Josha Stradowski

Rilke’s letter continues, “If we imagine our being as a room of any size, it seems that most of us know only a single corner of that room, a spot by the window, a narrow strip on which we keep walking back and forth. But isn't insecurity with all its dangers so much more human?” Within a few minutes of talking with Josha, I can feel that he does not want to be a stranger to the vastness of his own life. He tells me, “Oftentimes, the place you really need to end up is not the place you want to end up, and what you want is not always what you need.” Our conversation follows a similarly unforeseen path as he plunges into depths and reflections, stripped bare (almost literally, as the first story he tells is about running naked on the beach). He talks of filming season three, particularly in his innate desire to push himself to the edge. But he’s learned that the edge, too, is a narrow strip on which to live, and freedom can also be found in choosing to step back.

Josha feels his original shape most when he “gets out of [his] own way.” Rand starts to do the same this season and lets The Dragon crack him open in a tempest of darkness and light. When Josha speaks of his own freedom, he says, “You can think about it rationally, but being it is a completely different thing.” Rand feeling his fate rather than knowing it this season is also vastly different. This season, he learns that imitation will always fall at the feet of inner being, something Josha learned in drama school when looking up at his heroes. His mom’s words, “Do it with your soul,” sent the first ripple through him, one that is now a permanent drop in the tide that he will not hold back.

The Wheel of Time season three premieres on 13th March on Amazon Prime Video.
Note: This interview contains some book and season three spoilers.


Hi Josha!
Hi, how are you? Where are you?

I’m in New York. How about you?
I’m in Amsterdam. I’m coming to New York in three weeks. I really love it. I was there for quite some time this year and want to have it even more in my DNA.

From your Instagram, you seem to be a big traveller.
Yes, too much - there is such a thing as too much travel. Every time I arrive in a place, it takes me between three to five days to really arrive. 2024 was a great year, but I went to more than thirty countries. My dad was a sailor. He sailed around the world two and a half times. It’s in my blood. I have friends and family all over [the world]. In 2025, I will still travel but stay longer in one place.

Where is your favourite place in the world?
I think my favourite place in the world is Brazil. The minute I arrive, adventures happen. I really like Cape Town in South Africa. I feel like that is my land. I like the outdoors, kite surfing, hiking, chopping wood, and barbecuing steak. New York is also one of my favourite places in the world.

I like that you mention feeling like a place is your land, even if you’re not from it. It’s an interesting thing when it can just feel like something inside you is attracted to a place.
It’s also the simple things. If I look back on my life and all my favourite moments, it has to be because of the people. [thinks of a memory and laughs] This is a crazy story, but fuck it! I brought my two best mates to South Africa, and one is a bit of a devil in terms of wanting adventure. The other is like an angel on my shoulder who is more responsible. But this day, I was with the devil. We were running on the beach, and he said, “Let’s jump into the ocean!” He took off his shorts and threw them away. Standing on the beach, I ran after him and did the same. We ran back home on the beach naked for about half an hour screaming. We built a fire, and it was just two guys embracing complete freedom. We went home, and my other friend was on the couch and said, “What have you been up to?” We just looked at each other, smiled, and said, “We just went for a run on the beach.” [laughs]

[laughs] That’s so funny, I love that it just felt like a moment of complete freedom. At Boys by Girls, we talk a lot about those moments of feeling really present and how that relates to personal life or acting. Do you feel you tend to easily be present in your life?
I think I am a present person, or at least that is what I hope to be. For me, though, it depends on where I am. Some landscapes demand that you be present. When I am in New York, I feel very present, but that is more in a directional and fast, rapid way. When I’m in Brazil, I am present because the people are so loving and so welcoming. In South Africa, I feel present because of the activities I’m doing. I am kite surfing in the middle of the ocean, and I’m in a storm between big waves and see a sunset behind Table Top Mountain. That scenery demands presence from you. Here in Amsterdam, it is more of a struggle to be present. A lot of people here walk around in their heads, which is fine, but it’s just different.

