When Nick Cave first saw Matt Smith as Zeke Munro, the sex-obsessed traveling salesman from his novel The Death of Zeke Munro (Death of Bunny Munroe) from 2009, was taken aback.
"In the book, Bunny is no good at what he does, he wants to sleep with everyone and is a failed seducer who women treat with ridicule," explains Cave.
"While Matt is handsome, it brings a certain complexity to the story that the original Bunny didn't have, because when Matt courts women, they kind of like it and are attracted to him."
A dark comedy about sex, guilt and grief from the pen of an Australian musician has been adapted into a television series, starring the series star Doctor Hu i Crown in the title role of a man who begins to lose control of his own life after his wife commits suicide.
After kidnapping his own son, Zeka embarks on a chaotic road trip, holding on tightly to his own business and lust while everything else around him falls apart.
Smith says he agreed to play Bunny the moment he first met Cave.
He considered it "a fantastic opportunity and challenge to play a man who is brought to the edge by grief, sex and life itself."
For Cave, this project represents a return to one of his more morally complex characters.
This 68-year-old firmly stands by the fact that Zeka is not a completely bad person.
"When I look at Zeka, I don't see anything abnormal in him," he says.
"He's a flawed human being struggling with grief, his own heritage, and all the things that make us human."
Smith agrees and his version of Zeke is more captivating and dangerous, and Zeke's allure makes his downfall harder to ignore.
"He's a selfish and difficult man, but also funny, crazy and in a way charismatic," he explains.
"He's a human being and I see the good in him, he was very funny to me and I became quite attached to him."
This tension, that Zeka is simultaneously repulsive and relatable, gives this story its emotional power.
Smith says that beneath all this chaos "lies a truly moving story of a father and son."
Cave nods to that, adding that the story of Bunny makes him want to hug children.
"She is a reminder of the vulnerability of our children and the need to hold them in our arms while we still have time to do so."
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Set in Brighton in 2003, the television adaptation transforms Cave's novel into a period piece that feels close enough to the present day, yet far enough away to imagine how the world and tolerance for men like Zeka have changed.
But both refuse to agree that the series makes views on masculinity.
"That's for others to decide," Smith says.
"But for me, the story is really about the sins of the father and how Zeka Jr. breaks that vicious circle."
Cave sees it as a story about inheritance, what we take from our parents and what we decide to leave behind.
"Little Zeka needs to get away from his own father, because he's chaotic and a threat to his safety, but Zeka is basically good and we wouldn't want his son to run away from those parts of him."
The singer also suggests that the story is much deeper than just an exploration of masculinity, as it reflects "the way we relate to our own nature and humanity."
This sense of humanity is at the core of Cave's work and his music with The Bad Seeds is "essentially autobiographical".
Cave's son Arthur died in 2015 after falling from a cliff in Brighton, and in 2022, his eldest son Jethro died at the age of 30.
The singer was previously wrote about "endless" sadness which he feels and about it how the death of his sons changed him.
He also moved to Los Angeles, because "Brighton just got too sad", but later returned when he "realised that no matter where we lived, we would always take that sadness with us".
"If you listen to my songs and my lyrics, they paint a very clear picture of who I am and what I've been through," he tells the BBC.
"Even the hideous characters, they are not separate from me, they are just part of a very complex personality."
However, Cave explains that Bunny Munro is not an autobiographical character, but that there are certain overlaps between his life and the life of his creation.
“I didn’t write about someone I didn’t understand,” he says.
"I felt extremely connected to Zeko, not because I was going around trying to seduce women, although there was a little bit of that, that's how it is when you're in a band, but because of that inner male monologue, the first impulse towards living life."
"Most men, if they're honest, understand Zeka on some level."
However, Cave says that what makes him most different from Zeke is his attitude towards women, as he is "much more shy around women."
His confession is devoid of any rocker swagger, as he readily admits that he is "quite intimidated by women and their strength, and I've never felt too comfortable in their company."
Series premiere The Death of Zeke Munro it will be on November 20th
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