Helena Bonham Carter, holding up her iPhone accessorized with gold bunny ears, reveals a photo of her and Dominic West with Eighties hair and makeup, both looking very scared.

“We look like gargoyles, that’s the thing – I mean, THE most famous couple…” she says, breaking off into giggles. The couple in question is Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor, two of Hollywood’s all-time biggest icons. Bonham Carter and West have teamed up to play them in a feature-length BBC Four biopic.

“They’re incredibly intimidating!” adds Bonham Carter. “I hadn’t really met Dom before and I walked in and he just said, ‘Piece of cake, isn’t it?’ and I was like, ‘Yeahhhhh?!’”

Burton & Taylor is a snapshot of the famous couple in 1983, when, having married and divorced each other twice, they teamed up to appear in a revival of Noel Coward’s Private Lives on Broadway.

“It was a total publicity stunt,” says West, dressed in a crisp blue shirt and casual navy waistcoat, a gold signet ring on his little finger. “For her, no, maybe she wanted him back. Her career was in the doldrums though, wasn’t it?” he asks Bonham Carter, who’s quirkily clad in a floral tea dress, grey striped blazer, and red-framed glasses.

“Yep, it was. He was doing better because he’d gotten dry too,” she replies, drifting into Liz Taylor’s American drawl. “And you’d found Sally! I was lonely, I’d just gotten rid of husband number four. I was bored and I did need the money. It was £70,000 a week; it was a huge hit.”

Throughout our chat, Helena Bonham Carter keeps slipping into character, which is both hilarious and disconcerting. She admits that playing Taylor affected her home life, unsettling her family, including her partner, director Tim Burton. “I love pretending to be other people. I get away from myself, which is perfect—it’s a holiday. But it’s really annoying for everyone else!” she adds.

Bonham Carter developed a love for jewelry during filming, a passion Taylor shared. “I had a birthday during filming and Tim actually bought me a present that cost him a lot of money,” she explains.

“It’s funny how things educate you. I wasn’t really into jewels, but I got a few during the Elizabeth Taylor phase. During the Enid Blyton phase, I would have been a very cheap date!” While many remember Liz Taylor, West was surprised that “no one under 30 has ever heard of Richard Burton,” adding, “Well, certainly not the woman who did my hair.”

“She just thought he looked like Wolverine,” says Bonham Carter, referring to West’s long, wispy grey sideburns in the film.

In a biography of Burton and Taylor’s relationship, Taylor authorized the book because her former husband’s fame was dwindling. When the writers approached some UCLA film students about the biography, their response was: “We didn’t know that Elizabeth Taylor was married to Tim Burton!”

“Elizabeth Taylor was so horrified that the Burton name now meant Tim and not Richard, she said, ‘Write it! You’ve got to write it!’” says Bonham Carter.

Helena Bonham Carter discovered she and Elizabeth Taylor were born near each other in London’s Golders Green. “I never met her, but a close friend, who was her goddaughter, convinced me to do it and brought photos of her. She was famous for being beautiful and sexy, but also powerful, funny, and had great strength of character,” Bonham Carter says.

Dominic West adds, “The great revelation for me was that she wasn’t just a spoilt pain in the ass. She was ballsy and great to be around, which is why Helena was perfect to play her.”

Best known for The Wire and The Hour, West faced a challenge because Burton, a Welsh star nominated for seven Oscars, had such an iconic deep voice. “In the read-through, the script starts with ‘The most beautiful voice in the world says…’ I got his voice once after a heavy night of drinking and smoking, but couldn’t do it every day,” he recalls. West learned from the director that Liam Neeson was originally considered for the role. “I thought, ‘What? You couldn’t afford him, I suppose,’” he says with a grin.

During the run of Private Lives, Burton married his fourth wife, Sally Hay, in Las Vegas. He died in 1984 of a brain hemorrhage, but he and Taylor stayed in contact until his death. Taylor was battling addiction and became the first celebrity to announce her admission to a rehab clinic after the play ended.

“I don’t think he knew how severe her problems were before they started the play,” says Bonham Carter. “She was out of it and then checked into the Betty Ford clinic.”

West adds, “Part of the reason they did Private Lives was because they enjoyed acting together. They were amazing in Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? He agreed to do the play because he felt so comfortable with her.”

Taylor and Burton fell in love on the set of Cleopatra in 1963 while both were married. Their affair became public and they were denounced by the Vatican. “They were the first big immoral couple,” says Bonham Carter.

Would Burton and Taylor have reunited? “Yes, a third time around,” says Bonham Carter. “She often said that, and it would have been interesting once both were sober.”

West isn’t so sure. “Their giant egos would have burnt each other up. They loved each other more than anyone else, but living together was out of the question.”