On that topic of freedom, I remember during season two press junkets for The Wheel of Time, you described season one as drawing the lines, season two as colouring in the lines, and season three as having the freedom to have fun with it. How did it feel working in that freedom that season three provided?
In season three, I felt completely free. That makes sense because we’ve all been working together for a very long time, so we built trust. Also, it was the right time for me to be free. In season one, I had just finished drama school and walked onto this set with five hundred people. It felt like theatre again, in a way, with cranes and big sets. That was intimidating, and about ninety million copies of the books have been sold. I was the one who put the pressure on myself. For season three, I changed the way I prepared. I prepared in a much deeper way. I was able to throw everything out of the window once I stepped into the ring, let’s say. And also, the material asked it from me.

In episode four, I play seven different characters - young and old - with prosthetics. It’s TV, so we don’t have a lot of time to fuck around in prep because there isn’t any time. Usually, with those prosthetics, you would have three tests, but we knew we only had one, and it had to work. I couldn’t get in the way of myself. Everything that seemed like a problem immediately had to turn a new creative path. That was a good exercise for me, and it was a lot of fun as well. It was a dream and what I wished for. Be careful what you wish for! [laughs]

[laughs] Wow, I am very excited to see episode four. I had heard that it was a big episode for you and have been looking forward to seeing it. Going back a bit, you mention going from drama school right to season one. What is something you learned from experience that you couldn’t have learned in school?
That’s a really good question. I ask myself the same thing. I did an internship in my fourth year in drama school with the Internationaal Theatre company of Amsterdam and was working with my heroes. I watched them and thought, Why are they so good? It was not something they did; it was just their being. I would try to imitate them. I thought, This guy has played Hamlet, this guy has played Macbeth, this guy has played Richard III, year after year. I found myself at the bottom of the hierarchy because, in theatre, there is a hierarchy. I thought, I want to play Othello now. I don’t want to wait ten years. So I planned to do film and TV. Holland is relatively small, so I thought, Why not go abroad? The Wheel of Time came along, and I got my own Hamlet in a way. What I’ve found is that the process is always very different from what you expect it to be.

Oftentimes, the place you really need to end up is not often the place you want to end up, and what you want is not always what you need. This season was very mysterious, especially episode four. Rand goes through a test and has to go through his ancestors’ lives. If he does so, then he proves he’s the chosen one. So, in a way, it also forced me to look at myself as a human being because it gave him his purpose. We know the prophecy, but why is he actually The Dragon? This season, we aren’t only understanding his purpose but also feeling it. I can’t spoil too much, but I don’t mind telling you everything, really. [laughs]

[laughs] You just mentioned the idea that you often end up in a place that is different from what you expected or wanted. That reminds me of a part of Letters to a Young Poet by Rainer Maria Rilke, which I have seen you quote on Instagram. It is one of my favourite books and is literally open behind me…
[Gets up and brings back the book] It’s open here! Is it page thirty-three? Mine is open there.

Mine is on sixty-six! There is a quote in the book, “Be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves…Live the questions now. Perhaps you will then gradually, without noticing it, live along some distant day into the answer.” Personally or professionally, do you feel comfortable living in the questions and having faith that the answer may come?
I think the answer is yes. I have less stress in life and in my acting about the questions that I have. I have more faith in life and, in the process, that eventually, I’ll live the answer. That goes quite deep. Someone sent me an interview from four or five years ago when I started The Wheel of Time, and I can see in my eyes that I was obsessed. I still am but in a more relaxed way. I could see now that I was pressuring myself, finding purpose in this life, and trying to find meaning behind it. Now, it is completely different and is somehow linked to this season. As a man, I already know that I, as Josha, walk around the world, and he’s already saved, you know? There is no need to be saved from anything - no place, no character, no country. He’s already saved and free. I realised that’s inherent to my being. It’s quite deep, but somehow, that’s something not that you do. You can think about it rationally, but being it is a completely different thing. That’s what the season gave me. It was a deep experience.

That’s such a great thing to get out of it. As you mentioned, your journey somehow links to Rand in that way. Rand is trying to live in all the questions and, hopefully, find the answers along the way. In season three, what answer about Rand do you feel you found while living as him that maybe you couldn’t have found in the scripts or the book?
The trial Rand went through felt like a psychedelic journey in a way. Thomas [Napper], the director, and I spoke about that quite a lot. Filming the scenes of Rand walking through his ancestors’ lives showed me how deeply Rand opened me. At the end of the scene, there is another test when he reveals himself as the chosen one. We shot that scene in the dunes of Cape Town, and it was the hottest day in Cape Town in ten years. They measured forty-nine degrees Celsius, and I fainted. I was out for about twenty minutes. Rand is so obsessed this season and has a completely different presence because he wants to prove to himself and the world that he is the chosen one and that he’s good enough. When he revealed himself, they still didn’t see him as The Dragon.

