The King's Man star explains inspiration for Kingsman prequel

The King's Man was always going to be steeped in history – it is a prequel, after all – but the stars of the latest Kingsman movie have revealed just how inspired by real-life events the movie really is.

The King's Man, which is set during World War I, charts the origins of the Kingsman secret service as an experienced agent and his new recruit attempt to stop history's worst tyrants bringing an end to, well, the world.

Those tyrants are, of course, based on actual figures, including Rasputin and Mata Hari.

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Speaking exclusively to Digital Spy about The King's Man's plot, leading star Ralph Fiennes revealed that he did learn something surprising about actual history from working on the movie.

"I knew about the assassination in Sarajevo of the Archduke Franz Ferdinand. I always had the image of [Gavrilo] Princip coming out of the crowd with the gun and shooting," he explained.

20th Century Studios

"I didn't know that there was this thing of the missed bomb that blew up the car behind, then the Archduke got away, went down a back street and only there was Princip having a coffee. That's one of those weird things of real life that Matthew put into the film."

Speaking about creating The King's Man's plot, writer-director Matthew Vaughn revealed there were "three areas" he "honed into" for the prequel's story.

The filmmaker detailed a "family squabble" between the King, the Kaiser, and the Tsar, the first failed assassination attempt on Archduke Franz Ferdinand, and the death of Rasputin as "the building blocks" of the movie.

"I thought we had to be true to history and there are events I would have loved to change the order that they happened in because it would have made the script a lot easier to write, but they were the foundation of the film," Vaughn explained.

"History was the foundation of the film, number one, and then the history of the Kingsman agency was number two, and we just had to meld them together."

ralph fiennes as oxford, harris dickinson as conrad, the king's man

20th Century Studios

Vaughn added that The King's Man is both "true to history" and includes "a slight wink at some moments" – something star Tom Hollander appreciated.

"I did learn from Rhys Ifans, who plays Rasputin brilliantly, there were real British secret service people in and around Rasputin when he was in the palaces when he was murdered, which is odd," Hollander said, paying tribute to Matthew Vaughn for including the detail.

"I don't know whether that was a coincidence or whether he knew that and that's why he [chose it]. The melding of fact and fiction is very mysterious and brilliant."

The King's Man is set for release on December 22, 2021.

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Rianne Houghton is a freelance news writer at Digital Spy.

Ian Sandwell

Movies Editor, Digital Spy Ian has more than 10 years of movies journalism experience as a writer and editor. Starting out as an intern at trade bible Screen International, he was promoted to report and analyse UK box-office results, as well as carving his own niche with horror movies, attending genre festivals around the world. After moving to Digital Spy, initially as a TV writer, he was nominated for New Digital Talent of the Year at the PPA Digital Awards. He became Movies Editor in 2019, in which role he has interviewed 100s of stars, including Chris Hemsworth, Florence Pugh, Keanu Reeves, Idris Elba and Olivia Colman, become a human encyclopedia for Marvel and appeared as an expert guest on BBC News and on-stage at MCM Comic-Con. Where he can, he continues to push his horror agenda – whether his editor likes it or not.