Sheen worked with an accent coach to effectively mimic Blair's speech style, although he and Morrissey avoided doing simple impersonations of the men they played. Sheen cited Will Smith's title performance of "Ali" as a basis for his part; despite playing a real-life figure, he treated the role as if it were any other character. Sheen had made his film debut in Frears' "Mary Reilly" (1996), and although he was unsure whether his minor role had "burned into brain", Frears confirmed that he had remembered Sheen from that. Frears' casting director approached Sheen in the audience of a play, inviting him to appear in "a love story about Tony Blair and Gordon Brown". An informal meeting was scheduled between Frears and Sheen, at the end of which Sheen was cast as Blair.