I thought, Why do I need to push myself so hard that I end up in hospital? I took three months off to think about why I do the things I do and why I needed to push so hard. That changed me as a human being. That’s where you come alive, right? Right at the edge? That’s where I want to be in life as an actor and person. That’s part of my essence. In a way, though, you have to feel that edge and know when it’s time to get close to that and maybe when it’s time to take a step back. Giving it your all is not always the most interesting thing as well. I realised that just enough could be way more interesting. Usually, you think about what you can give the character, but at the end of this season, I thought, What did Rand give me?

Thank you for sharing that, really. Speaking of what Rand gave you, in The Wheel of Time, we see that the dream world is not so separate from reality, and everything is tangled. You have mentioned dreaming about Rand in the past. Does that dream state ever feel like it merges with your reality?
I think in the past, I was naive about the boundary between the character and the actor, but there were moments when it felt like the character was almost dying. It’s a matter of life and death. When you play that scene thirty times a day, your body doesn’t really know the difference between what’s real and fake. That’s where it becomes interesting, but I also think it’s part of the reason why my body eventually said no. Yes, it can go into your dreams. It’s always interesting how certain actors have this streak of the best performances of their lives, but there’s also something to them that has a big darkness. Then you see them do something more light because it has too big of an effect on them. Maybe, at the time, they aren’t fully aware of its effect, but maybe eventually, they will be aware. We are also human beings, with I don’t know how much water inside of us, but our head is just a piece of meat. I feel everything affects us. But it’s been a while; I haven’t seen Rand in about a year now. We finished shooting a year ago, which feels like a healthy thing.

Now that it’s coming out in about a month, how do you feel leading up to the release?
Most of my excitement is in the input. This season was the best input of my life. I’ve never had so much fun on set. It was heaven. I just look back on the beautiful memories, and it’s out of my hands. I don’t feel nervous at all, really. Sometimes, I lose sight of the result, especially because of the last couple of years with the strikes or COVID. When I have a press junket or when I talk to you, that’s when I realise it’s actually coming out. I’ve become quite used to doing it for the doing. Last year, I went to Japan to do a short film with a friend, and he just sent the last cut to me, and I was like, Oh yeah, of course, that’s coming out. I just did one of your favourite books as an audiobook, which will come out in the year as well. There are ten other things that I know about, but most people don’t, which is kind of great. The joy lies in the doing, and I think nowadays, it can become about the post on social media, and that’s when your life becomes a bit weird.

I agree completely. Like you were talking about how a role affects your body and soul even if you don’t know it, I think social media makes us play a role that affects us so heavily too in the way we perceive ourselves. Getting back to season three, I love Lanfear’s relationship with Rand, even though I probably shouldn’t. [laughs] Without spoiling anything, in season three, he says something about leaving the idea of comfort behind in The Two Rivers, and she so knowingly says, “No, you didn’t.” How do you view his perception of comfort this season?
Rand has this hero-like goal where he stands for hope in the world. At the same time, he has this big childlike fear about that comfort Lanfear mentions. This season, he also has this anger not only toward the people around him but also towards himself. Comfort lies in that illusion. Yes, he has left the idea of comfort behind because he knows home is not home anymore. Rand is ready for The Dragon, but on a human level, he is still that shepherd in a way and wants those birthday parties and wants to be with his friends. He knows he has to say goodbye to them, though, and he’s just trying to figure out how.

Lanfear also says Rand’s friends tie him to the boy he used to be, not the man he must become. For you, as Josha, do you feel like you have to lose anything in yourself to become who you have to be as Rand?
Interesting. Rand has to sacrifice pieces of himself to become what he needs to become. I heard in a podcast the other day where Mike Tyson said that he hated the man he needed to become, which is a monster and someone who destroys other people. Rand has the same. He knows he can’t become that guy if he’s with the people who have shared birthday parties with him and know his parents. But for me, I don’t feel that way. I want people close to me because they make it easier for me to be my original shape. That original shape is something where I’m not getting in the way of myself because I feel safe. That, as an actor, is not sacrificing yourself but is getting out of the way of yourself so the character can come through you. You’re just a vessel.

