In real life Nicholas Hoult could not be more different from his former Skins persona, arrogant womaniser Tony Stonem. When RiverOnline spotted him in the bar of Kingston’s Rose Theatre, far from lapping up the attention from the many teenage girls trying to stand as near to him as possible he seemed almost embarrassed by it all. We were intrigued by what we saw and were eager to find out more from the 19-year-old actor about growing up in the spotlight.

Luckily for us, and for the abundant number of Skins fans that seemingly reside in Kingston, Artistic Director of the Rose Theatre, Stephen Unwin, recently gave the public a chance to grill both Nicholas Hoult and Claire Foy, best known for her recent performance as Amy in BBC1’s Little Dorrit.

The setting was an informal question and answer session, which formed part of the government’s A Night Less Ordinary Scheme. The scheme was launched in February and enables young people under the age of 26 to get free tickets to many of London’s top theatre shows.

As we had expected, the audience was predominantly made up of teenage girls. Both actors confessed to being extremely nervous at the prospect of speaking in front of such a large group, but soon seemed to settle in, perhaps thanks to Stephen Unwin’s laid back and informal approach to the session.

Nicholas and Claire spoke to the audience about acting as a career, Claire describing it as a, “bloody hard struggle”, but Nicholas took a more laid back view on things explaining that, “It’s a rush and it’s always exciting. You get to mess around and make a living from it. Basically you don’t have to get a real job.”

Both have certainly endured very different experiences to get where they are today, Claire taking the perhaps more traditional route of an undergraduate degree in Drama and Screen Studies and then a stint at the Oxford School of Drama, from where she graduated in 2007. Nicholas however, was plucked from a theatre audience at the age of three years old by a director and later attended the Sylvia Young Theatre School before achieving his big break in 2002’s hit film About a Boy, alongside Hugh Grant.

There were many amusing moments during the hour long session which had had a good response from audience members, one in particular was a story Nicholas told about singer KT Tunstall mistaking him for another young actor, Thomas Sangster, when they were appearing on the same radio show, and telling him, “You were great in Love Actually” live on air.

After Stephen Unwin had finished with his questions, it was the turn of the audience. Does Nicholas miss being in Skins? He mainly misses the people and the fun they had on set.  Who are Claire’s acting idols? Juliette Binoche and Cate Blanchett. And what is both their advice for potential budding actors? “Persistence,” said Nicholas, “You just need to keep ploughing away.”

Nicholas’ modesty was very refreshing for someone who has worked with such high profile actors in the past. On asked what was his best piece of advice he had been given he replied: “Colin Firth once sat me down and said “make sure family and friends are the most important things, you need to have that side of things.”

After the session Nicholas Hoult told RiverOnline that although he had found the whole experience nerve wracking he was glad he had come along. He said: “I enjoy the fact that hopefully I can help people who want to get into the industry.” Claire agreed but told us: “It’s a bit weird because you worry that you might be misinforming people with your opinion!”

However, it seems there is little danger of that. Both Nicholas and Claire, neither of whom were paid for the talk at the Rose appear to have their feet firmly on the ground, which makes for a refreshing change in an acting world that is becoming increasingly reliant on celebrity status rather than on raw acting talent.

Before they left the theatre Claire urged audience members to, “do what you want to do while you are still young and you can deal with the consequences later on.” This is advice that perhaps not every parent would agree with, but judging by the success of these two young British actors, we can’t help but think that she might just be right.