‘My disability is the least interesting thing about me’: Actor Adam Pearson on fame, film and his sibling rivalry

Adam Pearson has a longstanding argument with his mother, Marilyn, about how well-known he is. The tension is most likely to surface when they are at home in Croydon and Marilyn asks the 39-year-old actor to do some menial household chore. For example: "We've recently put up a new shed, and tomorrow morning I've got to carry all the heavy stuff down to it," says Pearson, with a weary shake of his head. "There's literally a bag of cement. I said to her, 'Why have we got a bag of cement?' And she said, 'We might need it one day.' Fine! What day are we going to wake up and be like, 'Oh, thank God we kept that bag of cement!'"

So, a do-you-know-who-I-am moment then?

"That doesn't fly well in Pearson Towers," he smiles. "I may have said it once. It ended horribly."

The debate, though, took a bit of a turn earlier this year when Pearson invited Marilyn and his twin brother, Neil, to the European premiere of his new film, A Different Man , at the Berlin film festival. The satirical drama, in which Pearson stars alongside Sebastian Stan (of the Marvel universe and Pam & Tommy renown) and Renate Reinsve (from The Worst Person in the World ), had already been a breakout hit at Sundance and was now expected to make a determined awards push.

"For years my mum has been like, 'I'm sorry, Adam, I don't believe you are famous,'" says Pearson. "I'm like, 'OK, let's kick this argument straight in the knackers.' And in Berlin, she was just killing herself laughing on the red carpet. She's like, 'People have printed photos of you off the internet and they are yelling your name.' I'm like, 'So do you realise I'm famous now?'"

The premiere and the escalating acclaim for A Different Man has also settled his since-birth rivalry with his brother, Pearson believes. "Well, there's no more competition, my friend," he says, mimicking a conversation with his twin. "You're a library assistant . And I'm a soon-to-be-Oscar-nominated actor and he works in the Royal Marsden and unless he actually cures cancer, this is over!"

This exchange pretty well sums up Pearson, who is confident, funny and doesn't do false modesty. For years, the opening line of his CV read: "My name is Adam Pearson and I'm the best in the world at what I do." He laughs, "Granted, that's a little bit braggadocious, but people hold a CV for seven seconds on average... Also, not being coy, I'm saying that sincerely."

Pearson's CV is stacking up rather nicely these days. Born with neurofibromatosis type 1 , a genetic condition that produces benign skin tumours all over his face, he didn't immediately consider a career in entertainment. He studied business management at Brighton university, and after graduating landed a six-month contract at the BBC working for Mary FitzPatrick , editorial executive of diversity. Pearson went on a networking frenzy, which led to production jobs at the BBC and Channel 4, where he helped cast reality show The Undateables and the documentary series Beauty and the Beast . "Well, don't ask, don't get," he says, summing up his approach. "That's in the Bible . So who am I to question that wisdom?"

But Pearson's big break – or certainly the role he is most recognised for – came in 2013 when he was picked by the director Jonathan Glazer for the film Under the Skin . At the time, he had zero acting experience, literally none. But Pearson received an email from Changing Faces , a charity that works with people with visible differences on their faces, hands or bodies, about a casting call and decided to send off that punchy CV. Glazer was impressed and Pearson found himself heading to Elstree Studios in Borehamwood to meet his co-star.

"I'd done a bit of Googling by then and knew it was a Film Four thing," Pearson recalls. "And Olivia Colman had just done Tyrannosaur and killed it, so in my head, I was like, 'Oh, it's Olivia Colman.' Then I walk in, put some bass in my voice to establish dominance, and go, 'Hi, I'm Adam.' And this lady comes up and goes, 'Oh, hi, I'm Scarlett.' Then I freak out a little bit and go, 'Yes! Yes! You are.'"

That's Scarlett Johansson by the way, if you didn't know. Under the Skin had a curious premise about a sexy alien known only as the Female (Johansson) who finds men on the edge of society in Glasgow, seduces them and then harvests their bodies after luring them naked through black goo. Pearson was hired to play one of these misfits, a loner who initially knocks back Johansson because he is more intent on getting to Tesco before it closes.