You mention that “original shape,” so I want to go to an early memory. Do you have a vivid memory where you can remember feeling like acting was what felt right to you?
Yes, I do, actually. It still imprints on my life. It was when I was doing a musical, Tintin, at nine years old. I was in Rotterdam at this big theatre with about fifteen hundred people. I had this monologue where I begged the gods to save my friend and myself. It’s quite a big moment for such a little boy. I asked my mom, “What do I do?” I started theatre when I was nine, so I didn’t really understand the concept of theatre or acting, which I guess is the “original shape” we are talking about. It’s like when kids put on a cowboy hat, and that’s enough to become a whole cowboy. There’s nothing in between. My mom helped with that and said, “Do it with your soul.” I said, “What is your soul?” She said, “Do it like you die.” That’s what I did. I screamed to the audience to help and save my friends, and as I did, the whole audience stood up. That was it for me.

Wow. Is that advice you think about with each role?
My favourite actors are the ones who you realise did some real soul work. You can feel it. Without knowing then what it would lead to, my mom left a mark on me for sure.

Going back to The Wheel of Time, I know you have read the books and have said in a past interview that it made you wonder, “Is this hero still a hero?” What are some of the most intriguing questions you think the WOT universe poses?
I love a hero story, especially when they lose everything and go so dark and then become the hero. At least in the books, that’s where Rand goes. It feels like everyone knows exactly how to break him, and they do. You wonder, What’s left fighting for? At the end of the books, he faces The Dark One, and what I remember from it is that he gets asked that question. It’s a simple moment with his dad - Tam - who says, “That’s something you’ll never be able to take away from me, and that’s what I fight for.” He sees his life as a movie in a way and looks at it and thinks, “That’s it, actually.” They’ve taken everything, but that is a light that will never go away. That was such a strong image to me that I find worth fighting for in my own life.

There is so much to the world of WOT, but at its core, it’s such a human story, and it affects readers just as strongly.
It’s also because Rand has this darkness in him as well. Never, as an audience member, did I believe that a hero would choose the dark side. At times while reading The Wheel of Time, though, I would think He might actually [choose darkness]. I’d understand if he would. You almost think he should go dark. If you even think about the concept of darkness, you need to know the dark if you want to defeat it. That’s a concept that I really like. If you don’t know the dark, you’re always going to be too slow. You’re always going to be too dumb. You’re going to lose. Trying to get into the dark makes Rand understand it, and that’s why he wins from it. If we’re able to get that close in the show, it would be a dream.

That reminds me of a scene with Moiraine where Rand talks about the One Power and likens it to a well that tastes so bitter, but he can’t stop drinking because it’s so sweet. Moiraine says it’s important to embrace both so he always knows the difference. That is very powerful in WOT. Let’s end with some fantasy-driven questions. What in the world do you consider to be most like magic?
Wow. The last couple of weeks of shooting in South Africa this season were really tough because there were so many different characters and prosthetics, which took a long time, so there was no sleep. We were shooting in the desert, which doesn’t cool down at night. It was physically tough. We shot our last scene, which was supposed to be a sunrise, even though we filmed at sunset as it’s “He who comes with the dawn.” Everyone was worried that we wouldn’t get the sunset we imagined. But then, somehow, the sun broke through the clouds, and we got the most beautiful sunset ever in those three months being there. People started crying because everyone was working hard on this season. We got this beautiful gift at the very end. There’s dialogue at the moment where Rand walks Moiraine out of Rhuidean - the shot on the poster - and we cut the dialogue because no words were needed. It’s one of my favourite moments from the episodes. That, to me, felt like magic.

That’s so beautiful, and I love it when a scene is saying enough that there doesn’t need to be anything said. What power do you think you’d have in a world of magic? Not one that you’d want, but one that you think you’d have based on your personality?
I think probably that I would be able to really see people, like an all-seeing eye. Min has it in some kind of way, but it can be a curse.

Very true. Okay, let’s end with you telling me something, whether it’s a part of a book or piece of media that has really stuck with you recently.
I was reading Sand and Foam by Kahlil Gibran, and he wrote, “There’s a staying in your going and a going in your staying.” That hit me so hard. I don’t even want to explain it because it means something to everyone. I read that book before, and it didn’t hit me then, but now it did. That’s the quote I want to give.