The unexpected songs behind Rami Malek’s breakthrough role: “There’s something revolutionary”
Neil Diamond might not be the first song you’d associate with Rami Malek’s complex and anxiety-wracked character of Elliot in the hugely successful Amazon series, Mr Robot. However, the actor found a connection in the artist’s soliloquy of loneliness in ‘If You Go Away’, along with a host of ballads that explore loneliness, sadness, romance, and revolutionary spirit.
It’s a seemingly incongruous song for a series about a mentally unstable cybersecurity engineer who works for a corporation and hacks felons by night. However, the series’ anarchistic and revolutionary tone, coupled with Elliot’s ongoing connection to a fellow employee, brings a romantic energy to this story of the complex games of power and money.
Originally written by Belgian singer and actor Jacques Brel in 1959, ‘If You Go Away’ was used in the pilot episode of Mr Robot before becoming a recurring motif during its first season. Fun fact: Joaquin Phoenix also sings the song in Folie à Deux.
Malek also found solace in the melancholy, humorous and insightful lyrics of American songwriter Townes Van Zandt. The fifth song off of his 1971 release, Delta Momma Blues, ‘Tower Song’ explores all the things unsaid, with the singer reaching out to a long-lost love whose emotional walls resulted in a rupture in their relationship. The song’s ultimate clarity finds Van Zandt letting go and moving on, but the sentiment remains just as raw. Malek included the artist in his top three musicians and revealed that playing his enduring love songs broke his heart over and over again.
Rami Malek channelled Elliot’s revolutionary spirit through ‘Song for Zula’ by the band Phosphorescent, fronted by Matthew Houck. He’s credited the song’s drumbeat for helping him get into character, explaining, “I feel like there’s something revolutionary in there. There’s a fight in him that wants to break through”.
This complex fight against power and control, which becomes an enduring battle for Elliot in Mr Robot, is symbolised in Marina and the Diamonds’ ‘Power & Control’, a provocative song from the singer’s second album, Electra Heart, which explores the complex dynamics of relationships and love.
In a testament to Malek’s own complex character of Elliot, who suffers from mental health issues, the actor chose Cat Power’s ‘Werewolf’ and ‘Metal Heart’ as songs that reveal something deeper about this mysterious cyber hacker and his motives: “Elliot is a guy that I feel like was raised by wolves”, says Malek, adding that ‘Metal Heart’ speaks to Elliot’s “dysfunctions from birth”.
Contrastingly, the actor found understanding in Majical Cloudz’s ‘Downtown’, which he says speaks to Elliot’s desperation to be normal and low-key, with Malek shouting out one line in particular: “And if suddenly I die, I hope they will say / That he was obsessed and it was OK”, which he says “Eliot would appreciate”.
Malek also drew inspiration from contemporary pop musician Sia, crediting two songs in particular: ‘Burn the Pages’ and ‘Eye of the Needle’, both from her 2014 album, 1000 Forms of Fear. The tracks explore Sia’s reckoning with past loves and leaving things behind, with the artist laying her heart bare in the latter and unleashing her emotions.
But it’s ultimately Johnny Flynn’s, ‘The Wrote & the Writ’ that best explains Eliot as an outsider, existing on the fringes of society and never fully understood or seen by those around him. Malek, who listened to the song while shooting the pilot episode, said he could empathise with this feeling experienced by Elliot and also by Flynn and other songwriters like him.
The songs that made ‘Mr Robot’ according to Rami Malek:
- ‘If You Go Away’ – Neil Diamond
- ‘Tower Song’ – Townes Van Zandt
- ‘Song for Zula’ – Phosphorescent
- ‘Power & Control’ – Marina and the Diamonds
- ‘Werewolf’ – Cat Power
- ‘Metal Heart’ – Cat Power
- ‘Downtown’ – Majical Cloudz
- ‘Burn the Pages’ – Sia
- ‘Eye of the Needle’ – Sia
- ‘The Wrote & the Writ’ – Johnny Flynn
