Ifans’ Career Hots Up

Rhys Ifans, who stole the show as Hugh Grant’s hygienically-challenged flatmate Spike in last year’s Notting Hill, has swapped the chic London borough for a warmer climate - Hell. Rhys has just completed filming on Little Nicky, a comedy starring the Welsh actor, Adam Sandler and Tiny Lister as the sons of Satan. Rhys plays a wayward brother who is throwing the World off balance and Sandler is sent by the Devil to stop him. It's a diverse cast, as Ifans explains. 'I play one of Satan's sons called Adrian, Adam Sandler plays little Nicky and Tiny Lister plays one of our other brothers called Cassius. Now Adam's a New York Jewish boy, I'm a six-foot-two blond Welshman and Tiny Lister's a big black man...so it ain't going to happen again.' Rhys, who says Adrian is an amalgamation of all British villains, has plenty of experience in playing the baddie as cinema-goers can see this weekend when Kevin and Perry Go Large is released. Starring opposite Kathy Burke and Harry Enfield, Rhys plays egotistical Ibiza super-DJ Eyeball Paul. And while Rhys may have seen the son of Satan as all British villains rolled into one, he says his inspiration for Eyeball was rock stars and DJ's. ' It's the experience you have when you're about 15 and you meet these guys that you adore and they're disgustingly cruel to you. Kevin and Perry Go Large opens on Friday, April 21. Little Nicky is due out later this year.