happened. Black Bag came, and obviously the opportunity to work with Steven Soderbergh again… I jumped at it. It just happened that the project is in this spy genre.

What interested me about Martian in The Agency was what type of person decides to do this line of work, and what happens over a 20-year career in this? Who's the person at the beginning and who's the person at the end? I found the environment and the character fascinating, and the fact that he gets pulled back into this institutionalized scenario, and he’s in a crisis mode. I always like characters where, in some way, there’s some conflict going on. That’s when we get good drama. Those complex characters are always more interesting to dig into what’s motivating, what drives them, what sort of relationships they have. I like to be part of things where audiences leave either the cinema or in their homes at the end of an episode, and there are a lot of questions. They question the behavior, and how we interact with each other.

MH: This is a physically and mentally intense role and show. What kind of preparation did you put in? You’re running around a lot, but you also have very intense relationships and scenes with your co-stars.

MF: It’s a good question, because I was doing Black Bag and then had, like, a week off, and then straight into this. So, it was seven months straight. I put a pretty strict regimen in place, where I would get up early, work out, and then ice baths, and then into hair and make-up to start the day. That really helped me mentally. Training in general, for me, whether it’s doing a sport, or getting into the gym... working out is crucial for me to have that mental positivity and stability. Over the last seven or eight years that’s been very important to me, and that definitely helped me with the character to have a focus, and a stability.

Also, I would meditate for 20 minutes every morning on the way into work in the car. Then I would go to the gym, do the ice bath, and start the day.

MH: When you’re coming off back-to-back intense projects, do you have any sort of ritual or detox to say “Okay, this is done,” and close the book?

MF: Drink. [LAUGHS] No, I will definitely spend time with family; my parents are here, they came over from the screening. I’ll hang out with them tonight, spend time with Alicia and the boys, and just have that quality time. Go back to cooking. I enjoy cooking—I didn’t do a lot of that when were filming, because I was just literally learning lines, going to work, and leaving the house early. You know, having that nice time at home, having a few glasses of wine, and just unwinding and not thinking about work at all.

Hopefully also getting out and doing some testing, doing some carting, and getting back into a car.

MH: Martian in The Agency has three key pillars to his life—his work, his secret relationship, and the fact that he’s a father. How much did that you draw you into wanting to do this role?

MF: Absolutely, it was a big thing, because I think that’s the crux of it. At the end of the day, he’s got to reconnect with his daughter. That’s a relationship he’s lost so much time with. They probably saw each other very sporadically over six years, and I imagine they would’ve met in Cape Town or somewhere like that, for summer holidays, or two weeks here and there, but he’s missed her whole teenage years; she’s now a young woman, and he can’t get that back.

So he’s trying to reconnect with her, but then it’s also the thing of he’s had things his way, there’s a frustration of how she can get in the way as well. But he’s trying to connect with her as best as he can. He knows that’s going to be the salvation of his soul, and the relationship with Samia (Jodie Turner-Smith). By what he does in order to save that relationship with Samia, he might sacrifice his relationship with his daughter—and everything else.

MH: This run of roles you’re on is a series of real-world, grounded heroes and anti-heroes; you’ve played superpowered heroes/anti-heroes like Magneto in the past. Is there a difference in approach to those?

MF: It’s always trying to find the truth in something, and what that truth is for me to relate to who I’m playing. So, even if it’s Magneto, and it’s fantastical, you need to entertain, but it’s finding something that’s real and grounded with a character like that, with a helmet and a cape on, flying, and bending metal, and all that. There’s something at the crux of that story, which is somebody who feels like an outsider, who’s been damaged by that, and has a very complicated relationship with human beings because of what they’ve done to him. That’s very real stuff, and very human stuff to work with and relate to and find something grounded in a fantasy world, as it were.

With The Agency, it’s the same. It’s trying to understand what this character is about, and what the motivations are. Obviously, there’s no fantastical element to it—I think that’s what one of the very attractive things to me about this series was, is it’s very grounded in reality. It’s very believable. So, that was already there, here, and then it’s just about trying to find what this character is about. When is he lying? When is he telling the truth? Will the audience be asking those questions? Because I’m thinking he’s interwoven both those things into one, and he can't even decipher between the two anymore.