Pearson knew about Glazer's reputation as an advertising savant – the director has since gone on to win a pair of Baftas for 2023's The Zone of Interest – but he was sceptical that Under the Skin would land with an audience. He has been proved not to be correct: it placed fourth in the Guardian's list of the 100 best films of the 21st century in 2019. "It's aged so well," says Pearson. "I thought it would be in cinemas for two weeks and that would be it. I just went, 'This will be a flash in the goddamn pan.' And then nope, turns out it's a masterpiece. Oh well!"

Under the Skin also became a calling card for Pearson. He improvised much of the dialogue with Johansson – including the line about Tesco – and their scenes together, where the alien shows some nascent empathy, were the emotional heart of the film. "I just thought, 'I've done it, it's on the CV, it's part of the Pearson story,'" he says. "I'll buy a copy of it on Blu-ray, add it to the shrine of Adam, and we can all get back to normal, right? And then things never really did."

Pearson was always an extrovert growing up. He only realised he had neurofibromatosis when, aged five, he banged his head on a windowsill, probably trying to re-create a pro-wrestling move he'd seen on TV, he thinks. The bump didn't go away and he also started having an intense allergic reaction to certain foods. His brother Neil was diagnosed at the same time, but he experiences short-term memory loss rather than the skin tumours. Pearson has since had 39 surgical procedures to, in his words, "debunk" the tumours and there will be more to come. After his 40th, he plans to throw a party.

"I wanted to be a standup comic," says Pearson. "Because I grew up on Joe Pasquale , Kenny Everett , Tommy Cooper . And everyone likes the funny guy. Whether at the time it was just a thinly veiled defence mechanism I don't know, that's all too cod psychology for eight-year-old me to comprehend. But yeah, I was a real comedy buff from a really young age."

Secondary school was rough for Pearson: he was bullied – verbally more than physically – and his response was to lash back with insults of his own, which would then land him in trouble. "I was miserable and didn't exactly cover myself in glory with how I behaved," he reflects. "It was a noble anger, it was all a very righteous endeavour. But equally a very misguided righteous endeavour."

Pearson didn't pursue comedy or acting, because he couldn't see the point. "I didn't think disabled people were allowed in films, because I didn't see any," he says. "Up until quite recently, only two disabled actors have won Oscars playing disabled characters." These are a supporting-actor win for Harold Russell in The Best Years of Our Lives in 1947 and Marlee Matlin in 1987 for Children of a Lesser God; Troy Kotsur, who is deaf, joined the list with a best supporting actor win for Coda in 2022. Pearson adds, "And I'm like, 'That's pretty fucked up, right?'"

The portrayal of disability onscreen is at the heart of Pearson's new film A Different Man. The action starts with Edward, who looks a lot like Pearson, but is actually Stan under prosthetics. Edward is an actor, but an unsuccessful one: the only part he has managed to land is a schlocky public-service commercial about how to treat co-workers with craniofacial conditions. Then, out of the blue, Edward's luck seems to change. A doctor offers him a place on an experimental trial to treat his neurofibromatosis. It works; Edward literally peels off his old face and is reborn as Guy, now played by Stan without prosthetics. Guy, initially, has a great time: he lands a well-paid job as an estate agent; he starts dating his old nextdoor neighbour, the playwright Ingrid (Reinsve), after bagging the lead role in her new play.

It's then that Pearson, as Oswald, shows up. Oswald and the old Edward may look alike, but in every other respect they are unrecognisably different. Oswald is charismatic, brash, a masterful karaoke performer, popular with women. And, without seeming to mean to, he starts methodically dismantling Guy's hard-won new life. "It becomes a really dark comedy, almost," says Pearson. "It's this bizarre one-sided rivalry between Oswald and Guy, where Oswald's just unknowingly kicking Guy down this really long flight of stairs."

