NEW YORK, NY.- Aaron Pierre was an unsure British teenager when he took his first acting gig: a narrator in a secondary-school production of “Moby Dick.” The school didn’t have a dedicated drama program and produced a play once every three years; Pierre had focused on athletics before giving the stage a try.

As he recalled during a recent video call from his apartment in Los Angeles, his adolescent mind was thinking, “What’s going to happen to me walking through the halls if I do this play?”

The show turned out to be painless. He went out, hit his mark at the corner of stage left and looked at the audience as he said his few lines. “I remember getting backstage and just being like, ‘That was amazing,’” Pierre said.

The roles have grown a bit larger. Pierre, 30, played the hard-luck soldier Cassio in a 2018 production of “Othello” at the Globe Theater. Film and TV director Barry Jenkins saw him and was impressed enough to reach out to the actor on Twitter. That led to Pierre’s role as the yearning and enslaved Caesar in Jenkins’ miniseries “The Underground Railroad.”

Since then, Pierre has played an ill-fated rapper in M. Night Shyamalan’s thriller “Old” (2021) and Malcolm X in the anthology series “Genius: MLK/X.” He currently has another major role, in “Rebel Ridge” (streaming on Netflix), directed by Jeremy Saulnier (“Green Room”); Pierre plays Terry Richmond, an ex-Marine who faces off against civil forfeiture and a corrupt police force. In December, he voices the digitally animated lead of “Mufasa: The Lion King,” reuniting with both Jenkins and actor Kelvin Harrison Jr., who played the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. in “Genius.”

Pierre didn’t appear to be too caught up in the anticipation. “I don’t take myself seriously, but I do take my craft extremely seriously,” he said.

He talked about donning boxing gloves to train for “Rebel Ridge,” his reunion with Jenkins and how his admiration for James Earl Jones spurred his excitement to play Mufasa. These are edited excerpts from the conversation.

Q: You signed on to “Rebel Ridge” after John Boyega left the production. Did it take extra processing to fill the role?

A: I was made aware that Jeremy was searching for a Terry Richmond. And the moment I knew he was searching for a Terry Richmond, we connected. He sent me the script. I read it, no kidding, within probably five minutes of being sent it. I probably finished it within 90 minutes and then reconnected with him. I have a list of three things that are really important to me when I engage in a project. That is the filmmaker, it’s the script and it’s the character. All three of those were undeniable.

Q: How did you prepare to star in your first action film?

A: Jeremy Saulnier is, in my view and the view of many, one of our greatest filmmakers. He really creates an environment in which the artist that he’s collaborating with feels safe and they can also thrive.

So, he and the stunt team set up this enormous DIY gym. We had wrestling mats, we had boxing bags, we had boxing gloves, we had kneepads for when we were wrestling. It was phenomenal. I trained hard. I wrestled, I boxed, I sparred. I did all of these things just to get as close to the best version of myself that I could.

Q: “Rebel Ridge” is a more obviously physical role, but is there a physicality to quieter dramatic material?

A: There is physical preparation for that, also, because each individual is unique. It’s more than just physique. It’s physicality. It’s how you hold your frame. It’s how you engage with others. How you engage with the world, right? Even how I’m sitting right now, with my arms crossed and leaning forward. It’s all of those things.

Q: What was your relationship with “The Lion King” before being cast?

A: I have a really sort of personal connection to it, partly because it came out the year I was born. So I’ve always sort of rocked with that fact. It was definitely my most watched of any Disney film. Even today, having filmed this now for a few years and attended [the D23 fan event], which was awesome — after all this time, I’m still pinching myself.

I say this all the time, and I will continue to say it in every interview because it’s the truth: James Earl Jones is one of my greatest inspirations. And to have the opportunity to, in a small way, add to the legacy of a character that James Earl Jones created is just a dream come true.

Q: How has the actor-director relationship changed between you and Barry Jenkins coming from something like “The Underground Railroad” to “Mufasa”?

A: What stays the same is the way that he leads and the way that he helms these projects. You’ll find on set that the energy of the filmmaker, the energy of the director — that sets the tone for the duration of the shoot. And with Barry, he is so calm. He is so team focused.

On “The Underground Railroad,” he just ensured that everybody’s mental, emotional, spiritual and physical well-being was exactly where it needed to be to tell this deeply important story. And truthfully, he’s done the same on this.

Q: Did the way you work onstage have an influence on the way you approached this vocal performance?

A: When I’m in the theater, I do all sorts of things that are unique and specific to me. Maybe it’s weird, but I’ll need to be barefoot on the stage. I’ll need to place my hand on the floor of the stage and on the set to feel connected.

The action may not exactly be the same, but the intention of wanting to be connected is. So, when I do go into the studio, I still make sure that I feel connected to the space because that makes me feel safe, it makes me feel comfortable, and it therefore allows me to just give my best and hopefully achieve whatever the filmmaker is desiring me to achieve in these particular scenes that we’re doing that day.

This article originally appeared in The New York Times.