March 28, 2025

‘The Penguin Lessons’ Star Steve Coogan on Mixing Audience-Friendly Warmth and Humor with Politics (Video Interview)

Item: ‘The Penguin Lessons’ Star Steve Coogan on Mixing Audience Friendly Warmth and Humor with Politics (Video Interview)
Author: Edward Douglas

by Edward Douglas

For 35 years, Steve Coogan has been one of Britain’s preeminent comic actors, mainly with his popular TV presenter character Alan Partridge, but he’s also regularly branched off into other genres, and even received two Oscar nominations for writing and producing 2014’s Philomena.

The Penguin Lessons puts Coogan in the role of Tom Michell, who travelled to Buenos Aires, Argentina to teach English at a prestigious boys’ school in the 1970s. While there, he ends up becoming unwittingly involved in the country’s military government politics when the daughter of the school’s maid is taken by men, presumed to be a revolutionary. The country’s politics also close the school down for a week, so Michell decides to go to Uruguay on vacation, and having an encounter with a young penguin trapped in an oil slick, which he takes in to impress a woman he’s met. What Michell doesn’t realize is that he would then become responsible for the penguin, bringing it back to the school in Argentina where he needs to keep it hidden.

Steve Coogan and friend in The Penguin Lessons (courtesy Sony Pictures Classics)

Directed by Peter Cattaneo, best known for directing The Full Monty back in 1997, the film is not the type of cutesy animal movie that’s frequently made by the studios for kids and family audiences, though the penguin portraying “Juan Salvador” – what it’s dubbed by Michell’s school – is indeed quite adorable. Mixing Coogan’s cynical humor with a serious look into South American politics of the time, and the type of warm storytelling that often goes with movies involving animals, The Penguin Lesson is a wonderful treat that will have a nationwide release this weekend.

Cinema Daily US had a chance to speak with Coogan recently about making The Penguin Lessons, working with a real live penguin as well as younger actors playing the boys in Michell’s class. We also spoke about his work with Sarah Solemani on the short-lived mini-series, Chivalry, the possibility of working with her again and also any chance of him reteaming with Michael Winterbottom for another project.

The Penguin Lessons hits theaters nationwide on Friday, March 28.

Check out more of CinemaDaily US’ video interviews on our YouTube channel