Jude Law explains his skin colour change in The Holiday

Jude Law has finally explained why his character's skin colour changes in The Holiday.

In the Christmas movie, the British actor plays widowed father-of-two Graham, who romances Cameron Diaz's character, workaholic business executive Amanda, after she does a house swap with Graham's sister Iris, played by Kate Winslet.

Eagle-eyed fans of the much-loved festive movie have long speculated why Jude's skin colour changes dramatically over the duration of the 2006 film, switching from pale to a deep suntan during several scenes, despite his character living in the snowy countryside of Surrey, England.

The 47-year-old has now explained the reason to Vanity Fair, revealing that they shot the film's exterior scenes in the U.K., but then moved to Los Angeles to film the interior scenes.

However, director Nancy Meyers took more than five weeks to call Jude to the Hollywood set, meaning that the British actor had over a month in the hot American sun, topping up his tan.

“Nancy has the reputation – well I don’t know if she does anymore, but she has the reputation for taking her time,” he laughed.

"I’m sat in my house waiting for five weeks before they get to me. As you can probably see, if I look at the sun I go very brown very quickly. My father is very dark-skinned. And if you watch that film carefully, when I’m outside in England I’m really white and pasty, and as soon as I go inside I’m like, ‘Hey!’ and I’ve got this suntan," Jude joked. "No one really notices, but if you watch I darken by about two shades every time I step inside and out.”