Pedro Pascal has said learning to play the cello for Behemoth! was the “most challenging” thing he has faced in his career.

The Last Of Us actor, 51, stars in the upcoming feature film Behemoth! as Alex Serian, a gifted, classically trained musician who returns home to Los Angeles and the world of film scoring after travelling the world playing music.

To play the role convincingly, the actor had to learn how to play the cello in a very short amount of time.

Speaking on the red carpet for the UK premiere at the BFI London Film Festival, Pascal said learning to play the instrument was “the most challenging” experience he has ever had to deal with over the course of his career.

The actor said he would rather “choose fighting the Mountain”, referencing the notorious fearsome and violent warrior in HBO’s Game Of Thrones, which he also starred in, “over learning how to play the cello convincingly”.

He also said he would rather be thrown “off a cliff with Nicolas Cage” than learn how to play the cello, referencing a scene where the pair had to dive off a cliff in 2022’s The Unbearable Weight Of Massive Talent.

“Although now I’m in love with the instrument, and in love with the sound,” he said.

“It was always my favourite instrument sort of secretly and it’s really nice physical company.

“The size of it and the kind of embrace that it is to have a cello is an incredible comfort, but boy sometimes it is not on your side when you want to make it sing.”

The Chilean-American stars alongside Olivia Wilde, Eva Victor and Will Arnett in the drama directed by The Bourne Legacy and Michael Clayton filmmaker, Tony Gilroy.

The role was originally set for Frankenstein star Oscar Isaac, however, he reportedly had to drop out in August last year, with Pascal recast as the lead.

Gilroy praised Pascal and his performance for giving the film its “effervescence”.

He said: “I don’t have a movie without him.

“The movie was about to fall apart when he came in, and he didn’t just resurrect the movie, he made it possible.

“He’s the exclamation point. He’s the thing that lets the movie have its effervescence and its pop.”

The filmmaker said he struggled to finance the film because it was set in Los Angeles.

He said: “It’s not the kind of picture that’s getting greenlit all the time every day.

“It’s a mid-level. It’s not a sequel. It’s not IP. It’s all the things that movie making used to be.

“We had to make the movie in Southern California. We can’t go someplace else. It’s a movie about Los Angeles as a character, and the music community of LA, and that’s a lot more expensive than making the movie someplace else.

“It was a stretch, but we did it economically and you know you’re not getting a lot of movies like this at this point. We’ll see how many more there are.”

Behemoth! is out in UK cinemas on December 4.