The Telegraph has done an article detailing how Joe Wright came up with the artistic freedom he used for Anna Karenina.  The article makes several mentions of Matthew Macfadyen, detailed below.

If Karenin represents love of duty and God; then Anna’s jolly brother Stepan Oblonsky (Matthew Macfadyen), a serial adulterer who nevertheless loves his family, stands for a love of appetites.

“Cut!” cries Wright, now clearly enjoying himself. He’s even grown a moustache out of solidarity with Taylor-Johnson and Macfadyen. Oblonsky’s is so enormous it takes over his whole face. “This is a beautifully whiskery film,” says I vana Primorac, the hair and make-up designer.

Fans of Macfadyen’s performance as Mr Darcy in Pride & Prejudice, will be surprised to see that his Oblonsky is a heavy man, with the “broad box of a chest” that Tolstoy describes. Playing a character incapable of depression, Macfadyen begins the film laughing and eating and never really stops. “It’s all there on the page, so I jumped in,” he says, “I loved it.”

Be sure to read the whole article on The Telegraph!

(thanks to Jane)