Written and directed by Aaron Schimberg, A Different Man is a lot to take in and a lot to watch – comparisons have been made to the work of Charlie Kaufman , best-known for writing 1999's Being John Malkovich – but it is definitely worth sticking with. Schimberg wrote the part of Oswald with Pearson in mind (they had previously worked together on the 2019 film Chained for Life ) and he excels in it. Peter Bradshaw in the Guardian described it as an " exhilarating performance ".

"You turn up to every gig and try to nail it," says Pearson. "But particularly with this one, because it was written for me, I was like, 'I need to make my point here.' There's always Sebastian Stan and Renate Reinsve, so it would be very easy just to get lost in the shuffle and become the third guy in that film. And I was like, no, no. I rocked up with the full intention to steal this movie. I'm taking this to the bank. Every step of the way."

For Pearson, A Different Man is a revelatory film for its depiction of disability. Too often on film, he feels, a person with a disfigurement is presented as a problem that needs fixing. Here, Edward is sent into a tailspin when he receives his magical cure. "People always think of the tragedy of going from being non-disabled to disabled," says Pearson. "And no one really talks about it going the other way. I often say that my disability does a lot of heavy lifting for my awful, awful personality. But it also means I can get away with so much. I can behave thoroughly awfully and, at the end of the day, hold my hands up and go, 'I'm disabled, I don't know any better.' And the whole world goes, 'You're right, you're an inspiration and a hero. You go, girlfriend!' So if I had to operate within these new confines, I'd be like, 'I don't like playing by the rules one bit!'"

Pearson is also clearly gleeful to play a character that's not introverted or a loner. One, in fact, that's much closer to his own personality. He was especially pleased to unleash his karaoke skills, which he normally reserves for Memory Box in Croydon on a Wednesday night, banging out Journey's Don't Stop Believin' and Danger Zone by Kenny Loggins.

"A lot of my friends will accuse me of just turning up to work and being myself on camera," Pearson says, with a chuckle. "The charm and flamboyance are absolutely me. But the whole saxophone, jiujitsu stuff? Hell no! That's not who I am. I've never been so scared as the day we had to do that fight scene on stage between Oswald and Guy. Because he's Sebastian Stan, he's the Winter Soldier ! And I'm 5ft 4in and made of Oreo cookies and broken dreams."

Pearson wants to keep the run going: he's attached to a film role he can't talk about and on the shortlist for a big theatre part; he's also made a documentary about "why representation in film matters" that he's submitted to Sundance. "I want to get to a point where we can have guys like me in a film and I'm just there," he says. "Where the disability isn't the raison d'etre for me being there. Because I often say, 'My disability is the least interesting thing about me. Don't get me wrong, it's still pretty goddamn interesting. But there's more to me than that.'"

Still, Pearson is going to keep some time aside in February and March next year in case the Baftas and the Academy Awards come calling. Who would he take as his guest to the ceremony? A long pause, "I'd probably have to take the missus." He's talking about his girlfriend of three years. "She's quite a private person. I don't really talk about her much. I don't want her to be part of this three-ring circus. Or I might just flex and take another actor: here's my plus one, Jamie Lee Curtis! But it might be the first Oscar to ever go home in a Honda Jazz."

Pearson is a man on a mission: this morning he was so distracted that he called his mum by his girlfriend's name, which didn't go down well. "I want the Oscar nom," he says. "I want Oscar noms all round. I want to go to the Oscars and clean up. At the beginning I just wanted to be in the conversation. And now I'm in the conversation, I'm like, 'Fuck it, let's bring it home.' I've already gone to Ikea, I've already got the flat-pack shelves in the shed ready for it."

Ah yes, the shed. Pearson is momentarily brought back to earth with the reminder of his rather less glamorous task tomorrow. "And the worst-case scenario," he goes on, "I'll just put that bag of cement on there."

A Different Man is in cinemas now

Styling Tanja Martin; grooming by Maria Comparetto using Typology; shot at One Friendly Place